Finding Shapes

BEGINNING

MIDDLE
















FINAL

Unfortunately the last photo is not the best. I took it outside with a longer lens. The first two were taken inside by a window with a shorter lens and they show the texture better. I really like the thick texture of the paint surface, I am using lots of modeling paste.
I enjoyed working from a sketch, it was much better working from a loose fun sketch than a photograph. I felt free to change things and I was surprised when I revisited the place how different it was in real life. My memory had taken on a life of its own and become more real to me. But no longer represented reality.

Spring has sprung

I am playing and having fun. I can't decide if the painting is any good or not but when all of the Spring shrubs and trees start blooming I must react. We have lived here seven years and it still surprises me when we start having Winter and Spring at the same time.
I have decided to limit my internet and email time more. I think looking at so much great art everyday is making me want to tackle too much all at once. I want to do abstracts, collage, mixed media, serious, decorative, fun and dramatic work. I think I just need to stay with one thing for a little while before moving on. I am doing some sketches of the environment around me and thinking of shape and pattern. Doing shapes and patterns makes the sketches lots of fun. Where as trying to capture realistic light and shadow and correct size relationships seems like drudgery.

Not Abandonment Yet

Having a photo reference around just doesn't work for me, I get too tied to it and can't play or invent in the studio. My plan is to start several pieces at one time and add some collage elements. I am determined to play again, the dialogue with the work seems only to be open if I play.

Abandonment

I have given over fully to the controlled, detailed side and have seen the light. Abandonment shows confidence. Power lies in being able to loose it all at any moment and go for it. Not being put off when one doesn't succeed but have total faith in the next.

Now Showing

Paintings now showing at the Vam York Community Theater during the
run of the play, Blithe Spirit. Opening Night, January 25th through February 10th.
I am going to go hang out during the play on the 25th, hope to see you there.

Self Portrait

I can't believe I just did this painting. It seems I am working farther away from what I want to do with each study. I don't want to do portraits from photo references.
I don't think people that came into the gallery this weekend liked my new still life either. I think one of the problems is that it is an acrylic and I used the paint straight from the bottle. We have a lot of gorgeous oils in the gallery and this plastic paint just doesn't cut it unless I really watch the way I use it.

I can't believe that I keep forgetting all the lessons that I have learned and revert back to my old bad habits each time I try something new. So I wrote myself a list of do's and don'ts to hang on my easel.
Don'ts
Make outlines and fill in.
Make solid shapes and then break them apart, all space, no form.
Use acrylic paint straight from the tube of bottle.
Paint from a photo or become too tight too soon.
Do's
Use a sketch as a map not a template.
Paint a feeling or an idea.
Have Fun, paint it, fun in the process.
Use heavy modeling media or lots of fluid media, wet into wet or thick and sculpt it.
Let forms emerge, create shapes as I paint, wet drip, thick swash, scratch in a line, all through out the process.
Like life drawing: wouldn't fill in the outline of a figure then shade it in, emerges from light, heavy, thick and thin marks. Casual.

Back to the Still Life

I finally got to get back to my painting since the holidays are over and my sons are back to school. I feel like I have been holding my breath for a month and was nearly drowning by yesterday but now I can exhale. I am still excited about pattern, line and shape. I wanted this last still life to look like the objects were lost in a sea of pattern. I am anxious to try a human figure immersed in natural pattern this way. I have worked with this idea before but this will be a new approach. My graduate advisor was always saying that to the modernists the surrounding space was as important as the subject. For some reason, I interpreted that in my work as the space going through the subject and breaking it apart. But now when I look at some of Picasso's work around the time of The Girl in the Mirror, I finally get what she meant. Picasso outlines each section of negative space just as he does the subject shapes. They are all just as brightly colored and patterned. This makes for beautiful full compositions too. This painting is more Klimt inspired than Picasso. I will focus more on the negative spaces in the next painting.

Violet in Pattern

I am doing some still life studies and also trying to work in the spirit of Klimt to learn about pattern. I got a used book on Klimt and find his work very fascinating. To me, right now the whole world looks like a Klimt landscape painting. We live with so much tree texture and leaf pattern here in Gainesville. This city prides itself on its tree canopy and it is my favorite thing about it.
But my painting looks a little more like a Van Gogh painting than a Klimt but that's okay I love his work also.

