Janice Mason Steeves

A Quiet Place 2  16x16" Oil/cold wax on paper © 2013 Janice Mason Steeves A few weeks ago,  Rebecca Crowell and I wrote a co-blog post about Visual Language and the Art of Critique.   Later on, I  posted a followup conversation called Writing, Creativity and Critique: A Conversation , with two writer friends of mine:  Kim Echlin and Sandra Campbell , who meet regularly to give feedback and support to each other in their work.  They commented on how crucial this sort of feedback is to them. I received a number of emails in response to both blog posts.  One thing that came up in various ways was a general sense of fear at going through this process.  Perhaps the fear is justified because of harsh feedback from an instructor in the past.  But people also wondered if their work would be honoured for what they were trying to say and if suggestions for change would affect them negatively.  Many feared that putting words to this process would take away from the work. I bel

Silence Red 7  42x42" oil/cold wax on panel  © 2013 Janice Mason Steeves Two weeks ago, Rebecca Crowell and I decided to write a co-blog post   in a conversational format, about Visual Language and the Art of Critique.   That conversation sparked many thoughtful comments, some of which were posted here on my blog and some of which were sent to me personally. Two of my writer friends, Sandra Campbell and Kim Echlin wrote comments about the interconnections between intuition, technique and critique that I felt were too important to be hidden away in the comments section of the blog post.  I asked them if we could continue this conversation about how writer's work with feedback. Sandra Campbell' s novel  Getting to Normal (www.sandracampbell.ca) was NOW Toronto magazine’s choice for best books 2001. Her new work,  The Pig and the Soprano , inspired by the life of Georgina Stirling, is a tale of the 19th century soprano who dared ambition and desire. Her pe