Mona Lisa - Out of Office

ML - Welcome to Mona Lisa. A weekly newsletter for artists with timeless quotes, ideas and light bites for curious & wandering minds.

Lite Bites

💭 “I never look at other people's work. My mind has to be completely focused on my own illusions.” - Alexander McQueen

🍳 Salvador Dalí once published a surrealist cookbook titled Les Dîners de Gala featuring recipes like "Veal Cutlets Stuffed with Snails."

🎨 The Louvre is so large that if you spent 30 seconds at each artwork, it would take 100 days to see them all.

💡 The original design for the iPhone included a click wheel, inspired by the iPod, before the touchscreen was born.

Mona’s notes

I am writing today’s newsletter feeling conflicted by how I plan to end it. December always arrives very suddenly. It’s as if the 1st to 5th December doesn't exist, and then suddenly you’re on the 6th December wondering when September ended 🤔.

I frame December with the very misleading prospect of ‘a break’ at the end, because I am still 8 years old at heart, fantasising about the December school holidays where nothing exists beyond the 31st🎄. Today there isn’t going to be a break, unless I carve one out.

Do you feel indulgent when you take a break? Or is it more about losing the creative rhythm if you do? I wonder if rest is undervalued because there isn’t anything “finished” to show for it? Generally, I find that artists feel less guilty about taking a break - in fact I believe artists' are actually very good at discerning when they need to step away, often doing so in order to save their work 😇. In a world where productivity is seen as a virtue and busyness a badge, artists often don’t subscribe to these ideals with pride.

We know that rest can be restorative and transformative. Consider Virginia Woolf, who retreated to Sussex when the world became too heavy, producing some of her most acclaimed works in those moments of quiet 📕. When Georgia O’Keeffe left behind the sirens of New York for the quiet of New Mexico, she wasn’t running away, she was finding new light, quite literally💡.

To rest, some artists’ don’t need a break from their art, but rather need a break from the rest of the world. I would really like to curl up away from the world for 2 weeks, and just be in a snowy studio with my mince pies, a pine-scented Christmas candle 🕯️ , maybe Home Alone playing in the background, half a puzzle waiting for me at home 🧩 - just painting (Christmas-card core). I juggle other commitments, jobs and social events and it's these that I need a break from, not my painting.

With the impending influx of holiday emails and winter sales promotions, I am sure you will appreciate one less email this December. I’ve decided to switch off this newsletter for a month, but not without some hesitation 😬. What emerges when you let go of the need to produce or perform? Maybe nothing - but even the prospect of nothing sounds so sweet right now. 🤍 

With love & thank you for reading🎄 

Mona x

“It is impossible to love and be wise.” - Francis Bacon

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