Actually, what I'm trying to do is make something splashy for this show. I have a couple of 3'x5' canvases that I want to hang side by side, vertically, that present as a pair. I've been thinking about shape and color, but the details are hazy as yet.
What intrigues me is contemplating the mysterious slight-of-hand that will--must--appear at the end of the day to pull it all together and make it work. From this point in the planning, I don't know what will occur, but something always does for the painting to be successful.
Maybe it is precisely the hidden miracle that leads us ever on, both through the painting on the table and the next one taking shape in our heads. This, for sure: Painting wouldn't exercise its powerful tugging at me if I weren't chasing a miracle.
PW
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
October 28, 2009
I'm thinking about what drawing is, and if you can learn to draw.
One thing it is not: and that's a trick of the fingers or even of the hand. It's an energy originating in the solar plexus that gains momentum in the chest, traveling through the arm and out, making the charcoal or pencil or pen an extension of the arm. That's why you might not be able to learn it. One dances with the line and feels its lyricism, a pulsing flow of energy from the heart. The line should look like this, and I think that's why we fall in love with it.
Maybe you can learn to do this, not by instruction, but by lots of practice. You can try to call up the energy in your body, recognize it, and encourage more of it. Soft brown butcher paper with anything that makes a mark will serve you well, especially if you don't focus on trying to draw something. Which brings us to this:
Why do we represent objects by using line, when there are no lines around anything in nature(except the "edge of a shadowed plane," as I was told in classes)? If you set out to draw a face or a tree or a Bartlett pear, you drag the pencil around to enclose a shape. Then you put in smudges for shadows and depth. We might do this because we were brought up to draw this way; we might do it because we are really in love with line and don't know. Artists know it. Artists know it well.
PW
One thing it is not: and that's a trick of the fingers or even of the hand. It's an energy originating in the solar plexus that gains momentum in the chest, traveling through the arm and out, making the charcoal or pencil or pen an extension of the arm. That's why you might not be able to learn it. One dances with the line and feels its lyricism, a pulsing flow of energy from the heart. The line should look like this, and I think that's why we fall in love with it.
Maybe you can learn to do this, not by instruction, but by lots of practice. You can try to call up the energy in your body, recognize it, and encourage more of it. Soft brown butcher paper with anything that makes a mark will serve you well, especially if you don't focus on trying to draw something. Which brings us to this:
Why do we represent objects by using line, when there are no lines around anything in nature(except the "edge of a shadowed plane," as I was told in classes)? If you set out to draw a face or a tree or a Bartlett pear, you drag the pencil around to enclose a shape. Then you put in smudges for shadows and depth. We might do this because we were brought up to draw this way; we might do it because we are really in love with line and don't know. Artists know it. Artists know it well.
PW
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
October 27, 2009
It's hard for me to believe that a month ago I was sitting in a B&B on the west coast of Ireland contemplating the mystery of it all and wishing I had more time for chasing down the haunts of Granule, their Lady Pirate. I think of Ireland often: It comes to mind as an image flying by the window of a Dublin tour bus, or that all-over sense of being surrounded by mountains up close, or the surprise of seals sunning themselves on a rock in the bay. Or it can come as a return of Granule. When our national news reported that Ireland had voted to accept the "Lisbon Treaty," I thought of the conversation I'd had with the curator of the tiny Granule Museum, why she was opposed to it, what Granule would have thought of it, and then of the myriad other things that confront other countries that we know nothing about.
It is a magical place, Ireland. It doesn't leave you. No wonder these people believe in leprechauns and pots of gold at the end of rainbows!
I must harness my thoughts and get back to my latest project, my latest mess. But Ireland will not go away for good, I know that.
PW
It is a magical place, Ireland. It doesn't leave you. No wonder these people believe in leprechauns and pots of gold at the end of rainbows!
I must harness my thoughts and get back to my latest project, my latest mess. But Ireland will not go away for good, I know that.
PW
Friday, October 23, 2009
October 23, 2009
We went to Charlotte Wednesday. There is a sum total of two galleries in the North Davidson district still on their feet, and one of those features "high end" crafts. The one remaining is owned and operated by a smart, brisk, business-savvy woman who has a file of clients, many of whom are corporations.
Upshot: She loved my work Katherine showed her!
It's like the clouds have parted and salvation pours down!! Now I have ideas for much more work and all the energy it summons at the outset to begin.
The beloved loves me after all!
PW
Upshot: She loved my work Katherine showed her!
It's like the clouds have parted and salvation pours down!! Now I have ideas for much more work and all the energy it summons at the outset to begin.
The beloved loves me after all!
