It was over 20 years ago that I began a series of paintings on paper, inspired by Irish myth and the early medieval manuscripts of Ireland, the first of which were reproduced into a line of blank greeting cards. As I continued to make paintings I looked into having fine art prints made and found it was a complicated and expensive process that would have required investing thousands of dollars to offer even a small line of prints – something completely out of my reach. Over the years I have tried using a few different online services that do the printing and fulfillment, but it has never been what I imagined would be a good fit for my artwork.
A few months ago I decided to look into it again, inspired by some of the successful illustrators I follow on Instagram, and made a plan to make a dozen or so of my earlier paintings available as limited edition prints. In setting out it was important to me to have prints that matched the original paintings in color reproduction and the feel of the paper, and also to be able to sell them in a price range that was affordable. I had a few test prints made, and it was hard for me to even tell the original from the print, so I decided it was finally time to do this.
I have spent the last few months preparing image scans and having prints made – I have 14 images now available as signed and numbered, limited and/or open-edition prints. I am so glad to have finally achieved this long-desired goal that I first dreamed about almost 20 years ago, and even more excited to be able to make some altogether new paintings into limited edition prints in 2020.
I’m not sure why it took two decades for me to do this creative thing I had so long wanted to do, but I think this quote gets to the heart of it:
“The universe buries strange jewels deep within us all, and then stands back to see if we can find them. The hunt to discover those jewels––that’s creative living.” ― Elizabeth Gilbert, Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear
This is a lesson in patience, or perhaps procrastination, but a lesson nonetheless for me about creative living – the continued hunt within for the creative path. It is also a lesson in the power of setting goals, and the reward of experiencing the satisfaction of step-by-step seeing it come together as a completed creative thing. These lessons are likely not that obvious to anyone outside of my busy brain, but if it does mean anything to anyone, I hope is an inspiration to keep at whatever you love doing no matter how long it takes to actually get it done.
Below is a slideshow of the artwork available as prints in the Ninth Wave Designs Etsy shop:
