Tiki at the Beach
A Tiki enjoys his spot on an otherwise empty beach in this new painting (digital painting, that is). The Return of the Tiki is followed by another Tiki.
As often happens, this started out as just a normal beach painting, heavily influenced by Kaʻena Point Beach in Hawaiʻi. But as it went along, the empty space at the left seemed to be calling for something, and this Tiki gladly filled the space. That makes the artwork a little more entertaining, and a little more Burnsland, too.
This artwork was primarily created to try something new, although I did plan to share it all along, too. Read all about it in the “About the Artwork” section further on down.
Love Is…
Confession: Sometimes I wonder what to write next about Loving One Another, this journey that we are on for this year.1
So for an idea, I did what all the great writers do. I went to Google. That’s how Shakespeare got his start, right? Anyway, in the search box I started typing “Love is…” to see what came up. The first suggestion was “Love is blind.” Apparently, that is the name of some sort of reality television show that I never have seen and do not care to see. But it is also a popular saying.
However, I disagree with the statement that love is blind. I believe that you cannot help seeing things in other people, whether they are good or bad. If you are any kind of observant person at all, you will notice things about people. If you are looking at who you will marry to spend the rest of your life with, hopefully you will take the time to get to know the other person to see if you can in fact spend the rest of your life with them. If you go into it blindly, you will soon learn things that you did not expect.
Or if you are trying to love someone by helping them, you will notice things about them, eventually learning if they are trying to just take advantage of you or if your help is really doing some good. You really should not be blind about that, either.
So I kept on going down the list. Not too far down below, I saw, “Love is patient, love is kind.” That is different from “Love is blind,” but it is also somewhat similar. Instead of being blind to all circumstances, if we are trying to love everyone, we are patient with them and kind to them, offering assistance in a kind way to help with whatever they are going through. We are not blind to their faults, but we help them along the way. And sometimes that means allowing them to help us patiently and kindly as well, because we all have our faults.
As we love one another, we cannot be blind to faults and problems, but we can be patient and kind as we work together to overcome the bad things. True love is definitely patient and kind.
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. - 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
About the Artwork
I mentioned trying something new in the Return of the Tiki post, and I mentioned it above, too. While almost all of the earlier art had been created using the Procreate app on my iPad, and the first few were done with the Procreate Pocket app on my iPhone, this was one created using Clip Studio Paint on my iPad. I had seen a few recommendations about it, and I thought it would be good to give it a try.
It took me a little time to get acquainted with Clip Studio Paint, but the learning curve was not all that steep, especially since much of it is similar to Photoshop, which I also have a good bit of experience with.
Interestingly, I decided to start with a painting style instead of the hard-outline character stuff that I typically do. I even added a canvas-like texture to make it look even more like a painting. But Clip Studio Paint can be used for the character stuff as well, as you will see in the next piece of artwork here.
Can you believe that for all of the Tikis I have drawn by a beach, this is the first post to be titled “Tiki at the Beach”? Me either.2
