Art as a Portal to Wonderment
A conversation about watercolor, creative inspiration, and real life in Paris with artist Jessie Kanelos Weiner, author of the new book Thinking in Watercolor.
Signups are now open for Spring 2025 session of DIVE, our seasonal writing group facilitated by
// There are still a few lunar calendars left!Hello friends,
Happy International Women’s Day. I hope you’re doing something to celebrate.
I’ve been planning a little interview with my friend
for a while now—since her new book is out this week—and it just happens to land today, which I think is fitting: a reminder to celebrate all your women friends.A little backstory…
Twelve years ago I sublet my apartment in Portland and got on a plane to Paris. I didn’t really have any plans besides what I called a “creative sabbatical.” I was in my late 20s, the proverbial blank slate of life still felt blank and ready to be filled up with a wild dose of color. I was single, I had a book deal, and I could easily pack what I needed into one bag. I told my friends I would come back after a month. They did not believe me.
There was so much about living in that city that I loved, and that I now miss. Walking on Saturdays to Marché des Batignolles and getting potato and cheese galettes, the feeling of biking somewhere across the city without needing to take my phone out to check the map, all the cheese. But there was also a reality to living there that I felt was so rarely expressed in mass media. Paris has a certain global reputation, and whether or not you’ve been there, you’re sure to know what it looks like. Trying to balance the romanticized version of the city with the everyday reality of living there often consumed my thoughts1.
When I left, I was ready to leave. Yet I think back very fondly on that time. Paris is where I felt like I “became” a writer—it’s where I wrote my first three books. It’s also where I made good friends. There were three of us, all in the process or on the verge of writing books, and we would gather together over coffee and the then very-new Holybelly. Jessie was one of them.
An incredibly talented artist, Jessie has made Paris her permanent home. What I’ve always loved about Jessie’s work is that she’s able to capture everyday Parisian life with a sense of humor. There’s a little bit of the romantic side (croissants! cheese!) but it’s always paired with the realities (pigeons! cramped metro!).
She’s out with a new book this month Thinking In Watercolor: A Daily Practice to Unlock Your Creativity & Discover Your Inner Artist. It’s a thoughtful book that’s perfect for anyone who wants to explore watercolor in a deeper way, and it’s also interwoven with this personal thread of Jessie’s Parisian life.
Jessie calls watercolor “a portal to wonderment.” I think we’re all in need of that, so I hope that you check out her book and that her words offer you a little creative inspiration.
-Anna
Anna Brones: You describe watercolor as “a portal to wonderment.” How does it do that for you?
Jessie Kanelos Weiner: Water is the element that binds us all. I love how watercolor is an act of the present. It continues living and traveling along the page on its own until it is completely dry. It can be mostly controlled but otherwise it is like choreographing the paint, paper, water and the passage of time.
You moved to Paris when you were 22. How do you think that experience has influenced your work as an artist? Obviously Paris is a central character in a lot of your work, but I’m curious about this more in terms of how a life outside of a culture that you grew up in has shaped your own approach to creativity and your mindset as an artist.
Always knowing I was an “artist” of some kind (or at least a Pisces with an artistic personality), I knew I had to stay open to the possibilities that life would bring me. I graduated from college and literally moved to Paris as soon as possible. I knew that I wouldn’t have many opportunities to move abroad with no strings attached. I was expecting a year of high culture and gastronomy, but my life as an au pair did not really promise any of that. Paris wasn’t what I expected at all. I didn’t speak French and had to make sense of this new, voiceless version of myself in this city that seemed cold and impossible to understand. This is when I really tried to dissect myself and this celebrated city that I just couldn’t get. I started a blog where I shared the stories of putting my foot in my mouth. Camera phones were far from advanced at this time so I illustrated my posts with watercolors. This really was the catalyst where I had a story and had to find a visual concept to illustrate it. This really is the brut idea behind Thinking in Watercolor. It’s how to activate your own voice using watercolor.
Otherwise I grew up in inner city Chicago and spent my childhood studying the amazing collection at the Art Institute and taking field trips to the Lyric Opera. My parents are youth pastors and spent a good share of my childhood doing their work with them until after midnight. I surely learned a lot about things like holding the attention of a crowd, stage management and creating special moments with crowds of people. My parents are kinda hippies at heart and were always squeezing me into bars to watch live music, comedy shows, art house cinemas etc. I think it was a really rich, diverse childhood and my parents always encouraged my creativity and experiments, even if it drove them crazy sometimes.
One thing I’ve always appreciated about your work is that you manage to find a way to celebrate the beauty and romantic side of Paris but also capture the other, grittier sides of the city (pigeons!) and also the general difficulties of living in that culture. How do you think about balancing the two things?
I live here so I know the delicate balance. My son and I were walking through Belleville the other day and he said “this neighborhood is not chic”. I almost gasped. French kids are snobs. I think living in most big cities has that balance between Old World stench and futuristic urbanity. It’s easy drawing the pretty stuff but so many people do it already. I think humor has been a big way I deal with integrating into French culture and adding that to the illustrations is not something that a lot of people can do. So I’ve leaned into that.
I love how in the book intro you say that when you tell people you do watercolor you get one of two responses. Either “that must be so relaxing!” or “that’s so difficult!” I think anyone who has dabbled in watercolor will find humor in that. I am curious as to where you fall on that spectrum?
