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Tearing Down Road Blocks

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Still on the mend, but very happy with myself this evening. Three months ago, six months ago, or a year ago, actually for the last twenty years I have been putting myself off. Finding every excuse in the book to not work, putting up self-built road blocks, telling myself that I wasn’t good enough, or focusing on the “can’t” instead of the “can”. Putting myself in the position of having to answer to others, some I know, obviously some I don’t know, and most importantly to myself, has forced my hand literally. I didn’t feel like working again tonight. Still have an earache and a headache. I gave a fleeting thought to hanging a shingle up here on the blog declaring, “Blog closed due to illness”, but I am so committed to this project that I couldn’t do it. Not only did I work, but I confronted my biggest artistic hurdle head on. Perspective, it’s a dirty word for me. I pull out the ruler, I study the angles, it just doesn’t work for me! It isn’t perfect, which is OK, (because we all know I am leaving perfect behind) but I do love the finished piece.

A little about the subject matter. I have boxes of paper in my studio. Photos that I tore from magazines over the years because I liked a color, or a shape, or a face, something that appealed to me about each and every one. Then there are the computer files of the thousands of photos that I have taken, all with the intention of drawing or painting them some day, or using them for inspiration, but never actually doing anything but collecting them. I did attempt something from time to time, but as I have mentioned before when it wasn’t fitting into my idea of what it was supposed to be, I walked away from it, leaving many, many orphaned, half-finished works of art hidden away in my studio. In the last fifty four days since I began this project I haven’t abandoned anything. I do have a few works in progress, and I fully intend to finish them. I also intend at some point to go in to my studio and free the orphans. Take a good look at what I have that is already started and decide what needs to be finished. As for tonight, I made a decision. I will be recycling a great deal of paper. I don’t want to look to anyone else for inspiration. That doesn’t mean I won’t be moved or inspired by a painting, or a photo, but I want to rely on myself for a while. Tonight I looked through my photos. I took this photo in San Diego a few years ago. I couldn’t put my finger on exactly why I loved it so much, but I think Dan hit it on the head tonight. It has a certain nostalgia to it.This photo certainly gave me what I’m looking for, it is my photo, and it is certainly a perspective challenge. It is done in watercolor, ink and pencil. I will say again that I am really pleased with the piece, and myself for not giving in to the temptation of throwing up a road block, despite how I’m feeling.Image

Good Things Can Come In Small Packages

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5 25I have to admit that there was so much I didn’t take into account when starting a year-long project, particularly one that requires writing and the creation of a piece of art each and every day. I know that I have touched on this before, but life got in the way again today. It’s a holiday weekend, we had friends and family over today, and so I find myself once again rushing to finish something for my blog. I seriously had several false starts. It seemed as though I wouldn’t get anything done for tonight, and as tempting as it might be, I refuse to put up older work unless I am near and dear to my bathroom floor (which I was, by the way, last week). I feel like I’d be cheating myself if I did, and I have been cheating myself for far too many years. Not every project has to be a big one. Just creating is the idea. I mentioned the 365 Project when I started this, and the tag line on that book states, “Do something creative every day and change your life.” It is so true. Here I am not even two months in and I can feel the difference. Like so many artists, and more so, so many women, I don’t place enough value on myself and what I do. That is changing, I’ve learned a lot about myself in ways I never considered. I’m so excited about the months ahead, wondering where this journey will take me, and anxious with anticipation to see what work I  will produce.

Back to the subject at hand, life getting in the way of my project. I realized tonight that there might be days ahead where it will be difficult to get my work done. There are birthdays, and our wedding anniversary, and other holidays, all of which will require my attention elsewhere. I guess I will just try to take them as they come and hopefully still be able to create a little something. I did just that tonight. From a photo outside Claude Monet’s house in Giverny. I saw a gardener standing still studying the garden and took a photo. It is a photograph that I would like to paint some day, but for tonight a pencil sketch on an artist card. It is only a two and a half by three and a half-inch drawing, but this one I love. I captured the essence of that moment.  It took me back to Monet’s garden, and our journey there. We took the train from Paris to Vernon, and chose to walk the rest of the way to Giverny instead of boarding the bus with the other tourists. The air was filled with the fragrance of  flowers, and each cottage and garden we passed was more beautiful than the last. When we finally saw Monet’s house and garden, I turned to Dan and said, “How could you live here and not paint?” Now I have to ask myself, “How could you have been there and waited so long to paint?’

It was one of ten days in France with the one that I love, and that makes this little piece of art priceless.

No Surrender!