Thinking Man

I tried the thick modeling paste again. The results are interesting. I don't know if I am ready for solid blocks of color, I miss the variation of tones that was in the still life. But I do like the three dimensional presence of the thick modeling paste.

Light Weight Modeling Paste

Two Horses
I have been painting. In fact about three or four paintings on this one board. But I am not happy with it. The shapes and lines are not that exciting and the surface is so flat. It seems I am making a mess for mess's sake, trying to save it, but there needs to be more purpose.















Still Life
After the horses, I did this still life. I am very pleased with the surface. I coated a canvas board with Golden Light Modeling Paste and dropped paint into it and then took a pencil and scratched lines into the wet paste to draw the still life and textures. I did not intend to do a still life, in fact I sketched a plan for four abstracts in my notebook before beginning. But I didn't like the abstract and I wanted to use the paste before it dried so I did a quick still life. It was fun and I think the painting has a good presence and I like the colors. I wish the forms were more exciting or imaginative but I think it was worth while.

Next Show

Annual Holiday Show and Sale
at the Melrose Bay Gallery, OPENING RECEPTION
Friday, November 16th, 6-10 PM
This is a great party to start your holiday season with a reception across the road at Bellamy Road Gallery also that night. Come out to Melrose.

Melrose Bay Art Gallery
103 SR-26 at Centre Street
PO Box 36
Melrose, Florida 32666
Tel. 352-475-3866
Hrs. Fri 3-7 | Sat 10-6 | Sun 1-5
www.MBAGallery.SmugMug.com
I work one Sunday of each month
from 1 to 5, come visit.

More Images from Korea

Live fish are important to the culture in many ways. They sleep with their eyes open and are always enlightened.





Nature cures the body in many ways.
Attention to detail is a worshipful experience.

Buddhism is practiced at every mountain site.
Korea is 70 percent Mountains.
An Autumn Mum Festival in Seoul; Nature is still important in the City.

The Secret Garden: Island is the Earth, Water is the Universe.

Photos for Tour Group

Students in Gallery

When I went into the gallery last week, a class was sketching my paintings. That was neat to see.
I got a color copy made of the Angel Face digital piece. I am disappointed in how dark and flat it looks. I always like digital work better on the computer screen because of the bright glowing light. Also, I think that the machines at the print shop were off somewhat. I will try to transfer it on the wood but I know I will need to paint over it a lot and then I might as well change it and play with it.
I am not going to be able to post again until after October 15 because I am going to South Korea with my husband. He is giving a talk at a conference. I am looking forward to this experience and I bought a sketch book and traveling watercolor set. Hope to post sketches after our return.

Digital Finished

This was fun to do. Now I want to use acrylic medium to transfer it to a board and paint on it with acrylics again, metallic gold especially.

Going Digital Again

I am excited about combining my painted elements with digital photography on the computer. When I was in graduate school, I would do a digital piece then a painting and work back and forth. Then, I did not put paintings into my digital composites but mostly found textures and digital photographs. I was discovering how to work with paint media and texture with those explorations. I was very concerned about how to make things subtle and integrated. With my new work I believe I will learn about forms and shapes. I think going back and forth into the realistic elements of digital photography will be beneficial to my painting. I took a photo of this face when I was starting a painting. I proceeded to paint over this so I am glad that I grabbed it with my camera and was able to go back to it on the computer. Now I am adding photo elements to it. It might be hard to tell what is photo and what is not in the face. It is still a work in progress.
As I continued with the original painting, I overworked it and lost it. I am going to scrap it off and start over on the board. I recognize the mistakes of the painting because I have made them before. I had the idea I wanted to make a mythical beast so I drew the shapes and then tried to integrate it into the painting or space around it. Whenever I do that, it seems the painting falls apart into pretty marks and no form. The forms and images need to emerge from the process of painting almost like a sculptor building forms from clay. Tightening and defining towards the end of the process instead of the beginning. I am still not sure how to begin the entire process, although thinned out media seems to work well. When I do start with lots of thin medium, then finding good compositions and shapes is the challenge. But I see so many images in the tonal changes of color created from working with fluid acrylics and mediums.

