Heads up, y’all. I’m giving away some art. But you’ve got to indulge me and read the post first.
Fair enough? Okay, then start reading.
Once upon a time I had this blog (yes, THIS blog) and I wrote a post every single day for something like a year. Every day. Whack me upside the head, I did little else. I wrote about art and the family and food and all sorts of crap good stuff.
And then life got in the way. Art. Web design (how many new looks has Arty Life had recently?) Eventually I started slacking off. Three days a week. Then two. Then one. And then…(drumroll please) three weeks rolled by without ANY posts or any excuse. The site wasn’t down, the internet connection was up–I just was doing other stuff.
I was PAINTING.Like a madwoman, a woman possessed. Mornings before work. Evenings after work. Taking vacay days just to hang out in the studio and slap paint around.
And then I painted over everything I did. More. Than. Once. I was ‘sperimentin’, going through a heckuva lot o’paint. It was all part of the learning process as I took a class with Pauline Agnew, SEE. FEEL. PAINT. Great class, great teacher and tons of challenging content. I’m not sure whether it was Pauline, the energy of the other students or the self imposed challenge to push myself but I became damn near manic.
A good creative shake-up, something every artist needs once in awhile.
I ended up with a few finished pieces, several works in progress, a whole bunch of ideas sketched out on the ipad and new life given to some old canvases. But most of all, I ended up with a passion for contemporary landscapes.
I’ll give you a sneak peek at one. Just one. The rest I’m going to dole out in future posts.
Autumn: Lake Harriet, acrylic on canvas 24 x 24 inches 2014 Susan Lobb Porter
This is taken from a photo I took last autumn at a little oasis in the Nevada desert. If you’re familiar with my work you’ll know that I’ve painted a lot of abstracts with a landscape feel. But I haven’t taken an actual for-real landscape and abstracted it. Much to my surprise I found out it’s entirely different.
And a whole lot harder. But I’m getting there.
And now about that arty giveaway I mentioned up above…it’s something I first read about here, via Michele Bergh’s blog. She found out about it from someone else who found out about it from someone else who found out about it from someone else. Get the picture? Here’s how it works, paraphrased from Michele (who got her info from Deborah Weber):
I promise to send a small work of art to the first five people who comment on this post and say, “YES, I want in”. You must in turn pay it forward to the first five people who comment on your blog. If you don’t have a blog, a facebook post will do. The rules are simple: it has to be your work, made by you, and the recipient must receive it before 2014 ends. It can be anything art based: a drawing/painting/photograph/knitted item or however else you express yourself creatively.
I’m going to add print to the list because maybe I’ll send a print. Or jewelry. Or something.
This will be fun! I can’t wait to send my little gifts out. Remember, if you want in you have to say so in the comments below. First five who say, “Me! Me! Pick Meeeeeeee! Pretty please!!!” will get a little something from moi.
You may have noticed things look a bit different over here at Arty Life. You may be thinking to yourself that woman changes the look of her blog more often than she changes her underwear. And you’d be right, sort of. I mean, about Arty Life. But as for my personal hygiene, well…I’m NOT gonna discuss that on the interwebs.
WOOT! So once again Arty Life has a new doo. She is an ever evolving work-in-progress. Be sure to click the home tab up above–that’s where the change is more dramatic. Like red shoes dramatic. It’s still not completely finished, still has some quirks but I’m getting there.
Meanwhile, here’s what I did in the studio this week–besides all the cleaning, sorting, putting away/throwing away I’ve been doing under the fierce organizing-your-art-biz whip of Alyson Stanfield, that is.Yes, I made time to paint. To finish a few small oils.
Remember this?
work-in-progress
I showed it here a few weeks ago. Well, maybe it was the country playlist blasting from itunes today that inspired the change. This is what it looks like now that it’s done.
Southwest Impressions # 1 oil on cradled wood 10″x10″ 2014 Susan Lobb Porter
YEE-HAW! Back in the desert again, the place that feeds my arty soul. Oh my sweetums, there’s something about the light, the color and the harshness of the landscape that gets those creative juices flowing.
Today’s work was completed via palette knife. I like the way they smoosh the paint around. And they’re a heckuva lot easier to clean than a brush.
Got a couple more little works-in-progress to show you. These are little bitty things, 6×6 inches.
works in progress
All of these will be for sale soon on my big girl I-am-an-ARTIST!!! website. That’s also a work-in-progress but it’s next on the list and coming along.
As always, I’d love to hear what you have to say in the comments below. And if you like what you see, please share with your friends.
You may have noticed Arty Life has a NEW look. It’s still a work in progress and you may be wondering why, why would I ditch the old header and move some things around?
I could blame it all on my inner geek, the one that loves to fool with webstuff. The one that said don’t write a post this week, take the website apart instead.
Yeah, THAT one.
I could blame it on the same crazy creative mindset that paints over perfectly good canvasses. You’ve seen me do that often enough around here, haven’t you?
Or I could blame it on the time change. Yeah, lets do that.
But it’s not the geek or the crazy painter lady or Daylight Savings Time coming earlier and earlier every year that got me off schedule. No, no no… it’s SPRING!!!
Yep, spring caused me to blow off writing a post last week. And the one before.
Because in my corner of the world EVERYTHING is GROWING! All those plants we planted last year, planted with big empty spaces all around, well those plants, right now as I’m writing this, are having plant babies and SPREADING out, beginning to take over the empty spaces just like the plant lady said they would.
Plant babies! YAY!!!
