Look Ma! No Color--OK, well, less anyway

Memory's Ghost Watercolor 22x30"
Forgive me readers for I have slacked. It has been six days since my last confession. Er, I mean post. Life snuck up on me and well one thing led to another and before I knew it I was waking up in a ditch with a pounding headache and a new tattoo that says Avis Rent-A-Car below a blue Honda Civic. I have no idea where the poodle skirt came from but the chicken seems to like it. In my last post, you remember that one from almost a week ago, whew, how time flies when you can't remember where you've been or how you got there or why it seemed like such a good idea at the time even though you were pretty sure it was illegal in most states...Oh, sorry.

Um, where was I? Oh, yes, my last blog post. As I recall I made some high faluting promises about showing you that I really could restrain my licentious ways with color. I had to dig around for awhile before I found something that fit the bill and believe me it wasn’t easy. I clearly have a problem here the proportions of which will likely require a twelve step program and someone named Thelma with big burly arms and a thick paddle to keep me in line. Sure, I tell myself I can quit anytime but I'm just lying to myself, I know I can’t. It’s time for me to see that, to admit that I am powerless over all those juicy rich bright colors so creamy in texture and vibrant like confections in a Willy Wonka factory. WHAT? No, I wasn’t painting anything just now. What makes you think that? Oh, that? Nothing. Nothing at all, just a little um, raspberry jelly that’s all. There all gone now.
The Barn watercolor 22x30"
Anyway so as I was saying, color. The bane of all that is civilized and bland. It arouses wayward thoughts of self expression and unruly feelings of joyful exuberance. It must be kept under lock and key if not eradicated entirely. There is nothing pleasurable or more decent and respectable than a simple palette of two colors. A third color may even, upon special occasions, be included but, no more. We certainly don't want things getting out of hand. An artistic life with a properly guarded imagination can be quite fulfilling, especially with the judicious use of a third color on those few but special occasions.

Ouch! It hurts make it stop. Nope, sorry, can’t do it. I’m hooked. I’m not painting unless every darn tube of paint I own is sprawled out on the table in a pigment fiesta. Trays of pastels arrayed before me rainbows in sunshine. Each tiny package of color a joyous promise of beauty. Shades of hope and beauty, touched by light and imagination.

Yes, I love color. I love the way my brain interacts with the celestial light of our world and the shadows that lurk within. With each shade and hue there is a conversation that goes on in a place where there are no words, only your own emotional language whispering in your soul. And if it is done well, that whisper can become a song; a song to lift your spirit into the heavens or render it in two. We share the same Eternal Love affair with color and light as autumn leaves on a sunny day. Artists from the dawn of time have been capturing this impossible beauty. They have used it to move the greatest and most immeasurable weight in existence, the human soul.
Fine Young Ladies pastel 24x26"

Shadows and light, nothingness and everything, exceedingly simple and endlessly complex. How could I resist using something so glorious in absolute excess? Perhaps it comes from knowing darkness, from seeing the color drained from life or the light extinguished from within. Maybe it is a talisman we carry to remind us that the light still lives somewhere, even when we can’t see it. There to remind us in the darkened hours that the sun will shine again and when it does, it will touch the deepest of shadows, turning them into rich vibrant colors, ripe with the promise of life.

Thee and Thou and then just me

Thee and Thou
pastel, 24x36"

It has occurred to me that I have not posted a painting in awhile. OK. It actually occurred to me that I haven't been on a cool road trip or seen anything not completely waterlogged for awhile. It made for a fine excuse to drag out a painting. I am so lazy. These two paintings are both in pastel medium on sanded paper and I painted them some time ago. Unfortunately now all I can see is what's wrong with them. Of course I always end up seeing what I think is wrong with them after I have them framed up. As a matter of fact the surest way for me to spot what I think isn't working is to have someone buy it. Then I spend the rest of my time trying to figure out how I can get that sucker back off their wall so I can fix it for them. Apparently the police frown on most of my ideas. If I'm lucky I'll catch it just after I finish framing it and attaching the hanging wire. It's funny what an expensive frame job can do for your critical perceptions.

As you can see I am something of a color whore. I seem to lack proper restraint in that area. I am not hopelessly lost however in color overload. I plan to prove it to you in the next post when I will show you a couple of paintings that display my ability to limit my licentious use of color. Today however seemed like a perfectly acceptable excuse to show you these. It has been dark and raining buckets for at least the past two days. There was a brief sun break this afternoon and I thought if I was fast enough I just might make it outside to soak up some of that elusive sunshine. Not fast enough. By the time I got my shoes on I saw the cats waving to me as they drifted by in a row boat. Maybe tomorrow.

