Remarkably, time has passed since the last entry. I'm down to nine canvases to go in nine weeks. It's the kiss of death to think like this, because almost always one invites a stall or disaster when the gods (or "ill trained labrador") is tempted.
I think the well of ideas needs to refill from time to time. That's why, when I've finished a huge undertaking, I'll declare, "Never again. I'm going to quit painting because I've learned all there is for me to know, said all I have to say...." and then begin to assemble problems to solve again. Things just have to settle before another direction emerges from the dust. I'm fervently hoping this sense of depletion doesn't occur before the last canvas for this show is finished.
The monsters are safely propped up against a far wall and haven't managed to offend me as yet. Of course, I make it a point not to look at them for fear there will be "something else" I "ought" to do to them. Reason tells me that I've done the best I could with them and that any additional effort at correction would not only fail to correct anything but cause problems that weren't there.
It threatens to snow again today, about the sixth event of the season. Crocusses are showing in the garden, perhaps the clouds will see them and move on....
PW
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Saturday, February 13, 2010
February 15, 2010
This is to announce to the world (and I'm hearing a fanfare of trumpets) that The Monsters Are Finished!!! The weight of the world has been taken off my back. The buggers just need their edges neatened up and varnish applied, and they're DONE.
Now I can get to the other nine canvases remaining for the Big Show in May.
Last night we had the fourth snowfall of the season. I realize I shouldn't complain, considering the horrible condition of our northeastern neighbors, but I was numb watching it come down. My back can't take much more time behind a snow shovel, at least in one season.
But never mind: The Monsters Are Finished!!! The joy in that overrides everything!
PW
Now I can get to the other nine canvases remaining for the Big Show in May.
Last night we had the fourth snowfall of the season. I realize I shouldn't complain, considering the horrible condition of our northeastern neighbors, but I was numb watching it come down. My back can't take much more time behind a snow shovel, at least in one season.
But never mind: The Monsters Are Finished!!! The joy in that overrides everything!
PW
Saturday, February 6, 2010
February 6, 2010
I was showing my SO the progress I'd made on The Monsters, and she said: "These colors are just beautiful!" I said, I hope so, that's what it's all about for me, and my mind went back to a time many years ago when those words had an unwanted significance.
When I was 12 or 13, my mother had a good friend who happened to be the head of the psychology department at Baylor University. She arranged with him to give me a Rorschach test. I think this was because she wanted me to stop punishing my brother. I guess she thought anyone must be nuts that wouldn't love him, or that she might approach me more effectively through psychology than by the threats that hadn't been working.
(My brother was a poor excuse for a human being, he was his whole life long; and I'm not sorry for any grief I mananged to give him. I hesitate to call him an SOB or a bastard, because both these epithets wind up insulting my mother. As a feminist (and a mother), I am very bothered about that.)
Anyhow, I spent a couple of enjoyable Saturday afternoons in this gentleman's office identifying various blobs and shapes, the most memorable of which were the ones in color. I recall one that looked like a lake in a springtime meadow: It was ringed by a riot of flowers and sparkling insects, and I couldn't say enough about the color. It was truly beautiful. And when the test was done, I was told that I needed to be nicer to my brother. And my mother was told that I was too much in the thrall of my emotions. (Recall that we're talking about a a pubscent female, now.) While both these conclusions may have been accurate, I wonder why the psychologist couldn't have said, "What we have here is a potential artist who will find the joy of her life in working with color." Would that information not have been more helpful? Does all artistic passion boil down to some sort of psychological disorder? Are artists doomed to a wasteland of "Different" because we see the world around us in a way not typical of mainstream observers?
Further, I wonder how much of the arts is sacrificed to some physical/psychological deficit: El Greco had an astygmatism, Van Gogh was crazy, Lautrec was a drunk who hung out in the Moulin Rouge, etc. A better description of art and the passion some of us find for making it is that it is magical and mystical and defies explanation.
That's what I think when I'm just about finished with something and I feel it's turned out well. Other times, I'm afraid I do wonder if I've lost my mind.
PW
When I was 12 or 13, my mother had a good friend who happened to be the head of the psychology department at Baylor University. She arranged with him to give me a Rorschach test. I think this was because she wanted me to stop punishing my brother. I guess she thought anyone must be nuts that wouldn't love him, or that she might approach me more effectively through psychology than by the threats that hadn't been working.
(My brother was a poor excuse for a human being, he was his whole life long; and I'm not sorry for any grief I mananged to give him. I hesitate to call him an SOB or a bastard, because both these epithets wind up insulting my mother. As a feminist (and a mother), I am very bothered about that.)
Anyhow, I spent a couple of enjoyable Saturday afternoons in this gentleman's office identifying various blobs and shapes, the most memorable of which were the ones in color. I recall one that looked like a lake in a springtime meadow: It was ringed by a riot of flowers and sparkling insects, and I couldn't say enough about the color. It was truly beautiful. And when the test was done, I was told that I needed to be nicer to my brother. And my mother was told that I was too much in the thrall of my emotions. (Recall that we're talking about a a pubscent female, now.) While both these conclusions may have been accurate, I wonder why the psychologist couldn't have said, "What we have here is a potential artist who will find the joy of her life in working with color." Would that information not have been more helpful? Does all artistic passion boil down to some sort of psychological disorder? Are artists doomed to a wasteland of "Different" because we see the world around us in a way not typical of mainstream observers?
Further, I wonder how much of the arts is sacrificed to some physical/psychological deficit: El Greco had an astygmatism, Van Gogh was crazy, Lautrec was a drunk who hung out in the Moulin Rouge, etc. A better description of art and the passion some of us find for making it is that it is magical and mystical and defies explanation.
That's what I think when I'm just about finished with something and I feel it's turned out well. Other times, I'm afraid I do wonder if I've lost my mind.
PW
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