Ok so this blog is getting far and away from the art related content which is its focus… but I am trying to keep it real. If an artist is painting from her soul then she brings to the easel every part and corner and adventure of the surrounding world. If each sense is alive then they are constantly recording and… on a good day…remembering.
Painting from ones authentic self, nod to Joseph Campbell, is my goal. Woven through the early days of this year have been threads of death, dying, grief and mourning, anticipation, joyous birth, heart-pounding happiness, soul searching love and ab-stretching laughter. I’m expanding the dialogue here to share some of this life that is lived behind my easel. You will be the judge as to whether or not the common threads make their way into the paintings.
In that light, here are some photo updates and some things that fall into the category of … musings…
Finnegan's Fence FinishedTeaching her to spell her nameMy heart in her clamshellJust wait until we get to the beach !Almost as tall as the Irisese'er...all the roses that are blooming
A sweet sadness is in the air this morning. After a long life of loving and laughing and raising a family of 10 magnificant children with passionate curiousity and free spirited thinking and a nature of true kindness…and after a very brief window of going… our dear friend Julie died last night.
Here is her shining face with Pat in the studio a while back. Pat was honored to help care for Julie in the last few weeks she had on the planet and to send her peacefully to her much looked forward to reward of once again seeing the love of her life…her husband Frank.
Right about now they are getting that red canoe off the top of the station wagon and over to the lake… and all I need to know of love…is the hint of Frank’s pipe trailing in their wake.
Dear Julie, may flights of angels sing thee to thy rest…
’tis DONE !!! … though I’m going to have to wait for the photographer to do his magic in order to get a good reproduction, here is proof that the panel is off the easel and I am moving on…
The last few days involved cleaning up the detail on the remaining boats and making sure all the shadows were correct, then glazing in several more layers of water and reflections. Varnish will make a huge difference with a painting with this much contrast. The van dyke brown and olive green dark dry with a dull matte sheen and all subtleties within those dark areas are lost until the varnish pops them out. Imagine a beach rock which is transformed from a dull grey when first you pick it up on a hot and dry summer beach…and then comes alive with color as you let an ocean wave wash over it.
With that major project completed…and before I begin the whirlwind effort to paint the rest of the works for the July show…I treated myself to a rare morning of carving. In the midst of the pile of sticks, which Finnegan and I have been collecting each morning for her fence, I found a honeysuckle branch that decided it would rather be a walking stick. The wood is wonderful to work with. A slow growing hardwood that has a beautiful heartwood of purples and reds. Finn worked on removing the bark while I whittled away at the knot holes and we created a right fine pile of shavings…
It does my soul good to spend a morning listening to the birds, watching my sweet puppy play with her new bone, and working with wood.
We’re making good progress on the fence as well but were up too early to start hammering so here are some shots of yesterday’s work…we were running out of fallen branches so decided to get some fresh meat and trim out the honeysuckle and take down a couple saplings that were too close to the power lines.
After all that work…it was time for a break…
and then over to the fence to say hello to Jed and make sure Zola doesn’t miss her school bus !
A fine morning in the middle of May with friends old and new coming for brunch and to meet little Finn. Tender greens from the garden, a quiche in the oven with market asparagus and home grown herbs, a pitcher of log cabin mint tea, the light and sparkle of Miss Gail’s charming witty reparte, a pot of forget-me-nots from Ronnie’s farmette, gentle reminders to Finnegan that she may not join us at the table, and rounds and rounds of adrenaline releasing laughter… wonderful.
Quite a contrast from the way Finnegan and I began our morning the day before…
This is a bed of Burdock …
…the giant leaves in amongst the weeds and grasses… it is a show stopping vegetation and has tiny purple flowers in mid-summer that resemble thistles…which are pretty when they bloom and a bit of a nuisance when they dry and become these…
Brrrrrrrrrrrssss !
