intuitive painting

2009-08-16T13:53:00.003-10:00

At last, I have come to an insight as to my preference for abstract art.

With realistic art, you will have consensus from viewers what is the subject of the work (e.g. "a girl"). You might get some variation on the emotive qualities, sad, or pensive, whatever. But even that would be just a few variables.

With abstract art, you can get as many various responses as there are viewers. In other words, to answer the question "What is it?" abstract art tells about the person seeing it and the relationship that person holds with the forms in front of him or her.

The exponential number of responses is what I love about abstract art. Instead of being a piece of work about something, it is possible to be everything, or...

My favorite riddle:

What is greater than God?
What is meaner than the devil?
Rich men want it.
Poor men have it.
If you eat it, you'll die.

So, rather than painting something, I paint pure potential, or a whole lot of nothing.

2009-01-03T17:29:00.008-10:00

Above: The painting that is a stretch for me. I hid it (facing away from public view in a dark corner) until I was ready to approach it again. I think I'll title it "al dante". I still don't like it, but that may only mean it's not done yet. Or it wasn't one I did for me. Who knows?

After a screen printing class one weekend, I dragged a print across canvas from the screen, and am now building a cliche Hawaii painting out of it.

This image is a bit faded from the actual colors: brilliant jewel tones. Title "Tales from the Alhambra" after whose-it's book. I'll get a better photo of it when I put on the finishing touches.

Titled "Sense and Dollars" in this one I'm exploring the idea of a recession, fears of scarcity, and the idea that life is full of much more than money... and how much easier money can make things.

"Sense and Dollars" again, with an untitled work that is in progress.

A freshly started canvas, to show how I begin. This is "Talk Story". I will next put down glazes of color/tone to cover the canvas and then go back into the original sketched idea and elaborate on it. The tiny green canvas is another one I'm playing with, having first glazed it and then starting to doodle afterwards.

2008-11-20T09:31:00.004-10:00

It's one of those embarrassing 'aha's that hit me. You know, the thing everyone else sees as obvious, but you miss because you're breathing it? For me, the obvious thing is that I am rolling in creative clover.

We have an art supply store. We have a yarn shop here too. I am in a loving and supportive relationship with my husband who regularly encourages me to play. I have time and spaces available for my play. And I have no constraints (clients, designers, specs, whatever) on how I do the creating.

It doesn't get much better than this.

For me, listing what we have right now is a figure/ground shift. I have been warding off attacks from conventional viewers and creators, the mainstream of what is "art." We have been in economic uncertainty with the shop for a long time now. These external influences had colored my perceptions to the point of blacking out the general background that now makes me jealous of myself. The background has come to the fore.

In this new perception's light, my painting is taking on new light as well. I am free! I have materials with which to play. I will play.

2008-11-11T05:24:00.002-10:00

Screen printing!

I took a two day workshop this past weekend to learn silk screen printing. It is the latest "thing" for our customers, and I knew so little about it that I wasn't even sure what to supply. Now I know enough about it to have a reasonable supply. I cannot, contrary to my hopes, instruct customers in all the methods of using the media during their visit to the shop... it's pretty involved.

In the class, I went nuts printing because... you can. You can whip out copy after copy of the image until you've had enough of it and tried it on every surface you can think of and your classmates start to give you room just in case you find them sitting still long enough to print them. At least, that's how it was for me.

In order to stockpile prints to collage, and repurpose later, I printed on cardstock with and without designs, a canvas, watercolor paper, tinted pastel and charcoal papers, and velvet. I didn't print on clothes only because my designs were faces, and that seemed unclothing-like.

Today at the shop I prepared a screen with photo emulsion. This is the one technique we didn't learn in class, and the method that most of our customers are using. So, I'm going to try it on my own in the coming days. Right now the screen is drying.

I learned that with silk screens you can:

paint your design directly on the screen, do some mojo, and print it
paint directly on the screen what you don't want to print (reverse process)
use black markers, sumi-e ink, or whatever you want to draw and then reproduce that image
use ready made stencils or cut your own out of anything, including just freezer paper
print through a plain screen to print a colored background (and you can mess with that too)

Honestly, I was hoping that I'd learn the techniques and then be able to say, "This is nice, but it's not for me." Instead, I found I loved doing it, despite the messy, involved, cluttery thing that it is. So, you can expect some prints to be showing up in my images here in the future.

2008-10-28T17:09:00.002-10:00

I'm still painting, but in an unusual phase. Mostly, I'm working small, quietly, like water trickling from a stream. Eventually I expect the bits that I've done to end up as lakes, rivers, and oceans. Time will tell. I'm doing the little stuff because I can't seem to bring myself to do the big stuff.

