Spectacular Advice

If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.

~Vincent Van Gogh

Pushing Outside the Comfort Zone

I recently enjoyed an evening of oil painting with a teacher friend of mine - Mary-Leigh Doyle.  She is a wonderful painter and in particular I love her oils and her style of approaching them.  So this evening was for me an adventure in something fairly new and a relaxing evening of wine and paint - my favorite combination.  I have long wished that I could loosen up in my style as even when I start a painting out that way, I invariably end up with my nose less than a foot from the canvas working on tiny details.  So this evening the exercise was to copy a painting which gave me the "guide" to approach it in a loose and very painterly fashion.  I hated it.  Don't get me wrong, I love trees and feel compelled to paint them these days, but in this case the colors were not my favorites, and as I sat in my familiar 12 inches away from the tiny canvas it looked a mess.  I couldn't discern tree trunks from leaves, from background.  Only when someone insisted that I get the heck away from the thing - to step back and review - did I see what was going on in the painting.  OK....so it's not so bad.  What I do know is that to paint like this is completely foreign to me and it explains why I have such a difficult time getting there.

What you see here is unfinished - it's as far as I could go that evening without smudging it all into a muddy mess.  Once it dries I will add a few last minute touches...and try desperately not to add too much (any) detail.  Perhaps if there were an electric trigger rigged to the canvas that gave my ol' nose a little jolt when I get too close to it...

The Uncertainty Hump

I'm not exactly prolific when it comes to art projects....or at least it seems that way to me. I consistently feel that I rarely ever get anything accomplished or finished. I currently have at least 9 paintings alone that are started, but not done. I recently (just before the holidays) finished this one and I wondered to myself why it took me so long to get to finishing it.

The task of finishing really only took me an hour at best, yet I left it for ages. So, why?... I think for this one in particular it was about fear. I was worried that I would wreck the face. That's all that was left - just to finish the face. I'm not terribly good with faces, and so my uncertainty kept me frozen. Silly in hindsight.
I know I let this kind of thing stall me all the time. Seems too big, or I'm not sure how to do something and I run away and hide from it. And the un-doneness of it nags at me. I really dislike things to be unfinished, but not enough to get me to do something about it all the time.
One day, I'd like to figure that little hang-up out. At least for now, this fairy is done and off to sail on her bubble.

Words in Art

I'm curious....am I the only one who is captivated by words in art? Not just Words AS art, but also IN art. And, do you need to be able to read them if they are there or can they be there just obviously enough to see that they are words, but not decipherable? I met Lisa Tornack, a great Calgary artist, this past weekend at a show we did together, and I was instantly fascinated by the work she is currently doing.

In fact I am now the proud owner of this piece of hers. While obviously a landscape, what I was enamored with the most was the tangle of words that run throughout the horizon. Thankful that she was there to ask, I inquired about what was there and a bit about the process. As I understand it, this series grew out of an artist's residency she did in Spain last year and particularly from the prolific journal writing she did while over seas. What I learned about myself was that while I didn't necessarily need to know what was exactly being said in these words, I did want to understand where she was at, perhaps what she was thinking when creating this. And, of most importance was the energy behind the words. In this case she told me the word "friends" was there as well as another phrase which I can't remember now, but the gist of it was positive.....I interpreted it as "words with a good vibe". And, maybe the place she was at wasn't particularly "good"...I don't know that, but I felt the intent was "good or positive"...or maybe just genuine, heartfelt and honest. Perhaps she was just simply in the midst of her own journey exploring her own soul while in a strange land. It was odd in a way to observe my own reaction and to see what was important and not important to me in a piece of work. Had I not had this experience, I would have guessed that it was absolutely necessary for me to read the exact words - I'm just that darned curious....I want to KNOW everything. But, in this case, I surprised myself - I didn't need to know everything - each word. I am just content and feel blessed to now be sharing a glimpse into another artist's life - a small piece out of her journey through this earthly experience. A piece of her story is in there...somewhere. And that's really cool.
How do you feel about words in art?

