THINKING IN COLOR

Mathematics is visual! The sad reality is that this 3 Dimensional, creative and fun field is presented to us in the Second Dimension. Only. Watching this clip by Dr Jo Boaler, Nomellini & Olivier Professor of Education at Stanford University, makes me want to re-learn mathematics. It's all about touch, finding ways to figure it out visually and creating a hunger to 'get it' while constantly being pushed back into the third dimension where it belongs. Businesses know that the

A question that plagues me often is - why are we intrigued by beauty? My gut feeling follows Shakespeare's age old saying of "beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder." Did you know that the eye can respond to a single photon and with their over two million (no typo!) working parts, allow us to see an estimated 1 to 100 million colors. There are even colors we can't see. Oh how I wish! And then there is the freakishly amazing Mantis Shrimp which makes me go green with jealousy

If you think your art looks cr*ppy or is a flop, here's a possible why. Read on... Is your work bad or is not ready? Often, our work is still in a draft stage, but we launch it as a finished work. We then wonder why it doesn't look quite up to the mark. But we're not done with it. The trick is to work, rework and let it sit. Time is a true friend, who gives honest feedback. Often we're overeager to launch our latest creations. But the reward lies in the waiting. In the pause.

I call it the Purple Ring. Mauve actually. A cheap lipstick tint, made from shark blood (most probably). It's found in all disciplines of life, but in art it is particularly painful - marking the point of no return. In art this is a mystery. Elusive and shifting, yet it is what separates good from not so great, and good from great and ultimately great from excellent. Frustratingly so, you only either sense when you are near it or when you've passed it. With the goldilocks-zon

Many of us confuse perfection with getting it right. At least I do, at times. Perfection is the elusive Where's Wally of our minds. It doesn't exist, and those of us who slave after it are certified mad or soon to be, gold-diggers of achievement. The very few lucky ones who no longer slave after it, have an ethereal glow about them. Puffy eyes, irregular heartbeats and skinfolds of sleep deprivation are battle scars left over from rehab, from our bodies saying 'enough'. Getti