PW
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
October 20, 2009
The longer I ponder the notion, the more I believe that one's relationship with art--or one particular piece--is like a marriage: To keep on working with it, you must fall in love with it. You have to be interested enough in it to stay with it through the bad times to see how it turns out. There has to be some sort of sticking power that links the artist to her work.
You can break up, vow never to see each other again, throw away all reminders of the relationship; but you can't get rid of the connection or the whispering in your inner ear....
So, renew your vows, renew your vision of the beloved, and try something else, one more time. It's all you can do. It's all I can do, for sure.
PW
You can break up, vow never to see each other again, throw away all reminders of the relationship; but you can't get rid of the connection or the whispering in your inner ear....
So, renew your vows, renew your vision of the beloved, and try something else, one more time. It's all you can do. It's all I can do, for sure.
PW
Saturday, October 17, 2009
October 17, 2009
The weather is changing prematurely from a colorful promise of autumn to a miserable wet, windy, overcast winter. It's been this way all week, getting colder with each passing day, and more forecasted. Aside from hating winter anyway, I'm frightened that there is a return of the situation of last year that socked me in to a coma in front of the fireplace. I just need to keep working.
Additionally, I have stacked a few pieces of emotional furniture in my mental space that may make this winter somewhat different: I'm going to the gallery twice a month, I've met some other artists who react the way I do to the doldrums, and we've promised to be a support for each other, I'm getting to WeightWatchers every week, and I have the spectre of my show in just seven months spurring me on.
I do wonder if I should be trying to make paintings in the first place. What inner voice is it that whispers in our ears that we must be doing this, as both an identity and a life's mission. Maybe it came from some peculiar flight of imagination as children and we've become so used to it that we think it relates a Real part of us. On the other hand, I've denied it for years on end and it didn't go away, just hid in a corner. One of those "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" deals. An artist friend of mine says, "It just isn't easy being an artist."
We need a Godess of Artists to whom we might offer prayers and gifts (bribes) with the plea that we might stay on the ball and enjoy a happy life.
More to come!
PW
Additionally, I have stacked a few pieces of emotional furniture in my mental space that may make this winter somewhat different: I'm going to the gallery twice a month, I've met some other artists who react the way I do to the doldrums, and we've promised to be a support for each other, I'm getting to WeightWatchers every week, and I have the spectre of my show in just seven months spurring me on.
I do wonder if I should be trying to make paintings in the first place. What inner voice is it that whispers in our ears that we must be doing this, as both an identity and a life's mission. Maybe it came from some peculiar flight of imagination as children and we've become so used to it that we think it relates a Real part of us. On the other hand, I've denied it for years on end and it didn't go away, just hid in a corner. One of those "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" deals. An artist friend of mine says, "It just isn't easy being an artist."
We need a Godess of Artists to whom we might offer prayers and gifts (bribes) with the plea that we might stay on the ball and enjoy a happy life.
More to come!
PW
Monday, October 5, 2009
October 5, 2009
Saturday I went to WeightWatchers--the first meeting since our return from Ireland. We talked about the causes for our individual eating disorders and what we do about them. I said that I was able to become absorbed in making art and then didn't think about eating badly.
Immediately I could tell that the others dismissed what I was saying, because I am an artist and they are not. The leader asked, "Is your art like a hobby or like a job?" Here was my big chance to lay it out well, and I didn't because it caught me on the run and I didn't have a prepared answer. What I did say is this: We are all artists when we enjoy making something beautiful. I can't think of a woman who doesn't love some sort of "artistic" pursuit: gardening, sewing, quilting, cooking, applying make-up, whatever. But our society doesn't honor this in us. Quite the reverse! These activities are put down as "women's work," and the artist is some incomprehensible character who operates on a hidden, mysterious level. Even doing something well is not labeled as artistic, though there is no reason that it couldn't be.
But defining what painting is to me is still a bafflement: like a hobby because it is motivated by love, like a job because it is demanding and consuming. It is the Grand Passion that walks with us throughout our lives.
PW
Immediately I could tell that the others dismissed what I was saying, because I am an artist and they are not. The leader asked, "Is your art like a hobby or like a job?" Here was my big chance to lay it out well, and I didn't because it caught me on the run and I didn't have a prepared answer. What I did say is this: We are all artists when we enjoy making something beautiful. I can't think of a woman who doesn't love some sort of "artistic" pursuit: gardening, sewing, quilting, cooking, applying make-up, whatever. But our society doesn't honor this in us. Quite the reverse! These activities are put down as "women's work," and the artist is some incomprehensible character who operates on a hidden, mysterious level. Even doing something well is not labeled as artistic, though there is no reason that it couldn't be.
But defining what painting is to me is still a bafflement: like a hobby because it is motivated by love, like a job because it is demanding and consuming. It is the Grand Passion that walks with us throughout our lives.
PW
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