It’s my full-time job so somewhere between the two. It still is difficult but it is also a refuge. After being a watercolor illustrator for over 10 years, I feel like there was a moment where I put in my 10,000 hours and I was free to just paint whatever came out of me. I’ve been developing less figurative work the past couple of years, but it takes time to find a style and adapt the technique. I hope I can continue to evolve with watercolor; it’s a lifelong pursuit.
Oftentimes it’s not working when the big lightning bolt of creativity strikes. And you need to have a curiosity in spirit and open eyes to jot it all down.
-Jessie Kanelos Weiner
What does your own creative practice look like? Do you paint every day?
Most mornings, I run around the block a couple times to get my body ready to sit down for the rest of the day. Cardio is essential for my mental health and getting my mind focused to start the day. I’m a mother and spontaneity is not what it used to be. So I often bump into friends in the neighborhood and accept coffee dates. I usually write/do computer stuff at the local café in the morning hours. The afternoon is dedicated to studio time at my atelier in Montreuil. This is where I make giant messes and paint.
It feels like I have fewer moments just to sit down and paint. Sometimes the process of jotting down a sketch encrusts the idea that I can later breakdown in watercolor. It feels like catching a shooting star sometimes. If I’m inspired in a big way, I try to take 15-30 minutes to sit down and bang something out in watercolor. Even if it’s just a preliminary test. It can easily morph into something else later on.
And some days just aren’t productive or inspired or worth sharing. Those are the days I know I need to rest, go to a museum, see a friend or just be.
It’s one thing to learn the skills of a certain medium (in this case watercolor) and it’s entirely another to approach the world with a creative lens, find new ways to connect ideas, and come up with concepts for creative work. That’s what I like about your book, is that it highlights how important this part of the process is. What is your approach to keeping those muscles of yours in good shape?
A lot of amateur artists think you can just sit down and turn out an amazing painting, but not everyone knows about the sketches, revisions and failed attempts that happen before you can really make something semi-decent. My goal is to demystify that in this book. I love the Chuck Close quote “Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get to work.”
Because my life is busy and I do many different things, when I get to work I need to be inspired and produce. Oftentimes it’s not working when the big lightning bolt of creativity strikes. And you need to have a curiosity in spirit and open eyes to jot it all down.
Tell me more about all of your amazing painted and cut paper creations?
After over 10 years of producing work, I had a ton of watercolors on paper that were accumulating. They weren’t good enough to sell and I didn’t like the idea of tossing them in the trash. I started cutting them up, repainting and filming them to make stop-motion mini films for Instagram. I learned animation in Photoshop but hate being on the computer all the time. It is a joy building these paper worlds and I feel like no one has done it in this way yet. I started building a mini black and white Paris as a backdrop and it’s grown into a cabinet of curiosities. I built an entire table of Marie-Antoinette delicacies for a show this past autumn. I love the idea of the trompe-l'oeil, when you don’t know what’s real and what isn’t. I obviously had a blast building it and that is usually contagious.
As a working artist, how do you keep your own excitement for your creative practice alive. Do you do any creative activities that are "just for fun," ie not tied to direct income? Do you ever struggle with giving yourself time for those activities when there's the pressure of managing your creative work that’s paid?
This is a left turn, but while I was writing this book I started performing standup comedy in both English and French. I always dreamed of being a musical theatre actress but was too scared of rejection and auditioning. I think the process of being a mother has made me fearless in a lot of things I do. I’ve told myself that if I know I can do something, I’m always just going to try. It’s been an amazing way to find community (of fellow international oddballs), write in a different way and just have fun. I love it! This doesn’t pay well, but I think of it almost like doing an exercise class or something. It energizes me in a way that my other work doesn’t. And the text I am writing could easily be adapted into a script or a graphic novel later on. I think women have that power to continue evolving and expanding. I’m going to continue trusting the process and I’m excited to see what happens.
What are the 5 essential tools in your creative kit?
Kuretake watercolors
Arches Natural White Watercolor Paper, 300 g/m2
paper towels
Da Vinci natural fibre round brushes
Giant vase of water
What does it mean to be an artist?
An artist engages with the world on a deeper level.
What does it mean to be creative?
A creative person seizes beauty.
Thank you to Jessie for doing this interview!
Support Jessie’s work by ordering a copy of her new book Thinking In Watercolor: A Daily Practice to Unlock Your Creativity & Discover Your Inner Artist and signing up for her newsletter .
Check out her website, follow her on Instagram and TikTok.
You can find more Creative Fuel interviews here.
RESOURCES + INSPIRATION
Here is what Jessie has on her radar right now:
Revisiting the world of Oz: Wicked, The Wiz, The Wizard of Oz.
My friend Sarah Donnely’s hilarious standup special “The Only American in Paris”
Illustrator Lorenzo Mattoti
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Hey you know what’s fun? Sharing an essay you wrote 10+ years ago.
What a lovely interview!! Looking forward to reading Jessie’s book, I could look at her paintings all day!
I lived and worked in Paris for seven months in 1995 and loved it. And I too knew when it was time to leave. Jessie’s book arrived the other day. I’ve just started reading it and am excited about working through it.
Thanks for the interview!