Where Did My Art Come From - 2

I have long had a fascination with the written word and with beautiful lettering. So, much so that in my teens I began collecting and saving poems and quotes for using later in calligraphic work. And, before I ever owned a proper calligraphic pen, I was attempting to create a poster from a poem I loved with lovely script lettering....all with a regular felt pen. After that experience, I actually spent three entire days in a library going through back issues of Readers Digest looking for the "Quotable Quotes" page and copying the whole thing by hand. I'm still a quote junkie now. My Dad, who is not known for doing his own gift shopping, noticed my fascination and orchestrated the purchase of a calligraphy pen and paper set while I was still in high school, and I went on to create the program and place cards for over 300 people who attended our graduation. I still can't believe I never opted for a single art class in high school! Crazy. Of course, eventually I did take several calligraphy courses from a number of artists who belong to the Bow Valley Calligraphy Guild in Calgary.

While I don't really do much calligraphy anymore, words and beautiful letters do manage to creep in to my work on occasion whether it be a painting or a piece of jewelry. (This piece to the left is part of a larger wall hanging collaborative project I did with a group of people.)

Perhaps I just always feel like I have something to say, (those who know me certainly wouldn't argue with that!),,,,a soap box to get on, or a deep desire to inspire in some way, or to provoke reflection. I'm not sure, but I do know I love words in art and have been recently inspired by others to look at incorporating that more in the future.
More on that tomorrow.....

Riding the Artfest Wave

What a wonderful, blissful few days of creative fun with friends.  And, let me start by thanking those responsible for making it all happen - Teesha, Tracy and all the others who worked behind the scenes.  What  a huge undertaking to bring together an event of this size and scope.  And also a big thank you to everyone who shared such enthusiasm for my little "kissing fishes".  Thanks to my closest buddies (now dubbed the "Groupers"), I seem to have earned a new moniker as "The Fish Lady" - sheesh!  Anyway, the warm reception was much appreciated.
I didn't manage to get back for the show and tell night on Friday as we were too absorbed in finally exploring the lovely town of Port Townsend and enjoying a fabulous dinner.  So, here's a little show and tell of a couple of items I started in the classes I attended.  On Thursday I was in Sunny Carvalho's Plywood People class.  Really an impressive surprise.  Her paintings are so much more wonderful in person - they have such depth to them.  Mine still needs some finishing touches, but this is where I got her to before I left:

 

On Friday I was in Linda and Opie O'Brien's class, "Set in Stone.  This one was such fun to mess with metals, patinas, cold connections, and concrete.  I managed to get a couple of pendants complete and ready for chains which I will finish at home in my studio.

 

Now....what to start on first now that I'm back home and my head is swimming with ideas and creative energy??!!

Being Grateful For Me - A Mixed Media Self-Portrait

My Naturopath gave me an assignment - to keep a gratitude journal about myself.  Not what I'm grateful for that is outside of me (other people, places, things, etc.), but what I am grateful for each day about myself.  Wow, that's an entirely different thing...and infinitely more challenging.  But, I set out to give it a whirl and from this initial little gratitude note I wrote grew a self-portrait, and with it I observed again some initial resistance.
A self-portrait seems like the most daunting of creative endeavors. Why is that? Do we feel we can only attempt a portrait if we have the skills to get the likeness just right? Or is it because we really have to look closely at ourselves; if not at our actual features, then at ourselves, our lives, our values, etc. Sometimes this navel gazing seems like a huge task that we don't have the time to do "properly" - with genuine reflection and effort. Does "properly" mean that we need to get it RIGHT? Goodness, there seems to be so many things that can stop us dead in our tracks because we have this perception that we must get it right.
I think of that quote...."boldness has genius in it...", you know it:

Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now.” - Goethe



So with that abandon to action, I attempted a self portrait that became a wonderful exercise in letting go and surrendering to the process. Surrounded in a variety of papers I found appealing, magazines I love reading, pages from old journals, and a current writing on Gratitude, pictures of family and a selection of my own artwork that had some meaning for me, I let loose with scissors and gel medium. The process of collage was completely absorbing and enlightening as I watched myself be moved and inspired by certain images, colors, and words.
The whole process was inspired by the book Taking Flight by Kelly Rae Roberts, so I can't take credit for the idea. I can however own the courage it took to jump in and allow myself the gift of engaging in the process. It's hard to give ourselves permission to take the time for these things most of the time....so for this I am grateful - to myself.
In the end, it was very moving, enlightening, and fascinating as the painting spoke to me on it's own as I worked. Only one brief moment felt frustrating...when my critical brain (left brain) piped up to observe that my facial features were out of proportion. I was both amused and grateful that my Wise Woman (right brain) very quickly quipped back..."that's OK, it's SUPPOSED to be like that!"