For any of you who may be interested in the process I employ in my pastel paintings I'll bore you-- I mean provide you with a quick run down. The surface aka paper I use is Kitty Wallis museum grade sanded paper. It is like a very fine sand paper. I love this paper! You can pretty much do anything to it and it will hold up beautifully. This works well for me because I like to abuse the living daylights out of my pastel paintings. With watercolor I am much more civilised but, pastel is a full contact sport. I have been known to take a hose and scrub brush to this paper and it just laughs and keeps coming back for more.

Like many artists I paint an under-painting first. This is where I probably go off the reservation a tad bit. I use oil pastels directly on the paper. Some poor unsuspecting fool once said within earshot, that you could not mix oil pastels and dry pastels. I didn't make it out of the art store before I had a new mission in life--proving that unimaginative fool entirely wrong. I'm kind of punky that way. Of course no words were exchanged but it was definitely ON.

The way that this reasonable impossibility works has a lot to do with Kitty's fabulous paper. I use painting medium to thin and work the oil pastel into the tooth of the paper. I have to wear those little rubber finger tip things they use for counting money at the bank though or I would sand my fingertips right off. Sure, I could use a tool and sometimes I do but, I like the finger painting approach. It's in keeping with my juvenile nature.

The real reason I use this method and not the more traditional mediums for an under-painting is that the oil pastel quickly covers a lot of space and maintains its much more rich and vibrant color. This in turn means I can get where I am going in a painting a whole lot faster.

The other particular thing I prefer to use in these paintings is my own hand made pastels. I learned this little art form from the famous Kitty Wallis herself and I have been hooked ever since. I love being able to craft and create my own special colors and shades. It's a tactile thing and a little reminiscent of playing with Clay-Dough. Plus, I'm greedy with colors. There's that juvenile nature again. I find something absolutely irresistible about being able to purchase pure pigments and play around with colors and mixing them up as if you might know what you're actually doing. One day I hope to play around with composition as if I know what I'm doing. I have such lofty artistic goals. It's good to have goals. Goals and Play-Dough that's my motto. Well that and a shiny new box of Crayons. The big one!

Summer Afternoon
30x22"

Possibilities

This painting is of a man on the edge of his life. And he is wondering. There is a question before him, it comes as reliably as the seasons and it is always the same. “Do you have the courage?” He doesn’t look out of the window, it isn’t there. He is looking out of his now. He isn’t thinking of how he hates his job though he is often certain he does. He doesn’t think of his tiny apartment though he can feel its walls surround him. They close in on him like the uneasy feeling that chokes his dreams in the lonely hours before dawn. He doesn’t think of those things. Instead he thinks of the road ahead, the one out there. Feeling the winds of change blowing through his mind and the eternal warmth of possibility upon his face. He remembers a time when he believed he could be something, someone. And he wonders. He wonders if this time he will be brave enough, if there enough strength or imagination left in him to take that step into a new future.
This is the story of a man who has not yet begun. It is the story of a man on the edge.
What mysteries await his discovery?

Many people ask me what I paint. They wonder what medium I paint in but mostly they want to know what style and subject I paint. Not surprisingly I am pretty well stumped for an answer. I have put together plenty of bios, résumé’s, descriptions and introductions but have never believed in a single one. I don’t paint from life and my painting buddies have stopped asking where my reference photo is. They know by now that there isn’t one. Of course it might seriously help if I used one once in awhile. Often artists refer to painting the truth of what they see. I try to paint the truth of what I feel. The rest of it is just the vehicle. My work is easily grouped into cohesive shows but to say that I paint a certain subject matter or in a particular style never quite seems to fit. It would be more accurate to say that I paint with a particular voice.
Thank you for listening.

So Now What?

It has been raining here for about 1,600 weeks now. Daylight Savings time came along and stole one entire precious hour of sunlight or perhaps I should say one slightly less dark grey hour of the day. It is now solidly dark by the hour of five PM and if you make the mistake of sleeping in or worse yet, having a day job, you might mistake yourself for a Morlock. Of course they did do some pretty shabby things to those poor Eloi and the worst we did was to inflict Starbucks and Grunge fashion on the rest of the world. Don't get me wrong I am a big fan of Starbucks and have pledged my first grandchild in exchange for daily infusions, though I am a tad less enthusiastic about the whole grunge thing. I suppose under certain comparisons Morlock and Seattleite could be interchangeable. Well, at least in the rainy season anyway.
But really, it’s not our fault! You can see what we’re dealing with here. These things are bound to happen when the only daylight you see is in the snapshot you carry around in your wallet reminding you of that one glorious hour last summer just after the Fourth of July when the rain finally stopped.

