Stepping Stone: retrospective

I'm loving the new banner. Deena (BFF) is a master with Photoshop both in her work and her art work...so it was my pleasure to pull up a chair to her desk and see all her 'tools' and watch her work the magic. We began finding pieces of my work and moved through choices with little more than yes, no, yes smiles, clapping, try again, no, yes...such a joyful collaboration!! I'm so grateful for her friendship that runs deeper and sweeter than words could ever express...it just is. My job has been to find a good back drop color and I'm pretty happy with this color but I think changing will be interesting too!

This post is also about announcing or making clear my newest project. Right now the question I have for myself is will I ever get it off the ground? Actually I am moving forward, somewhat slowly but forward. My project is about creating a book, a retrospective, a book of images plus text...not a how-to...more of a creative expression of my journey these past years. It's not yet formed and I'm glad to be in process. I've created a muse 'Ruth' to keep me reminded of looking forward and staying balanced. Creating this banner is also a way of keeping myself 'on track' and I've laid aside time to glean my pages here on this site and pages and pages of journal writing...putting what seems important to me in files for later use. I'm excited and unsure about this idea but so far I'm moving ahead just to see what happens!
This is an excerpt from my journal as it pertains to Stepping Stone as my personal metaphor: journal, Thursday May 2010: My book as a stepping stone, the heart home where I get to express in book form a place to land, I can be a conduit, a reminder, a lesson, a support, an inspiration, an example. I can find the words to welcome and the welcoming images. This gives me meaning and purpose to the book and at the same time a clear reminder of all our contributions to one another on this life's journey...working title 'Stepping Stone"

Putting together potato salad and planning a fun holiday weekend. My heart carries a sadness we all share in watching this ongoing oil fiasco. This is an awful wound we have taken to our coastline and gulf area. Politics aside...like everyone, I just want the restoration of this disaster.

Finally saw 'Seraphine' last night. Beautifully filmed in the countryside in the early 1900's...showing what a hard life was lived by an artist with everything against her...being a woman, mental depression, war and awful economy but still a spirit portrayed of passion for life, nature and expression. Next in the queue is Goya's Ghost.

Beginning The Crossover

SPECIAL NOTE: Banner under construction.



24"x36" acrylic,canvas, fabric collage, crayon and
pencil, guiding words:












Creating the dreams written as real
Seeing the glory of hands unshackled
Colors making simple vivid marks
Let me see the inside of this soul's voice
Keep me in the game
Throwing my dice and moving my charm

I've been making changes in my paint handling and favored compositions. For now, I'm okay and will lay this one aside. It seems for me to make a change, I need to swing to an extreme so it takes me awhile before I find a good balance. This 'new way' to paint my poems and writing is requiring me to re- look at foreground and background...shapes organized and disorganized with a minimum of texture and 'stuff'. I want to stay focused on story....story floating as a whole and I'm in the beginning stages of finding better ways to pull this together in satisfying ways. I must keep reminding myself that I no longer have show dates or gallery calls so I need not rush this very personal process. I'll start a new piece and what I learn on that one I will bring back to this one and there begins my crossover dance! It's going to be an interesting spring and summer!

I'm a big fan of PBS and have found (I'm always late to these discoveries)recently an interesting show New Scandinavian Cooking which takes in cooking, travel and very young forward thinking chefs...here, it is on Saturday afternoons around 1:30pm. Pablo is home from Las Vegas and I have eaten my fill of eggplant, olives and sundried tomatoes so now I will try plainer fish and chicken dishes. Sundays I have on my list "Masterpiece Mysteries" tonight being a Miss Marple episode. Oh My, I'm sounding like my mother?!
I've ordered from Netflix two movies about artists "Seraphine" and "Goya's Ghost"....So often I'm disappointed in "artist movies" but I will give these a try. Anyone seen these two?
I'm not sure of the day or time but Bravo is starting a new series very much like Project Runway only with artists? I will watch it and report!

Slow-Motion

These are small sections taken from a larger piece that I've been working on. I've been "trying on" new ways of art making (for me) and it's been a slow process. I enjoy beginners mind and new materials, new ways of expressing is challenging. I'm no longer connected to a gallery and I'm not actively looking for places to show so I have the freedom to step away from consistency of expression and just explore.