It was a great show!

The opening was wonderful. Lots and lots of people, delicious food that never ran out and live music. Looking at the video I wish I was taller (short even with very high heels) and a better conversationalist, but I loved meeting the students and other attendees. Everyone else seemed to enjoy themselves too.
Thank you to the art students who took the video. They did a great job, I did the sloppy editing. While I am thanking: thank you to everyone who came to the opening, Blue Water Bay for the food, SFCC for being the host and Jayne Grant for coordinating it all. Jayne did a great job hanging the show, I was pleased with the way it flowed and that I actually filled the gallery. What a relief!
If you liked Soul Passages you can buy a print here: http://swaziaid.org/makersunited/Gallery.php
Also I have prints available at the Melrose Bay Gallery in Melrose.

Anticipation

I have been more excited and anxious this week than I anticipated. I am not generally a very social person and do not like being the center of attention. I can see why famous artists might have gone a little crazy when they became popular. As an artist, I am focused on the work and putting it out there, not me as a person. But now that I have taken the week to get used to the idea, I am looking forward to the evening. I love to talk about art. That is what I have enjoyed about doing art fairs. And the positive feed back is quite a rush. Friends that I know and volunteer with at church and in art organizations are coming. So I can see another reason it pays to get out of the studio and make contacts, you have someone to share in your celebrations.
Everyone whom I talk to seems very excited about coming. I was trying to figure out why I have more people wanting to attend this event than some others like art fairs. I guess the free food and music is a nice incentive. I hope people are not disappointed that it is a lot of works that have been shown before. I am glad that I have the writings that go with all the paintings to unveil, that is all new. When I do another big show in the future, I would love it to be all new works. But I went to a friend's show this past Summer that was a mixture of old and new works and I really enjoyed it. It was nice to see all of the works together in one place and in a nice space. So for the next post I will let you know how it goes. Unfortunately, I hear it thundering outside. I hope that will not dampen the attendance too much.

Show Information

The reason why the show is called Painted Dreams is because the best way I can describe my painting process is to compare it to dreaming. You do not decide exactly what will happen in a dream, it emerges from your thoughts, concerns and experiences. Forms and sometimes narratives emerge from my painting process, as well. I do not do preliminary sketches or studies, images appear from my layering, textures and gesture marks. Although I work intuitively, I intend for my paintings to focus on the positive and bring beauty into the world.

As with dreams, my paintings have recurring symbols one of which is a bird. To me, birds symbolize freedom because of their flight, nurturing and love because of their frailty and joy from their song. For this exhibit I am doing something I have never done before. And that is write a short poetic statement about each piece to put into words my thoughts and feelings about what developed in the painting. These words are often as ambiguous as the paintings and still leave viewers room to form their own interpretations. They are free to dream also.

Please come to the opening reception. There will be tasty edibles, live jazz and imaginative paintings. A feast for the senses and mind.

To Plan or Not to Plan

Today
Well, I am finally discovering that if I plan the direction of a painting that it takes longer to paint it than if I work with out a set plan. It is a revelation for me because I thought I was somehow making things easier by having a plan. With a plan, I do guarantee that I will have a better composition in the end but the process is not as satisfying. When I did California Poppies I made some shapes for composition, had some vague ideas of color and how I wanted to work the media but the imagery and subject matter developed toward the end of the process. A delight for me. Of course if it doesn't come together then it is very discouraging but if it works, it is elation. With Tree of Life I keep revising the colors, the marks and the media. It feels two inches thick. I have done this before, just when I think "okay it is going to work" and I make plans to send it somewhere, then it falls apart and I have to bring it back. Yesterday, I took a picture of it to post and discovered it looked worse than the last post and I thought it was surely done. Last night, I worked on the tree again, I felt it needed more outline marks to make the whole painting come together. In the previous version, I was trying to take the emphasis off of the tree and put it back on the atmosphere imagery around the tree. Too much thinking. I have been working on this since early August,ugh. But now it must be done, the show opening is just days away.
Yesterday