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Tonight’s project is a small oil painting, but before I get into that I want to be really honest here about my struggle today. I’m actually working on several projects, most of them have to do with refurbishing flea market finds. I’ve been putting those projects ahead of this one, thus the late night art work and posting. I’m fine with that because it isn’t about avoiding my art, it’s about earning a living. My struggle today was with the very same issues I addressed last night. I almost did it today, I almost walked away from this painting. Oil painting is my biggest obstacle. It is the art I am most drawn to, and the one I have the biggest issues with. To begin with I really am an “instant gratification” artist, when I want something done, I want it yesterday. I’m also a bit of a control freak, (A bit? I don’t like to fly, I hate it actually, but as I have told Dan repeatedly, if I could fly the plane there would be no issue) anyway, oil is not a medium for control freaks. It directs the time line. Things were not coming out the way I wanted and the canvas only had paint on half of it. I put it down and went in search of my watercolors. I decided what to paint, but then I stopped. I made myself go back to the oils. The struggle continued right on to the end. I won’t give in to it. I have to keep pushing. No Surrender!

Whew! Got that out. The painting…

Struggle Part Deux

My other problem, I have no style. Not personally of course, that is if you consider jeans and a shirt of some form roughly three hundred fifty days a year a style, but a painting style. Again the lack of lessons has left me clueless in the use of materials. Just before I started writing I told Dan that my paintings are flat. My Dad was a house painter by trade, it’s sort of how I used to paint. No dimension, like painting with a brush on a wall. When I go to art museums I am as close as legally allowed to paintings, always studying the strokes and texture of the paint. My paintings looked for the most part lifeless. The other issue (there’s more?), is that I can’t decide how I want to paint. Realism? Yes and no, too much precision. Impressionism? More yes than no, love Impressionism, first place we went to in Paris was the Musee d’Orsay, the Impressionist museum. It’s a difficult style for me because I’m still a little hung up on the “it has to look like it’s supposed to look” issue. I love Grant Wood, Edward Hopper and Andrew Wyeth. Particularly Hopper. I’m just not sure who I am as a painter. I just decided to post two pictures tonight. The one I did earlier this evening, and another older one. In my efforts to get over myself I figured out a little trick. I had put a soft focus filter on a photograph to blur the lines. It helped me get past the “has to” nonsense. I only needed to do it one or twice, but it really helped. Once I realized that my “not exactly as it really looks” paintings were something I liked, I was able to move past some of the crap in my head. (The older painting was actually in part a photo from Gourmet magazine. Just want to make sure I give credit.)

So tonight I was playing with style and texture. I didn’t work from my actual photograph, which was from a sunrise I photographed in Virginia Beach, but from what I saw in my mind from looking at it earlier in the day. Not entirely pleased with the results, but happy I didn’t give up.

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Jigsaw Puzzle Art

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Like the title of today’s blog? I called it that because that is what I feel like I produced yesterday. I decided to go with oils, and also to try something new. Many of my paintings appear flat to me. Again, without lessons I’m not really sure if I do things the way they should be done. I did a small 9×12 painting based on a photograph I took in central California farm country. I am very drawn to old barns, abandoned buildings, old doors and windows, essentially anything that looks lonely, speaks of solitude, and seem left behind. I haven’t mentioned it before but I am also quite a good photographer. My photography is much the same, lonely; there are never people in my photographs. I was a very shy child and sometimes quite lonely. Alone is a place I’m comfortable in. (I’m sure at this point arm-chair psychologists eyebrows are raised.)…back to my painting saga…

I tried to use a palette knife to lay the paint on thickly. My knife was too big for the small canvas, so it quickly became a mucky mess. I scraped it off and tried again. Same issue. At that point I was feeling defeated, I felt like things just weren’t going to go right. My artistic mojo had abandoned me. I almost gave up, but the blog was calling. I kept thinking that I had to do something. My “not good enough” voice was whispering in my ear, “You have other work you can use.” Do you think it’s possible to get Catholic guilt from a blog? I believe it is, because I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t use an old painting, or another piece of art, I couldn’t break my promise to myself. I told my “not good enough” voice to shut up, and I tried again. This time I used a small brush and dabbed the paint on the canvas thickly. It seemed to be working; at least the piece had texture. My husband came in the room and said he liked what I was doing. That gave me the confidence to continue. All in all it took about two hours. When I was finished my husband said he loved it, me not too much. There are particular areas that I like very much, where the paint has a vibrancy that I love, but quite frankly, in the end I don’t like it very much. I wrestled once again with the thought of not posting it, but this blog is about discovering who I am as an artist, so I guess that means warts and all. Even if I think it’s garbage, it will be here. Things will get better, of that I am sure. I have not consistently produced art or painted in years. So I have decided to give myself a break and tell “not good enough” to shut up more often, maybe at some point it may go away.

Oh, the title of today’s blog? When I looked at the painting and told my husband I didn’t like it he said, “I love it”. To which I replied,”You know what it looks like? It looks like one of those awful paintings they turn into a jigsaw puzzle.”

Anyone need a thousand pieces?Image