Was never a problem with our big dog Gully as she had learned not to bother the flower beds…but…everything is brand new to our little Finn and when I saw her emerge from underneath those giant green leaves …well there was hardly any puppy showing for all the burrs. No, I did not stop to take a photo of that. The poor dear was not at all happy about the removal process. But while we were struggling and wrestling with the comb and the teeth I made a promise to her that I would not let one more burr find it’s way onto her tender torso.
Soooooooooo…
we decided on a fence… and with money scarce and our supply of twigs and sticks a plenty…we began to gather some woody bits…
This morning we walked down the lane and added more soldiers to the pile but the rains and wind from a passing storm drove us inside…we figure on needing a lot more sticks so hopefully the storm will cooperate and drop a few dozen… meanwhile it’s easel time…
an orange Croc looks and tastes exactly like an orange dog toy…
when the twigs of a rosemary plant become a chew toy the chewer smells as good as an herb garden…
and the dulcet tones of Suede’s newest album can settle even the ornariest among us…
My apprentice was upset that she could not keep a closer eye on me with the big painting in the way…so I danced through the raindrops to get Drew’s mirror out of the garage…and voila…we’re both much happier…
In a little over a week our little family of 2 will triple… and then some. The Follansbee Family will be arriving for the better part of a week so Papa can give his lectures at Winterthur Museum Furniture Forum and so that we can have our much needed fix of hugs and giggles from Mama, Rose and Daniel.
And …at the tail end (pun intended) of their visit…we bring home our new pup Finnegan !
My goal was to get this mammoth painting finished by then … sooooo brushes up !
Here’s where we stand as of 8am this morning…
After days and days of rendering those tiny little shacks I have enough detail on them to move over and get some paint on the right side of the panel. It’s amazing to me how much harder it is to get a building to appear convincingly ( jury’s still out on that ) real when it is an inch tall vs. 6 inches tall.
The line of buildings in the distance will be partially obscured by boats and pylons and loads of nautical detritus in the middle and foreground …you can see a piece of the sketch taped to the easel which I will have to re-trace on top of the foundation work I’ve done…so I’m holding off of the final details until I see what will be revealed.
But I needed to see some real progress… so last night I blew in some vegetation and roughed in a few more of the houses on the hill. I have one good reference for the late afternoon October sun that I am striving to portray…Menemsha is a popular place for islanders to come and watch the sunset and pick up their fish or lobsters for supper at Larsen’s and the quality of the air and light makes the autumn sunsets particularly magical…but when I took those photos in 2004 I was concentrating on the fishing shack and I did not pan over to get shots of the houses on the hill or the buildings in the distance. And almost all of the several hundred other shots I took in the ensuing 5 years are in vastly different lighting conditions. So I am using that age old artistic license to render a continuity of light…and throwing in some clouds to suggest that one could be blowing over at any moment and throw a house or two in shadow.
One part of sharing the process of painting something step by step that I don’t like is that you don’t get to watch the viewer as they see a painting for the first time and are drawn closer, from the back of a gallery, to discover a whole new world of details and whimsy at the surface level and beyond. Feels like I’m a bit of a spoiler.
One such conceit that I am consciously preparing for them is this tiny little version of the Quitsa Strider…
For last year’s Granary Gallery show I painted an 8 foot homage to this wonderful old swordfishing boat…so it seemed fitting to include her here…even if she’s only 2 inches long. Diminished in size but certainly not stature.
Forgive me if I take this opportunity to mention that I do still have some of the limited edition prints we made of that painting available…
Click on the boat for more information and to purchase a print.
It’s my birthday and I thought I’d show you the bouquet that the gardens have offered up…
And there’s also a look at the newest addition to the studio garden…
Last week we took great advantage of the gift of Jon’s visit and used his muscles and brawn and creative stonework to help extend the very first bed we planted here. He and my nurse forbade me from lifting …anything…so all you can see of me in these shots is my shadow.
We’re going to take a picnic up to the lake in a bit …and the local ice cream shack opens today…and then some mussels, asparagus and a pinot grigiot to top off the day…
may your day be as bright and full of spring flowers… HN
