Oh my sweetums, I’ve been spinning my wheelsuber busy in ArtyLand, so busy I neglected to post last week. Imagine that!
If you’re impatient or have a short attention span, you may scroll down now and watch the video. But if you’re here for a good story, stick around. You’ll get to the movie eventually.
It’s not that I forgot you, au contrair, you (my most best, BEST beloveds), have been on my mind CONSTANTLY. I’ve thought of you even more than I’ve thought of CHOCOLATE!!! Which is a lie, by the way, because nothing comes between me and my chocolate. But it sounds good, like overtime devotion in bloggy land.
Have you ever gone from point A to point B via points M,Q and X? Well, that’s what I’ve been doing. And getting nowhere fast in the process.
It all started when I got this idea for a blog post. I was scrolling through my iPhoto library, grumbling about the BAZILLIONS of photos I’ve taken and have yet to organize… yada yada… and I must be NUTS to think I can ever find a specific photo. Getting a wee bit frustrated because I’m not exaggerating the number of photos (well, yes I am because I don’t believe bazillions is an actual quantifiable number) when it dawned on me–ping–like a light bulb in the brain–that a lot of my arty photos resemble a LOT of my paintings. I don’t consciously take photos of rocks and paint them. And I don’t consciously paint pictures and then go photograph things that remind me of them–
But you’d never know that from looking at all those photos.
Never. As in NEVER. EVER.
So I thought it would be cool to post photos I’ve taken that inspired my paintings. Or at least resemble paintings enough to see where I drew some inspiration. I began picking and choosing photos to illustrate that point, saving them all in an album. Then I thought what the heck, let’s see how this works as a slide show. And then, since I liked the way it was working, I needed to find music. Music that was legally MINE to use and wouldn’t get all this work kicked off FaceBook or YouTube. That meant half a day pouring through license free music sites. Which is a mega time suck, believe me. I finally found something I liked, tweaked the timing so it would work, converted the whole shee-bang to a movie file, did the YouTube upload and went to bed.
Where I lay there thinking of how I could make it better.
The next morning I got up and did it ALL OVER AGAIN. New music. More bounce. Tossed out some photos, added others. Rearranged EVERYTHING. And then I added text because WHY NOT?
And when I finally got the video I was REALLY happy with, I thought the heck with a blog post, this is going to be my HOME PAGE on my website, the one that showcases my ART. The site I basically ignore.
Ah, but if I’m inviting people to see my stuff I’d better clean things up. Like get the galleries updated, the store open. Things I’ve been ignoring because they’re H.A.R.D. Technical. Not.Fun.
So now you know where I’ve been. I’ve been herding ducks. That’s right, getting all my little duckies in a row. You ever try and do that? It’s like herding cats on quack. (I’m high fivin’ myself for that one, yes I am!) What began as a simple blog post, turned into a video, a revamped website and a functioning store. Holy crap, I’m even impressing myself.
All because of this:
Do me a favor, if you liked this post PLEASE tell your friends. Share it on FaceBook. Give it a tweet. And, as always, stop in and say hi in the comments. I love it when you do.
Faded leaves. Bleached grass. Frost on the meadow this morning.
I took the long way down to feed the ponies. Long way means heading to the left instead of the right. Means looping down around the meadow before circling back again.
Because there’s something about the light, the sun-with-no-warmth quality of a November morning, that demands photographs.
Demands to chronicle the understated glory of frost rimed leaves.
And deer trampled grass. Andrew Wyeth grass.
Ice in the horse trough, crackled and crystalized along the edges.
Hiding mysteries underneath.
And in between.
Reminders of children now grown.
And ancient horses. Muddy. Waiting for breakfast.
And Jasmine, the sourse of many ‘mom’s hairy ass jokes’ waiting for her kiss. Mmmmmph!
Six PM. One hundred degrees. I’m in the hay shed, wrestling with a forty pound sack of beet pulp, trying to find the secret to the magic string, the one that’s supposed to open the bag easy-peasy.
No dice. I end up going after that sucker with a pair of scissors, one stich at a time. Because if I just cut the bag, like I’m tempted to do, the woven plastic unravels, comes undone and I end up serving shredded beet pulp with a side of shredded plastic to the ponies. Which wouldn’t be good. So I clip each and every stitch. It’s a slow process. I’m stinky, sweaty and impatient. I tell myself it’s not so bad, things could be worse.
And they could. I could be at the county fair. With children. Hot, tired, li’l darlin’s cranked out on sugar, demanding more. More, more, more, more, MORE. Of everything! NOW! Eventually their whines becoming indistinguishable from the rest of the cacophony inside my head which includes (but is not limited to) country music played at a volume guaranteed to homogenize your brains and a couple of Sumo wrestlers tossing each other around somewhere between my right temple and the left.
All in 100 degree heat. That’s 37.7777777 degrees to those of you who measure these things in celsius. When the thermometer goes that high, it’s legal to kill. Well, it seems like it should be. Anyone you want. Especially if you’re at the fair.
