BACK AT LAST!

After two years of no posts, I am ready to begin anew. Last year I didn't paint at all for various health reasons - like a broken right elbow! I am now back to painting and focusing on new subjects. Last summer's drought in Oklahoma caused many wildfires and I became interested in the beauty of that which cleanses and renews as it consumes.

Wildfire is the first in a serieds of fire pasintings I am making. My plan is to make fire the first subject in a series of works focusing on the forces of nature - earth, air, fire, water.

Dixie

Not quite a month ago, I stopped to look at some Lab mix pups, free for the taking, in a Wal-Mart parking lot. I have done this many times and gone on my way. This time, the guy was way too smart as he held her and stroked her and suddenly reached in the car and put her on my shoulder. She began licking my throat and my face - next thing I knew she was coming home with me. It has been 50 years since I had a young puppy and I had forgotten the many lessons to learn (for both of us!) and the many weeks and months it takes to settle in. She is a love, is great company, and has me moving around more than I have in years!

Painting, once again, suffers although I have managed to start an 8x10 of clouds - the first in a series of six cloud paintings. Dixie and I are making progress so I'm sure painting and I will progress also - and the results will appear once again on my blog.

Homage to Magritte

The time between the holidays and my March trip to Nashville was not completely idle. As part of a fundraiser, I had the manikin head of a youth to decorate in some fashion for an auction. My first thought was of a young man, his head in the clouds with an unknown future full of possibilites. As I described my idea to a friend, he mentioned Rene Magritte, one of my favorite artists. Clouds are an essential element in many of his paintings and the reference excited me. I began looking at Magritte images online and discovered he had painted four plaster heads made from a cast of Napoleon's death mask. I found three of them and all were blue heads with white clouds. That sealed it for me.

First I painted the head blue - probably ten times - until I finally got the color I wanted. Then I began painting - first the face, then around to the side, the back, the other side and back to the face. Once I made the full revolution, I discovered that the clouds on the face no longer made sense with the ones on the last side. So, I started again - front to side to back to side, with a few zigzags in the process. I don't know how many times I painted around that head, at least seven and maybe more. Each time the paint got thicker and stayed wet longer. If I had not had a deadline to submit the head, I would still be painting round and round. So I made an arbitrary decision to complete where I was and stop. I mounted the head on a slab of black walnut and sent it out into the world.

Lesson learned: I do not want to make a habit of painting in the round. It is amazingly difficult and that possibility had never entered my head when I started. At the same time, thinking in three dimensions like a sculptor is comfortable for me, as I began my foray into art by sculpting. So who knows - lesson learned but maybe having learned it I can do it again - better than the first time!

Marsh Triptych - version 1

This triptych consists of three 20"x20" canvases, which I painted for my niece and her husband for Christmas. She and I had discussed the space in her living room where she wanted a painting, the colors and the general idea of a landscape. I worked from a series of disparate photographs to create a composition true to the idea of a marsh with my own message - that man moves into fragile environments, pushing the limits and changing the natural habitat forever. Thus the fishing shack, the distant boat and the large egret observing.

That was my idea and I thought it would go rather quickly when I began painting in September. It did not go quickly and I laboured on it without much satisfaction. My plan was to drive the three canvases over to Nashville at Thanksgiving and store them at my brother's until Christmas. Finally realizing that I could not finish them, I set my brushes aside with the idea that I would return after Christmas to complete the paintings.

The afternoon before I left I started to make changes and eventually changed about 1/3 of the composition. Wet paint began turning to mud that evening and I realized that the paintings I was giving them for Christmas were not at all what I wanted them to be. Nonetheless, this is what they looked like when they unwrapped them. They liked the idea and the general paintings but were glad I planned to return in a few months to complete them.

Meanwhile, the holidays were upon me - many activities and things to be done. I didn't paint at all during the that season. And that non-painting period extended until I returned to Nashville in March to complete the triptych.

