My Relaxing Hobby

I was watching something on one of my many cable tv stations tonight and I saw an unusual commercial.  The product was essentially coloring books for adults.  The commercial showed lots of scenes of adults (looked to be age 30's and up) using crayons, colored pencils, markers, or paint, and coloring in black and white designs on white paper.  The designs included scenes, complex geometric designs, florals, etc. Mostly people sitting at tables, and at least one working in bed.  The announcer talked about how coloring was a great way to relax after a day of hard work, plus you can end up with beautiful unique artwork which can make great presents.

Unless you are a small child, few people will see your colored pages as a fine present.  Some people might put my own color work into that same category, but in my case I design and create the original black and white line drawing, choose colors based the original artistic vision, and none of it is mass produced.  The above image is an early color version of one of my boardwalk prints.  Those colors would change in the final version.  The part about it being a relaxing way to wind down from a hard day, that can be true.  Most art processes share that quality- I've had many students tell me that the process of carving a design into a wood block, despite requiring exacting effort with very sharp tools, is very relaxing for them.

Coloring can be the same way, too.  I remember a time back in the 1990's, when I was working in a vacation group home in the area.  One day a staff member from a visiting group went out to buy supplies and came back with a bunch of paint by number kits.  While the clients were all inside doing whatever, some of those staff were sitting on the back deck around a picnic table filling in numbered spaces in the design with the correct colors. No great art was made that day/night, but they all had a relaxing time before dinner.  If that's all you're looking for, then why not spend your time coloring pages of art.

Of course, I wouldn't spend $12.99 on a coloring book, as this tv offer was suggesting.  You can find these kinds of designs on the internet and print them for free.  Otherwise I could make a living just printing my own coloring books.