Oh fine. I’ll stop whining. But it has been raining pretty darn steady for some time now and I’m feeling like a kid home from school with a slight cold. The dogs don’t want to wear the cute little outfits I made for them and hide when they see me coming. I’m not even trying with the cats after that last doctor bill. Sheesh, what an attitude. So with all this time indoors I’m starting to get a little batty and goodness knows I do not need any help in that direction.

Which brings me to the point of today’s post. Deep breath in, now let it out slowly…

It is time for me to get back to work. I have been stalling and making false starts for months now and so it appears that another approach is needed. I have got to kick myself in the behind and what better place to do that than in public? I am an artist and I haven’t seriously painted or sculpted for longer than I should have. I paint in oil, pastel, watercolor and sculpt with stainless steel mesh. Wow. I feel like I’m at a twelve step meeting and that was a lot tougher than I wanted it to be.

I have been watching a few artists who participate in the “Painting a Day” blogs hoping that it would inspire me to get back to work. Unfortunately I proved to be immune to that therapy. I did start several paintings only to get to the “hump” part and stop. I had plenty of reasons for my distraction and the garden proved a pretty handy excuse most times. Soon blogging was also a handy scapegoat. Now if I keep this up it will be the holidays as an excuse and then it’s spring tulips leading to summer and still no painting. I am ready to admit I have a problem and in that vein I am giving myself an intervention of sorts.

I am showing you a couple pieces of my work today. Then I am going to paint another painting and put it up here again, and so on. I am not a painting a day kind of artist. That just isn’t my creative cycle so there’s no need to worry about that. I am really just hoping that if I can feel that pleasant obligation to stay connected with you through this blog and that it might extend to my art which could be just the jolt I need to get back in the palette again. Did you notice that clever little twist on the old “back in the saddle again?” That’s what staying up past your bedtime and no sunlight for two weeks will do to you. You’d think with all that talent Microsoft would come up with a program called “Stupid Check.” Now there’s a world changing invention just waiting to happen.

And so to conclude this rambling little post I will leave you with this. I have no flowers and no sun and I need to find something to blog about soon. I have no idea what you real gardeners do with your blogs over the winter months. I haven’t been around long enough to find out so I kind of imagine you talking about house plants and stuff like that. I’m a little low on house plants right now so I thought maybe I could paint instead.


I should probably tell you what these pieces are before I close out.
Blue poppies are pastel on sanded paper, 22x30”
Koi are watercolor 22x30” on 300lb hot press
Red poppies are pastel on sanded paper 30x36”
The sculpture is stainless steel mesh hand formed and prized for the shadows it creates

I’m going to fix a bowl of popcorn, put in a stupid movie and forget I posted. The good thing is, I’ve ordered a sun lamp so incidents like this should be less frequent.

Scrappily Honest

This is a slightly different post for me today but then again I don’t really have an actual theme do I? I keep looking for one but just can’t seem to figure it out. I have decided that I will post pictures for no good reason. Why? Because I like them, because it will give you something to look at while you are wondering just why in the world you come to my blog. It will distract you from my writing and you will forget all about that dangling participle or misplaced comma. Quick! Look over there. Ooh pretty flower….

Tara over at Eye Feathers hit me with… I mean honored me with the Honest Scrap Award. It’s sort of like Slug Bug for the Internet. It’s a game, people get hit, somebody cries and someone always gets in trouble. So I said, “You bet I’m in!”
Here are the rules:
You tell ten truthful things about yourself.
You pass the award on. You know like that horrible cold you had last winter.
You include the link for the louse…darn, I mean the super great friend who gave it to you
And include links to your victims, shoot…nominees.
Not only does Tara have a wicked sense of injustice she is also a pretty savvy editor and not to shabby with a pen and paper of her own. She is currently working on a novel for young adults. Give her a visit.