Marsh Triptych

Upon returning to Nashville in March, I spent a lot of time looking at the original version of this painting and determined what I perceived to be the major problems. I liked my concept and the basic design but because my niece had changed her living room, it was apparent that I needed to brighten and lighten the painting. The water courses did not feel true and actually created a discordant feeling when I looked at the composition.

I set up my easel in my brother's garage and went to work defining the marsh grass areas and the new water courses. Using bright ochres and yellows for the grasses achieved the brighter and lighter effect I wanted. Delineating the lines where the grasses emerged from the marsh waters turned out to be the most demanding aspect of the changes and the most critical as that element grounded the whole composition.

When I finsihed, I was quite happy with the painting. It pleased me aesthetically, philosophically and was a successful completion of a personal challenge. And, most of all, my three-year old great nephew studied it intently for a minute then turned and said "Susie, you are a GREAT painter." What more could a great aunt want?!

The challenges involved have to do with the lessons learned:
1. Only paint what you know, what you can see, and what you understand. I have only had one marsh experience in my life and that was thirty years ago. I don't have the "feel" of the marsh inside of me so I had to approach it from a cerebral rather than a visual or emotional place.
2. Paint only for the painting. Wherever it hangs, if it is a decent painting, it will look good. By painting to a specific room, lighting situation and furniture arrangement, I first limited myself and developed a darker painting that I did not like. The final version, still designed for a specific place, is truer to me and my emotions rather than to the aspects of the room.
3. Once again, I learned that you can always correct your mistakes. You might have to start a new canvas but you can rework a painting until you are satisfied that it has reached its completion.
4. Paint for yourself and love what you are painting.

Now, will I remember these things and move forward?

My Backyard

This is the painting I have been fighting all summer and finally it is done. Richard McKown, my mentor, challenged me in late June to paint my backyard in the dark. So I began painting from 6:00-6:30 each morning and found the process interesting and fun but difficult when it came to the details, which made it very busy. The junipers alone presented a huge problem and the somewhat ragged flower bed with a mix of daisies, echinacea and hydrangeas were basically chaotic. And then there was the partially hidden bird bath which really made no sense. I painted and repainted and was ready to toss it, when Richard suggested I simplify it with hard edges defined by color.

His suggestion came from my reaction to the many paintings we had viewed together online and in museums as he was trying to understand what reaches me emotionally and can be the impetus that will inform the way I express in paint the essence of what I value. The approach he suggested was defintely in line with the paintings I love but was also a whole new way of painting and I hardly knew where to begin. There were many more layers of paint and more struggles as I tried to understand how to simplify and create interest without losing the sense of my backyard. During this process, the time of the painting moved into the light of mid-morning. The blocks of flat color are simplified forms of the yard's plantings. Although not easily seen in this photo, the major features have a contrasting color outlines which energize the painting while defining the objects. Color really became the major consideration in the composition to give the painting movement and create interest.

I learned a lot in the long process of making this painting and am anxious to start another one of these - likely one of the skulls which I love and which lend themselves to this approach. That, unfortunately, is apt to be November since I have so much on my plate for the next 6-7 weeks. So this will be my last post for awhile but I would love to hear from you and get your thoughts on this new approach.

Pecos Mission Ruins II

If you look at Pecos Mission Ruins I, which I posted way back on May 16th, you can place this view in the context of that view of the ruins. In the Pecos I painting, on the lower right side, you see two beams sticking out from the church. In this painting, those two beams are pointing toward you, one atop the other, right next to the corner buttress. The painting it self is fairly dark (top image)and the details are hard to see, so I have lightened it a little in the lower version so you can see the details more clearly.

I have done very little painting since June and am only starting to paint regularly again - although I'll be away for several weeks and will return to prepare a senior seminar that I will be teaching in the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at the University of Oklahoma. The topic of my seminar relates directly to these mission paintings as it will explore the idea that through the architectural remains of 17th century missions and pueblos we can come to some degree of understanding about the relationship between the puebloans and the friars who directed the building of these missions and played an important role in the life of the pueblos.

I do have one painting which I will finish this weekend and post before leaving. It is a complete change of direction from what I have been doing and would love to hear some comments.