The slow motion is showing up in so many areas of my life....my banner change has been put on hold for awhile. My oil painting on the deck was cut short with a cold front that left the deck wet and damp. My promise to swim everyday was also hit by the cold front! ha I have a writing project that has been in the gathering stage and not even a new muse can hurry that process along! Now this painting project of new ways of art making is in a slow down. Part of me is so ready to make some changes and yet the habit of hand and eye is strong so I have taped up three quotes from a favorite artist Lee Krasner (also wife of Jackson Pollack) and using them as inspiration and encouragement.

I have never been able to understand the artist whose image never changes.
Lee Krasner

My own image of my work is that I no sooner settle into something that a break occurs. These breaks are always painful and depressing but despite them I see that there's a consistency that holds out, but is hard to define.
Lee Krasner

Painting...in which the inner and the outer man are inseparable, transcends technique, transcends subject and moves into the realm of the inevitable.
Lee Krasner

Slow or fast I hope all your art making is a rich and full experience!

My Muse Mosaic

Mosaic of seven images...two repeated to equal nine from Mosaic Maker a fun site. I have more images but not photographed and some have sold. Is that proper to sell one's muse? My muses over the years have usually been Viking angels...bold ones lighting my way. The mostly yellow faced muse "Forlorn" was created as a way to let my muse hold my doubts and disappointments artistically. My newest muse is in the center made of blue crayon and water. I gave her coin earrings and very curly hair. For my latest project I need strong, worldly intelligence with uncompromising loyalty. Her name is signed Ruth for the good Ruth of the Bible. I like her and believe we will work well together and know she is loyal to me and the project (because I said so! ha)

Watched "Lovely Bones" ...powerful, scary, creepy and from a beautiful perspective. It dragged in some parts but it was mostly heartfelt and thought provoking. Anyone see this movie?

Shred or not to Shred?

These arms and machinery belong to a local shredding spot. It is 20 cents per pound and plastic covers, metal spirals and a years worth of journal pages are fed into the teeth of this room size shredder. I have a small household shredder perfect for personal papers but dismantling journals with covers and spirals is a bigger project. Before I take them to the shredder, I glean the poems and important notes and the rest I consider personal blah, blah, blahs. A place where I work out thoughts about the art and everyday life...on any given page...could be a shopping list, a dream revisited or an opinion written out. My girlfriend asked her husband to burn her journals if she died first and he did keep his promise. I've been keeping a journal for over 30 years so it is a space problem as well. What is the general opinion...shred or not to shred journals?!

movie report: I was not disappointed with "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus", beginning with great visual sights, costume and set design. Simple story and I'm sure I missed the English Monty Python humor but I was fine with the changes in actors replacing Ledger's role...seamless for me and, and Tom Waite was a perfect devil...being himself such a rare character it was wonderful to see and hear him deliver lines in such a perfect form...the devil!

Too cool for painting on the deck so it's acrylic in the studio today! Made headway on "3" probably because I stopped caring about outcome. Have a great week!

Mom and Me

Boxes of old photos all wrinkled and torn. Today I remember her and look at her in new ways. I am so surprised to see her tiny waist as she was convinced she was grossly overweight? I remember her doing floor exercises to Jack LaLanne and NEVER wearing shorts. She did love swimming and walking. In my baby years she did crochet work and later embroidery. One of her favorite remarks (she had many) was that she was a great audience member?! She did her absolute best....she had her chance at being a mom and as far as I'm concerned...she did just fine.
In memory: Happy Mother's Day Mom!

Three

My true love brought home to me: Three Ligonberry jars of jam, One jar of Raspberry jam and one jar of Gravlaxsas!! Can't exactly put this to music! ha Pablo was near an Ikea and ran in for these favorites of mine. The Gravlaxsas is a mustard sauce used on salmon and is wonderful.... the jams are wonderful too. Behind these jars of jam is "3" a 16"x16" canvas using again my old collagraph prints, molding paste and acrylic. I have been sanding, repainting, sanding. It's on purpose that it is in the background of this photo as I am about ready to place it on the unfinished work pile. All that sanding left me with a rather dull image. I'll leave it alone and come back to it with fresh eyes! It happens ever so often and this one just missed the mark.

I have plans to continue painting with acrylic in the studio but I have also decided to arrange an easel on the deck and paint with oils in the cool mornings this Spring and Summer. My pulmonary problems won't allow oils in the house so this is perfect timing to return to my first love...oils!

Tonight a quick dinner and a movie "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus". It didn't get great reviews but I loved Terry Gilliam's "Brazil" and I'll see anything with a devil played by Tom Waite?!!