OK so here I go. Just like truth or dare but without the bottle and the cute guy your spin never lands on. At least my hands aren’t sweaty…anymore

Ten truths about me

1. I paint to disaster movies. It keeps the other side of my brain occupied so I can just do and not think. Dante's Peak being a frequent disaster. As a matter of fact the more you watch it the more you see just how big of a disaster it is. Love that movie. hehe
2. I regularly encourage my adult son to quit his day job. He has a good job. I have my reasons.
3. I bite M&Ms in half. OK, there’s no defense for that I just do.
4. When I was a kid in the first two weeks of the school year I would read through all my text books and do all the work. I think I might be an undiagnosed nerd.
5. I saved a man’s life. (not kidding)
6. Painting or sculpture I always hate it right before I am finished. I have learned to stop tossing them out.
6.a. Bonus truth: I secretly want to take back paintings I have sold and “fix” them. My ego is attending group meetings. We’re working it out.
7. When I was kid I ate Peanut M&Ms while watching Sean Connery in Live or Let Die. I got sick. I threw them up. To this day I can not look at a Peanut M without gagging. Looking at Sean Connery, not a problem.
8. I worry that I will die before I have done anything spectacular with my life.
9. I’m not afraid to die. I’m just not interested. No seriously. I’m not interested.
10. While I appreciate grocery stores I hate shopping in them. It’s the lighting and deliberative psychological layout. It rubs my instincts the wrong way.

Now this is the part where I list my victims…I mean my nominees. There is a wonderful mix of characters here so I hope you will stop by each of their blogs if you don’t already. Yes, even if they don’t want to get all honest and stuff. Oh, come on guys, it’s not like I’m asking you to reveal your deepest darkest secrets to the whole wide world. Well, unless you want to that is. I mean that’s ok if you do. It’ll be just between friends. You can totally trust us. It’s only the Internet after all. Who could possibly be watching?


Terry Lynn Johnson: I want to learn more about someone with such an appreciation of nature and her adventurous spirit. Was she outdoorsy as a kid or is this new? Has she ever been attacked by wild animals? What’s the strangest thing she ever ate? Does she secretly wear fuzzy pink slippers because they make her feel girly?

NuttyGnome: Because while we have only just met she sure seems like very interesting character and I have questions. How did she get that way? What is going on in that quirky head of hers? Does she have a maniacal master plan written up somewhere? Does she have minions and what’s the application process for that?

Rosey Pollen: because she just seems really fun, brave and like a pretty cool person. I also bet she has some juicy dark secrets. Hehe Has she ever been in a motorcycle gang or a member of a quilting bee? Does she have a secret talent that we don’t know about?

Janie is a brand new mystery to me. I just met her but I love her energetic spirit, joy for life and I would like to know more about just what makes her tick. What is it that puts that great big light up a room smile on her face?

FlowerLady: My sweet dear friend who has had a pretty interesting life and yet is so shy about it. What wonderful adventures has she had that she keeps stored away in a box at the back of the closet? What makes her such a sweet and thoughtful person? Is it the bread machine or her adventures in Europe? Who is the mysterious DH and does he have anything to do with it? Does she wear fuzzy pink slippers because they make her feel adventurous?

Jeni at Highly Irritable: just because I wanted to see if she would yell at me for tagging her. The woman is a terror and her children are plotting world domination. Seriously, if you want to know the enemy you should read her blog. Her stories are hilarious and so representative of what we’re all thinking but too chicken to say out loud.

Jewel at Pink Ink: this amazing woman is always trying on new hats in her life. She lacks the good sense to be insecure and embarrassed like most of us. She lives boldly, with passion and honesty and I just want to see what she has to say. It should be a lot of fun!

You realize of course that I have we will never hear from these guys and that I have been banned from their blogs. sigh. It is a terrible price we pay for art.

A Post post correction: In item number 7 I stated it was Sean Connery in Live or Let Die. A reader has graciously informed that it was actually Roger Moore in that film. A great big Oops and apology to all involved. I still think Sean Connery is pretty nice to look at though.

Survivor Extreme Home Edition, episode 2

Oh where to start today’s episode? The horror is almost too much to face again. I have always heard gardening referred to as a genteel activity. Something to calm the nerves and sooth the soul with all that gentle quiet nurturing. Lies!

In this next episode I will tell you the horrible dirty truth of gardening’s seamy underside. The underside of the all those pretty flower beds with their lush green foliage and bright cheery flowers decked out like two bit strumpets. Sure they say, “Come on over, take a little peek, get a whiff of my intoxicating perfume.” You take the bait, you look, you sniff and suddenly you’re hooked like an innocent rube on a free crack high. You can’t wait to get your next one, your next hit of horticultural ecstasy.
Suddenly your life is all about those little fantasy peddling pimps wearing the bling of the garden world, aprons and dirty garden gloves “Oh, yeah, we got what you’re looking for. We have some fine young ladies in pink for you just over here or perhaps you’d like something a little racier in deep red?” they coo at you with their compost scented breath. “Oh, but first you’ll need a few things if you’re to keep the little pretties happy. Let me direct you to our $ales a$$ociate”