If there's anything I've learned about creating so far, it's to keep going, keep doing, regardless of my feelings. If I keep the momentum going, it's much easier when the flow grows to keep going than to get started again.

So, my recent mantras are:

Work quickly
Use what you have already
keep the momentum going

I'll show you the results of these thoughts as they form visually.

2008-10-16T10:16:00.007-10:00

This is a finished painting "Listening" which is hung over a sculpture my dad just finished for me title "Limu" (Hawaiian seaweed.) It's fitting that my father/harshest critic/fan/medici has stretched to a work of semi-abstraction and given it to me.

This is a new favorite I just started (mentioned in the previous post as delicious greys). I've titled it "Tales from the Alhambra" since I just finished reading the book and this underpainting and initial sketch seemed very Moorish.

Two of four paintings re-created out of a larger work that I vivisected and am now finishing with a breath of a sine wave in the overall design. This will be able to be hung in a long arrangement with some longer/narrower elements, or a square format with the same assymetries. I'll show you the possibilities when the foursome is complete.

Some more delicious greys from the previous week. I have since put in a haze of warm red. I don't know what this one is about yet or where it's going. It is rooted in fear: the barrage of outside voices opposing abstraction got focused onto this canvas. I did that same transmutation of feelings of aggravation at "life's little irritations" and ended up with my highest-paying painting yet. We'll see what this fear will turn into...

Jack and me napping: with some new layers of color washed onto it. I don't know what to do next with this one.

2008-09-29T12:56:00.002-10:00

Mona Lisa Smile

We borrowed the DVD and watched it for the second time. I didn't know we'd seen it until part way through and I said, "This is the one with the paint-by-numbers."

I had to wonder why that detail, of all things, stuck in the brain that couldn't remember seeing the movie in the first place. The PBN (paint by number) scenes turned out to reveal the thesis of the movie, to wit, that an artist is popularized by the masses and never by the critics. (I wanted to add that popularity rarely comes in time to put supper on the table, a table in the house, or the house around the artist. But that isn't true, nor is it the premise of the movie.)

So, the idea is that if we are going to remain true to ourselves, that will make sense later in life. I'm thinking that what I'm doing might not make sense until later in someone else's life... if ever.

Today is my painting day. I'm writing this blog between canvases. I could hardly get started again after the poison of judgments that have flown about my head lately. So, I set aside my head and let my heart paint. I was afraid to paint. I got some greys on the canvas. Some delicious sweet and savory greys. I made some marks. I was about to freeze on marking the next canvas when I saw drips from the first splotching the surface. That freed me to make whatever mistakes I will proceed to make. So, I'm on with it then.

2008-09-18T09:32:00.005-10:00

My dad decided to buy the abstract painting that he has been baby-sitting for me. It is titled "The Space Between" and is full of computer components and painted entirely in 0's and 1's. I was thinking of our techno-busy lives and how it is such a breath of fresh air when the computer goes down, the electricity off, and all our conveniences let go of us. Then there's just space.

When dad first saw it, not knowing the title, he said, "I see that you painted my brain." I laughed, told him the title, and said maybe I was thinking of the space between his ears. He has since re-named it "My Brain Headache" as a play on words for migraine headache.

Dad's purchase of the painting is very strange because of my receiving from him two emails saying that Picasso was an abomination. The last one said that Picasso should have been stoned to death. Then I got dad's opinion that I was smart to sign my abstracts with a nom de plume (Kala Kale: Sarah Charles in Hawaiian) in order to hide my real identity on that sort of work. The painting that dad purchased was one of my first abstracts, and I was embarrassed to think at the time of creation that he might ever see it and know I did it.

I have some things figured out about all of this. First, the purchase is a mercy mission. Dad knows that the shop is slow, and it's his way of giving us some money. Second, a part of dad actually likes the painting, although he hasn't said that and probably never will. Just by sitting with it for these weeks, it started to have a conversation with him and asked him some questions he hadn't previously entertained. Third, I did a good job protecting my developing abstract-artist self from a mean man. I am now more immune to his scathing opinions, but not entirely. If he had hit me with "this is trash but I'll buy it from you" when I was starting out, I wouldn't have painted again.

I don't know how to help my dad to creative freedom. But I can see now that his criticisms are much more painful for his life than they could ever be for me. My job, if I choose to accept it, is to keep from holding my opinions and beliefs so solidly that they become my prison.

It's my blessing to dad that the painting will continue to converse with him, and give him permission to open the non-existent barriers.

2008-08-26T13:20:00.006-10:00

Yesterday I painted during my 3-6:00 dedicated time at the shop. The Critic showed up (my internal editor) and said a few things about my efforts. First I heard, "I've forgotten how to paint." Then I heard a sneer and, "As if I ever knew how to paint in the first place." I recognized these unkindnesses for what they were (fluff and fear) and painted anyway.

