Unlock Your Creative Magic: Artistic Voice Analysis

Wow, what a disservice Chronicle Books did to this fine author. I would give her content 5 stars if I could read it. Three stars is a generous rating, considering. The print is so tiny and so faded looking that I can't bear the struggle. I intentionally bought the print rather than Kindle version because of the lovely illustrations. I'm not about to shell out more money for a second Kindle version, and this is all a shame. I will donate the book somewhere, but it seems unlikely anyone will ever read it. Authors beware: do NOT let publishers do this to your work to save a little money on ink and page count. Lisa Congdon is a wonderful artist and speaker and writer. It's sad that her book isn't higher quality.

A good book that I felt was helpful. Many of the things said, especially in the interviews, resonated with me. There were a few things I disagreed with, but it was overall good advice.

The thing I feel would have improved the book is some photos of the interviewed artists' artwork and maybe an actual photo of the artist and a link to their website. I get that the author was illustrating her own book and wanted to make that a thing and I think that's good and gives a cohesive feel to the book, but adding some actual images of someone else's artwork, when they are the ones being interviewed, would not disrupt that, imo. Every interview I found myself wondering what that person looked like beyond the author's black and white line rendition and what their artwork was like, especially when they were talking about elements in their work or what materials they use. I realize I can look them up, but there are many reasons why just having those images right there would have been helpful and made the interview feel more solid to me, a very visual person.

I used to think that art was reserved for the skilled. The truth is we all start somewhere. As a middle aged adult I felt as though I'm a late starter but Lisa points out that it doesn't matter that I started late as long as I start. Real inspiration for those struggling with artistic identity. Thank you Lisa.

Honestly, this is a really good book. I just think she overused the work of Kaufman & Gregoire to prove her point.

However, I very much enjoyed this book. It really expands your creativity and pushes you to think outside the box. It gives you strategies to find your voice, and encourages you to show up everyday. That last one is perhaps the most important. I liked how each chapter had an interview with an artist, as you can see that the voyage to finding your voice will look different due to your circumstances, influences, culture, etc. I also liked that the author added her own artwork.

I recommend this book to any artist having trouble finding their voice. It really helped me see that the process is not linear.

I enjoyed how she shared her own experiences and process. interviewed various artists to find out their experiences and process. Basically comes down to hard dedicated work and with time, experimentation and floods you'll discover your voice.

I loved this book, her insights were spot on, I loved the parts where she would interview other Arists and talk about their process.