On you way over to the, ahh, $ales A$$ociate you notice the oddly glazed yet hungry expressions on the faces of the newly addicted. They shuffle along pushing carts full of bushy plants from seven different zones. A bell goes off in your head but you can’t hear it. The heavenly sprinkler system has just turned on and it is causing those tender young things to glisten with sweet moisture. There is a heady scent of rich lavender filling the air. Bees are hurrying to and fro rubbing their dainty legs in the fertile pollen dancing wildly in the… um, excuse me while I uh…


Ok, never mind all that. It’s better if we just move along.
If you bought the sales pitch from Guido the plant pimp and you expect those garden beauties to perform for you in your bed at home then you had better not be taking them home to this…


On the previous episode of Survivor Extreme Home Edition we learned how I had rocks and more rocks on top of one great big rock. So yeah, no dirt. No heavy clay to amend, no sandy soil to loam, no bone dry depleted desert baked dust barely able to support cacti. Nope- just rocks. Now don’t get me wrong, I could grow a mean crop of gravel if I wanted. I think there were even a few species of alien weed left over from the last ice age in there but, if I wanted the floozy cabaret that Guido the plant pimp promised me then this would simply not do.


First to tackle was… oh hell, who am I trying to fool? There was no “first things first” business because there was no plan. I approached it the same way I approach my paintings and sculpture. I want to create a certain feeling or express a particular emotion and that is my focus. I’ll admit a little secret here that I always try to hide from my art buddies; I don’t give a lick about the subject or the light. Gasp! I know, I know. Blaspheme. For me it is always about what I want the art to say. How I want you to feel when you see it? It is about plucking the chords within the soul to produce a certain song unique to you. And that is how I saw this space.

There was a tough issue with the layout of the house and driveway, it cut right through the middle. There was the problem a too large an area of weeds to kill and the total lack of soil. Then I also had an unexpected issue caused by a lack of visible boundaries other than the electric horse fence. The space right behind the pond/yard is the neighbors land; their horse barn is just up the hill.

I wanted to incorporate all those challenges rather than fight them, I wanted to highlight them. The “Rock” I wanted to dig out and make into a focal point. (That however was before I knew what it actually was). From the Rock the neighbors had a lovely view into the woods so I wanted to visually make that part of our space. It was important that the space felt like it was supposed to be there, that it blended in with the surroundings. I suppose I really just wanted it to feel like the land had risen up to meet us.

We started…OK, I started, Hubby had better sense than I did, started pulling in gnarly tree stumps and digging up large rocks. Well I suppose I should use my chiropractor’s words, huge boulders and giant trees. He was so finicky. I had put down light gardening on my activities list and he about had a hissy fit when I told him how big they were in terms of feet x feet. Of course he should have seen that coming when I first came to see him crawling on my hands and knees. He very deliberately and right in front of me I might add, scratched out my light gardening entry and put “suicidal.”


You may be wondering how we got the desert landscaping. Pretty aint it? (no offense meant to all my desert loving gardeners. I know this isn't what you mean by desert garden) I can not begin to tell you how awful it was to look out there and see that everyday. The chiropractor may have been right if I had to keep looking at all that ugly brown much longer. You see a neighbor to the side of us has a saw mill where he is milling the lumber to build his house. This seemed like a good situation for both of us. We went down and collected his sawdust to spread on our “yard” and he got rid of the build up. I figured the sawdust would smother the weeds and hopefully add some cushion. We went down to the mill every few days and collected all the sawdust we could and raked it out. We just kept going till we eventually got a pretty thick layer all around. After a never ending ugly blur of time everything looked like the Saharan desert. It was just the look I was going for!

In between sawdust runs I was working on hunting down and dragging home new and interesting stumps and boulders. Every day the poor man I am married to would come home to find me smiling some big dumb grin and saying “honey come look what I found! I just need some help…” It was usually something like digging it out of the earth or lifting this 50 foot tree. I was trying to build up natural structures to fill the space. Eventually each one of these elements became the framework of a bed. With every new piece added I would walk the entire area to see where my natural step wanted to travel then placed items according to that pattern. There is a very easy natural flow that encourages strolling the garden. Because of doing this at the beginning of the process I don’t have to fret about placing focal points or plants. There are natural breaks and flows. I even placed seating according to that rhythm.

Next time on Survivor Extreme Home Edition we discover how to turn a mole hill into a Big Freakin’ Pond. What was I thinking and why did my doctor threaten to send an ambulance?Tune in next time for those answers and more…

I just needed a little happy place at the end.