Later, an ole guy came in for airplane parts (he's known us for three years, now) and observed that I knew how to paint. Yup. He asked if any of my work was in the shop (oh, just on all the walls here), so I showed him the portrait of David.
He harumphed and said that he guessed I just about nailed a likeness. Then I showed him the abstract in process that was right in front of him. He violently turned away and said, "oh no, no, that's not for me. I never figured out what that's all about."

Apparently, for this man, if you can't figure it out, it doesn't exist in front of you. Even for three years.

A customer came in and looked at the works in progress and gave me his opinion: "Well, you just let it all hang out, don't you?"

The next blow came in an email from my dad, who is babysitting one of my paintings. Dad intended to compliment it, but ended his comments with

I never thought Picasso had the right idea,

even as successful as he was!

So, in one day, I had been told by myself, a curmudgeon, and my father that abstract painting is impossible, invisible exhibitionism, pointless, and just plain the wrong idea.

Phew. That's a lot of creative poison. But leave it to my really old friend Lao Tzu to have the antidote. My translation from the Tao Te Ching says:

A good artist lets his intuition

lead him wherever it wants.

This was exactly what I needed to hear. The intuition (no wonder I call it intuitive painting!) gets to take the lead. It's not about what I want (acceptance, popularity, big bucks...) It's about wherever the intuition leads me.

Well, that's a relief. Now if I get the wrong idea, I can blame my intuition.

Said another way, here is an alternative definition of the Law of Attraction from the blog The Compassionate Eye:

instead of trying to attract something to ourselves, we are invited to surrender to the Presence that is seeking to make itself known in and through us

So, yes, I guess I do let it all hang out. And maybe that is exactly what is needed of me.

2008-07-22T13:03:00.003-10:00

Reflection

about 8"x10"
oil on canvas

This is one of Dede's favorites... I think because it is of him when we're finally doing our rocking chair and meatloaf for dinner thing.

The canvas started out as purely abstract, and then I went through my cabbaged photos from the internet. This gent's presence was so compelling that I doodled him onto the abstract.

He seems to be pretty much at home.

2008-07-22T12:32:00.001-10:00

Rubber Ducky

about 12" x 14"
oil on canvas

Well, really: which way would you have turned it before signing it?

2008-07-22T12:22:00.005-10:00

These are pieces which I am working on currently. The "Shower Tree" and "Out o'the Box" are two stretching exercises I gave myself to try working differently from my usual style. They both make me very uncomfortable and leave me wondering what I am to learn from them. None of us are done yet, so the story awaits further light (and darks).

Shower Tree

11"x14" or so
oil on canvas

Out o'the Box

11"x14" or so
oil on canvas

Jack and Me Napping

24"x30"x3"
oil on canvas

The above is a just-started piece inspired by nap time before class. The canvas is a "breakage" unit because something tore the surface (not captured in the shot) a wee bit. I had to curb my enthusiasm when a customer came down reporting a torn canvas upstairs. My mind raced with what I could paint next!

2008-07-22T12:01:00.002-10:00

Listening

oil on canvas
approx 38"x44"

This was a primo canvas stretched for me by Ed and Verna as a gift. It is huge, and it is lead-primed linen (claussens). The canvas itself weighs a good bit. The painting is almost done... as in only a gazillion more hours of dry brush work to go to get it to where it's a zinger.

The most interesting thing about painting this piece has been working with the backlighting. Ed suggested that I paint the face highlights in lavender, and the shadows in peach, all of a light hue. This taught me about using cool and warm to create form instead of the usual light and shadow.

This one will be a keeper because the canvas was a gift and I like the gist of the message.

2008-07-22T11:59:00.002-10:00

Also shown in an earlier post, this painting is now complete after its sale and exchange for another...

... It was almost a preemie

2008-07-22T11:49:00.004-10:00

Being a purveyor of the stuff of art, I make samples from time to time with materials that we sell so that people can see some possibilities. Product R&D accounts for a good percentage of our sales: to ourselves.

This canvas is linen (lovely bounce) primed with a clear gesso, so that the color of the linen can become part of the scheme in the piece. I chose to do a sketch with oils, putting down only the shadows and highlights so that the tan of the linen would provide midtones:

8"x8"

We also sell tiny canvases/canvaii. These are popular items, but I had to give them a go just for fun. The last picture is of the tiny things on display so you can get a sense of proportion:
2"x2"

1.5"x2"

2008-07-22T11:40:00.002-10:00

Blue Squares

oil on canvas
42"x48"

This piece has appeared in previous posts because I had the canvas tacked to the walls of the shop as a painting, although I've known it isn't finished yet. A customer who purchased The Source (aka Zeus) asked me about this painting, and when I told him I didn't feel like it was complete, he said it needed turquoise pyramids. Just spelling that slowed me down. Hearing it quickened my inspiration and sounded like a wacky enough idea to do it.