And it makes me happy. Sooooooo happy I was out there for awhile today pulling weeds and humming and sipping on some cold coffee while the dogs and cat hung out with me eating enough grass to guarantee they’ll be puking later on.
Note to dogs and cat: Not on the bed, please NOT ON THE BED!!! Or anything upholstered.
Spring caused me to want to spread out and renew myself. My blog. And my other blog.
Other blog???
Well, YES! Remember Big Bold Beautiful Yes! The blog where I wrote down to my soul, the blog I stopped writing a little more than a year ago. After an ugly presidential election that came between friends. After the terrible school shooting at Sandy Hook where guns came between friends. It was hard to write YES! when all I wanted to do was scream NOOOOOO and knock some sense into anyone who didn’t agree with me. So I pulled back. Missed a week. Then two. Then a month and a year and basically forgot it ever existed.
Until spring began to stir things up and YES! began bubbling up in my soul again. YES! YES! YES!!! I went back to it, took a look at what I’d written way back when and fell in love again.
And so I’ve decided to revive it. Expand it. Make it better. And change the look so it tied in better with Arty Life. And since I was doing that, I needed to change the look of my art site, the one that’s still waiting for me to finish, I needed to tie ALL THREE of them together. You can get to any of them through the nav bar up there. Or the sidebar if I get around to it. They’re different sites with different looks. Different message. Different voice. But if I did my job right they’ll work together.
Check ’em out. And do let me know what you think. Here’s the link to YES.
Hello my lovies, in case you’re wondering where I’ve been, in case you’ve noticed I haven’t been here in Arty Life Land this week, I have a good excuse.
Website stuff. Mine. And the non-profit where I work. Because why rebuild one site when you can rebuild two??? At the same time???
So I’m a bit pre-occupied right now, don’t really have the time or inclination to write. But I found this really great article that I want to share with you, or rather my FB friend Pam found it, over on the Huffington Post. 18 Things Highly Creative People Do Differently.
Go ahead, read it. And then come back here ’cause I’ve got something to say.
Waiting patiently. Humming. Drumming fingers on the table.
Back now? Was that an AMAZING article? I mean, really–did you see yourself in it? Because holy crap, I sure did! It’s me to a T. That part about observing everything? Some day I’ll tell you a story about Ranger Rick, the canoe and what I saw that impressed him enough to ask me back to the park after hours. Someday. But not now.
Because now I’m going to go to bed and dream of 1-800 numbers and tech support.
It’s an arty geek thing. And since we need something visual I’ll leave you with this magical selfie I took last week with Da Boy.
Lovin’ on Da Boy
What could be more magical than a pony kiss? Really, what???
As always, sweetums, love to hear what you have to say in the comments below.
Today, as I write this, it’s the first day of December. Our lazy, easy autumn is about to give us a winter preview tomorrow. Or the next day. Hard freeze. Rain. Snow. The times they are a-changin’.
Take it away Bob—
Well, really, I was only talking about the weather. But other things are changing as well. See the navigation bar up above? There is magic there, oh yes indeed. MAGIC.
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh….
I know you’re attracted to the bright shiny colors but WAIT!!! You must listen to me. Come a little closer so I can whisper. Because important things, VERY important things, carry more weight when whispered.
See those two new links? ABOUT and PORTFOLIO.
DO. NOT. TOUCH. THEM.
No no no no no…not until I give you a heads up!
OKay, sometimes very important things need a shout. Sorry.
But you can’t click on those links yet because once you click on them–either one–you’ll end up transported as surely as James T. Kirk to another dimension.
And just to thoroughly mix up metaphors, you will end up down the rabbit hole in the land of SLPorter.
Ooooooooooooo….
The land of SLPorter, my dearies, is my official not-ready-for-prime-time, ART website. The one I’ve been dicking around with rebuilding for, umm…a while now. And it’s still a work in progress. The PORTFOLIO page is a total tease. But soon, soon, you will be able to click on galleries and individual images and sales information for originals and prints.
Ahhhhhhhhhhh….
So go ahead, click on them now. Wander around the site-that-isn’t-quite. And when you’re ready come back here and tell me your impressions in the comments below—because you ARE coming back, right?. And all you have to dowhen you want to come back here is click the BLOG link on the SLPorter nav bar. And poof–just like that–you’re back in Arty Life Land.
True Confession: I thought I was making things better.
Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!!!
OH. MY.
Somewhere in this world, that’s polite lady talk for, well…a word polite ladies don’t say. Ever. But I say it all the time. But not here.
You know how last week I said I was rebuilding my art site? Well, I am. And now it looks like I’m rebuilding Arty Life as well. Because it’s like, y’know, I don’t have enough to do…
At least that’s what the Cyber Gods are thinking. I will not bore you with the technical details–mostly because I build websites by the seat of my pants and I don’t know what the technical details are.
Well, yes, I do. Sorta. After spending the better part of the day messing around the back end of the site, which sounds every bit as dirty as it is, I discovered (through the magic of google and support forums everywhere) the oh so recent update of wordpress does not sit well with my premium theme. Among other things.
Oh, I lost you already, didn’t I?
Okay, so I’ll give it to you in non-technical speak–the dog ate my homework blog. Left it torn in iddy biddy little pieces with sidebars missing, pages missing and turning up where they don’t belong. In short, left it looking like crap.
Sigh… I can fix it. I CAN. But not tonight. I’m going to bed. Arty Life will be back next week. And she’ll be better than ever.
