You are dedicated to your craft. You have spent countless hours honing your skills. You have a boundless curiosity for the underlying theories and structure of communicating ideas. You are the artist who finds the connections between your medium and other communications media. You are the artist who relishes in a setback; after all, it's a new opportunity to learn and grow. Inspiration is more than a haphazard mode of thought requiring constant nurturing: it is your natural state of mind.
Lean Into Art is where you go when you're ready to push yourself as an artist in new ways. As a place to learn communication arts online it combines an art-journaling approach, the best of live and time-shifted classes, and a recognition system that encourages students to finish projects, give feedback, even participate in teaching.
It's a big art challenge - that's why we put the enticing warning in the name. You have to lean into it.
Friday, June 1, 2012 at 3:26PM 
It's another abstract discussion on keeping our minds focused on the intangibles, the joy of being an eternal learner, and recognizing our failures as signs pointing us in the direction we ultimately need to go.
Friday, May 25, 2012 at 10:10PM
Having found ourselves in a situation where our professional and personal pursuits are colliding, we spend some time this week talking about the importance of adapting to situations, or keeping loose knees on the deck of the boat. While we explore how prioritizing, avoiding the comparison game, chipping away at projects, and learning to delegate (when possible) can help one adjust to the constant pressures of a creative lifestyle, we face the inescapable conclusion that the terror never ends. But maybe we can adapt to it.
WHO just colored 158 Photoshop files in 30 minutes? Oh right, it was me. Go Speed Racer, Go!
— Ryan Estrada (@ryanestrada) May 10, 2012
You can feel bad or inspired by this.
Oh, and some fun talk about our old D&D characters!
Friday, May 18, 2012 at 10:20AM 
In this follow-up to LIA Cast 34, Rob takes Jerzy through some more practical examples of how diagramming, spreadsheeting, and mood mapping can help you sort through and prioritize the many creative projects that can line up to demand your time.
Also: What should we call the LIA Cast listeners? Let us know via Twitter or G+!
Or tell us via this Google Spreadsheet-powered form!
Wednesday, May 9, 2012 at 11:04AM 
Should visual artists think of themselves also as entertainers? Can the work speak for itself, allowing the artist to stay behind the scenes? What about a little of both? And what does it even mean to say one is an entertainer?
We walk around these questions this week and examine some well-known entertainers to see what they do to foster engagement with their fans. We also spend some time looking at what benefits such engagement brings, from networking to audience building to having more fun at public events.
Monday, April 30, 2012 at 4:18PM 
Spreadsheets are sometimes the symbol of numbness-inducing number-crunching to creative types, but in this week's audio-only Lean Into Art Cast, Rob walks us through how they can be used to make better choices in our creative lives. As it happens, it's a lot like buying a car!