Mwha-ha-ha-ha. And that’s when I know, without a doubt…and without trying to inject any theology in here, there IS a God…because my kids are all grown up and I don’t have to take them to the fair any more.
Sweet Diety, thank you!
Now before you think I wear my cranky pants during fair week, the biggest social event of the county, let me assure you I have nothing against going… on my own terms. Which means it has to be cool. Or at least not hot. I go by myself. Bring my camera. And I wander around like a crazy lady talking to myself and eating caramel popcorn and funnel cake while taking lots and lots of photographs. I run into friends and we chat but I don’t feel obligated to look at the goats with them. Or the chickens. Or the man selling Vitamix blenders. No, no, no…I just do what I want.
Here’s a few photos from years past.
So there you have it. Rides, games, Food. Anti-gravity kids losing retainers. And the craziness builds up and up and morphs into holy crap! Demon cartoon birds guaranteed to haunt your dreams…if you’re lucky enough to pop the balloon.
And now, because this post wouldn’t be complete without them, let’s SUUUUUUU-MO!!!
When I was a kid, maybe 9 or 10, Mama came home one day and said she’d run into her friend Marion at the grocery store. Or some other mom hangout. She knew Marion from Girl Scouts. They were both leaders. Cookie chairmen. Badge honkers. District council mucky-mucks.
A chance meeting where Marion mentioned she was an artist and was teaching classes out of her home. A chance meeting that turned into years of Saturday mornings in Marion’s magical rambling arty house.
Saturday morning lessons with sister Marjorie Ellen. Because in the beginning it was really about her. She was the blazing art star, I was the tag along little sister. But those Saturday mornings with the Dunkin Donuts and the comaradarie, the kneaded erasers and the charcoal smudged fingers…those Saturday mornings set me on my life path.
Because Marion taught me how to SEE.
How to narrow my focus down to a piece of the whole, And expand my world in the doing. How to find elements of design and beauty in what others would pass off as mundane. The quality of a line. Or light. The indefinable something that sets one square inch off against another.
It’s a lesson I’ve taken with me. A lesson I’ve done my best to impart to my own students over the years. Look. Look look LOOK around you.
SQUINT!
I keep a camera with me most all the time. You never know when you’re going to come across the perfect crack in the sidewalk. Or a tree root.
Or an old rusty Ford truck. I could parcel this baby into at least three paintings.
And this stack of crates, funky old weathered things that once held fruit…this will be the inspiration for an oil and cold wax piece, I just know it. The finished painting won’t be a photo replica. It may not look anything like the photo at all. But there will be elements. Texture. Color. Something…
My absolute favorite from this particular day’s photos, another painting waiting to happen…screaming to happen when I put aside the acrylics and dive back into the oils…
The potential in this one takes my breath away. Where, WHERE could I have stumbled across such beauty???
In a restaurant parking lot, that’s where. A stucco wall surrounding the dumpster. A green SUV parked next to it, the light from the sun reflecting through the windows, tinting the wall.
Adding mystery. And richness.
The wall around a dumpster….
Because once upon a time Mama’s friend Marion taught a little girl to open her eyes and see.
I spent some time in the studio today, totally lost in painting. The kind of painting that comes…just comes. Not thinking, just doing. At the end of the day I had two paintings well under way. But not enough to show just yet.
And then I spent maybe half an hour playing in Photoshop. No agenda, just playing with filters like a kid with a video game.
Started out with a photo of a metal bird wing.
Zoomed in and cropped it. Interesting composition. But Photoshop Filters make everything more interesting.
Here it is with a combination drybrush, pinch and grain.
This is the brush filter.
A little more intense with Fresco.
And something completely different with posterize.
Changing color is a piece of cake.
Lots of potential here. Ideas for paintings. Backgrounds for mixed media. Patterns for collage. I’m going to play with some of these between now and …whenever. And when I do, I’ll show you what happens.
Friend Christina is cleaning. That means if I’m not careful, if I have my back turned or am otherwise engaged, I will discover all sorts of CRAP on my desk. Just. Like. That.
Some of it I even want. Some of it I can use with my class. But the pirate eye patch? No. No no no no no! Even if Johnny Depp wore it once upon a time. Which he did not.
I took the empty pencil tins. The nice ceramic jar for brushes. And half a dozen little bitty used canvasses that someone will be happy to paint over. But I really scored on the books. Collage anyone? Altered anything?
Disclaimer: I don’t cut up beautiful photography books. I photocopy them and then do the cutting.
Is this a beautiful little booty or what? Yum yum yum, I know there’s something I can do with this.
And I’m always a sucker for mother and child bonding.
Oh look, Mummy…those people are on a floating booty barge!
And now it’s time for some Grungetastic manipulation.
This style is called Worn. Looks like it’s been through the washing machine. It’s an upgrade purchased through the app. Another 99 cents. I really like it, maybe not for this image. Something where the action is lower on the page.
There are hundreds of variations I can do with this image alone. Picking only one is a challenge. I see using any of these as a transfer added to a painting. Or used as an element in a collage. Or whatever else my heart desires.
