I was sitting at home yesterday reflecting on what I should write about for Monday Thoughts, when I stumbled on a story on Flipboard called “the most amazing photo ever taken from a commercial airplane”. The story which you can read here, was published in Inc Magazine and demonstrated not just an amazing photograph or art outcome, it really demonstrates the lengths Jon Carmichael and other artists will go to follow the idea in their hearts.

When I started One River I was compelled to learn why artists to what they do. Sometimes it borders on the irrational but when you talk with them it is anything but irrational. The ability to see and feel things, to discover and create things, is embedded in all of us. To some degree, I celebrate the journey that lives in the five year old who is just starting to draw, to the mom who paints every Tuesday, or to the professional artists who lives to create morning, noon and night.

So, whether you are Jon Carmichael who goes to great lengths to capture that special photo of a solar eclipse or Alexander Tovborg who lives in caves to study early religious paintings, I am inspired to celebrate you. But, if you are simply looking to tap into another part of your brain that allows you to draw, paint, make and learn, I am inspired by you too.

Art-making is an outlet for expression that each of us needs to explore.