“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.”
~ Augustine of Hippo, 415 AD (give or take a few years)
Augustine of Hippo (/ɔːˈɡʌstɪn/; Latin: Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430), also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Africa.
You have a voice. It’s just getting your own confidence, and you find it just by doing it. — Tom Cruise
…our strongest drive as human beings is the need to stay consistent with how we define ourselves. —Tony Robbins
I change during the course of a day. I wake and I’m one person, and when I go to sleep I know for certain I’m somebody else.
~ Bob Dylan
This is a reminder that is hanging over an 8th-grade science teachers desk at the Rivers School in Weston, Massachusetts, taken on November 12, 2021. Photo by Robin Tinay Sallie
intersectionality : the complex, cumulative way in which the effects of multiple forms of discrimination (such as racism, sexism, and classism) combine, overlap, or intersect especially in the experiences of marginalized individuals or groups [Kimberlé] Crenshaw introduced the theory of intersectionality, the idea that when it comes to thinking about how inequalities persist, categories like gender, race, and class are best understood as overlapping and mutually constitutive rather than isolated and distinct. — Adia Harvey Wingfield
Intersectionality is a lens through which you can see where power comes and collides, where it interlocks and intersects. It’s not simply that there’s a race problem here, a gender problem here, and a class or LBGTQ problem there. Many times that framework erases what happens to people who are subject to all of these things. ~ Kimberlé Crenshaw
Bias Incident ~ refers to conduct, speech, images or expression that demonstrate conscious or unconscious bias which targets individuals or groups based on but not limited to their actual or perceived race, ethnicity, sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, body type, disability, age, religion, socioeconomic status or other social identities.
propulsive ~ having the quality of driving or pushing forward.
revelatory ~ adjective. (usually followed by `of’) pointing out or revealing clearly. synonyms: indicative, indicatory, significative, suggestive revealing. showing or making known.
Reducing your consumption of plastic should be the first priority. Plastic is forever. Reusing, repurposing, and upcycling is your second-best option. Reuse everything. Recycle only as a last resort. The recycling symbol you see on different products doesn’t necessarily mean it can be recycled. Plastics can only be recycled so many times before they are chemically unable to be reheated and reshaped into something else. Unfortunately, this means that virtually all plastics will eventually end up in a landfill when they reach the end of their recycling life. Some plastics can never be recycled, not even once.
white savior complex ~ The term white savior (or saviour) is a sarcastic or critical description of a white person who is depicted as liberating, rescuing or uplifting non-white people; it is critical in the sense that it describes a pattern in which third world peoples are denied agency and are seen as passive recipients of white benevolence. It is about having a big emotional experience that validates privilege. Those who are being helped ought to be consulted over the matters that concern them.
I am a novelist. I traffic in subtleties, and my goal in writing a novel is to leave the reader not knowing what to think. A good novel shouldn’t have a point. ~ Teju Cole
neutered language = “racially charged” is used when it would be more honest to say “racist”
Pointing out something as obvious as white privilege is seen as unduly provocative.
microaggressions – thinly veiled, everyday instances of racism, homophobia, sexism (and more) that you see in the world. Sometimes it’s an insult, other times it’s an errant comment or gesture. The difference between microaggressions and overt discrimination or macroaggressions, is that people who commit microagressions might not even be aware of them. People who engage in microaggressions will not believe that what they said was racist or sexist or homophobic. And so calling them racist or sexist or homophobic would make them very defensive and make them unable to even recognize what their impact was. These “everyday slights” have consequences on a victim’s mental and physical health.
Click here for a Tool: Recognizing Microaggressions and the Messages They Send
Click here for a guide on responding to microaggressions
To forget past mistakes and press on to greater achievements.
To put first things first.
To make my work a joy.
To allow nothing to disturb my peace of mind.
To never lose self-control.
To spend so much time improving myself that I have no time for criticism of others.
To think the best, work for it and expect it.
To be a friend to man.
To stand for the right.
To be true.
To be kind.
To take every disappointment as a simulate.
To live on the sunny side of every cloud.
To smile.
To look ahead.
To keep moving.
LeRoy Brownlow, Today is Mine
Today is not the end of another year, but the start of a new one.
MAKE TIME TO DRAW!! Nothing is more important.
“Don’t copy. Steal.” See the world around us. Ideas are everywhere. Find ideas and translate them.
Rather than waiting for inspiration to strike (which it rarely does when I’m going about my daily suburban life) I simply focus on finding somewhere comfortable and safe to sit, and then I look for something to sketch.
Any faces you invent are informed by the collective memories of every face you have ever seen.
Objective perception— learning to see what is in front of you as it is, not as you expect it to be.
Drawing is a visual language.
The ability to draw is the result of an application of skill over time. You need dedicated practice.
Take pleasure in the process, and don’t fixate on the outcome.
Try different methods, reject the ones that do not suit you and adapt the ones which do.
A photograph only tells one story about a face — one angle, with subject-to-lens distortions, and the camera’s interpretation of light.
By copying or reinterpretation another artist’s drawing you will learn their marks and gain an insight into that artist’s process.
Practice as often as possible.
Repeat exercises because regular practice helps develop fundamental skills.
Copy to learn. Look hard and copy.
Focus on the processes and not the outcomes.
Commit. Work daily. Focus on improving.
Make lots and lots and lots of bad drawings. Learn from your failure.
Learn to look.
Experiment to find materials you enjoy using and suit your preferred methods.
Trust your eye. Make marks with a purpose. Look for answers by studying your model closely.
Line is a fundamental unit of drawing.
“One lives only to make blunders,” wrote Charles Darwin in 1861.
“Often the work we have not done feels more real in our minds than the pieces we have completed.” – David Bayles.
Relentless Robin 