Now the canvas is stretched properly upon bars and ready for the next whatever, probably a suggestion of something in turquoise.

You have to love it: turquoise pyramids! Oh, and he said they should be the three-sided ones. I didn't know pyramids had different numbers of sides...

For Where's Waldo fans, the painting has two elements from actual photos: the highlights on a baseball cap and the highlights on a rippling evening gown. All of life is merely abstraction made into preconceived patterns...

or something like that

2008-07-22T11:32:00.002-10:00

Mermaid's Smirk

approx. 14"x18"
oil on canvas

Yes, portraiture.

I'd like to use this post as a venue to open up a discussion:

Upon seeing this image, you may have said something like "oh, wow" or thought something like, "oh, she CAN paint". I'd like to ask you to think aloud in the comments section here and help me to understand what it is about a recognizable picture that catches us so instantaneously.

This is more than mere curiosity. I would like to get that same "ah!" from my abstracts, but I don't know yet what is the Ah-factor.

2008-07-22T11:11:00.006-10:00

Penny in the Fountain

oil on canvas
approx 30"x48"

I think it is now done. The glass bits I added to the painting this morning came from a birthday gift assortment of doo-dads from my sister:

This canvas was originally prepared as part of a mixed-media class, where we contrived to add as much stuff as possible to the creation in progress. My results were the equivalent of an attempt in throwing a wad of pizza dough into the air along with string and copper wire. The conglomerate never made it to the prepared canvas, and I used this surface instead for one of the paintings done in my accustomed manner. This is the first undamaged canvas I have worked on in some time.

2008-07-22T10:41:00.007-10:00

Here's what I've been up to, on Mondays from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. in the parking lot. I paint, and people come to learn and end up just painting. I get nervous just before class wondering what I have to offer any other person who wishes to create. After each class I realize that I offer a space and time, to myself and others, where we can show up and paint. It's the best scope and sequence I've come up with in my teaching career: just painting.

I'll show the works in a series of posts so that each one doesn't get too image-heavy, and I can talk a lot about each idea without sounding as windy as I am.

The two recent paintings "Root Children" and "Penny in the Fountain" are hallmark works in that I think they may show the direction my work will take from pure abstraction into adding two elements: recognizable forms, and attachments or inclusions.

Root Children:

oil on masonite panel
approx 22"x30"

The inclusions are plant material found by Jack's lua, and on a hike to the end of the world. I didn't alter the shapes of the bits at all, only adding a bit of coppery gilding to them in places:

2008-06-02T20:45:00.006-10:00

Well, twist my proud trumpet into a tuba.

After celebrating my overnight success, David and I joked that the woman might return the paintings as flawed (I paint on the damaged/rejected canvases from the shop*) or "the wrong color" for her decor. David went so far as to suggest that we tell her, in such an event, to repaint the house to match her new paintings.

How intuitive are we? Next morning, she calls, asking if she can exchange all four paintings. Eegads. There was a distinctive hiss as my spine deflated, and then I had to figure out what would be fair to all of us. Oy, the dismay I felt at such a short moment in glory.

I was reminded of the Tao Te Ching:

"Success is as dangerous as failure.
Hope is as hollow as fear.

What does it mean that success is a dangerous as failure?
Whether you go up the ladder or down it,
your position is shaky.
When you stand with your two feet on the ground,
you will always keep your balance."

I have been saved by a near imbalance...

Whether the colors worked for her or not, I am reminded that this woman was touched on a different level by my paintings, and for a moment, my voice was welcomed into someone's (a stranger's) home as beautiful.

* in preparation for my defense against the "flawed" claim, I came up with the following shameless self-promotion: Yes, I used damaged goods for my paintings. This is part of my trademark, rather like the distinctive flaws that identify a diamond. This is one of the ways that I create my work so that giclee's and reproductions will be clearly less than the original... Take It Or Leave It (TIOLI).

2008-05-30T19:47:00.003-10:00

Koi Pond:Gestation:
Today a woman purchased four..... count 'em, four of my original oil paintings. I am so thrilled, I don't even know what to say about it except, Phew. She bought the above two paintings (gestation wasn't finished, but then I guess that's right for the title...) plus two others pictured in previous posts: "Life's Little Irritations" and "Bambooish".

I signed Gestation while she ran errands, and then told David I was treatin' for dinner. I ordered three entree's and a pizza, for the two of us.

I am greatly encouraged. And it's really nice to have the spaces on the wall that now need to be filled. Flow!!!

2008-05-27T18:21:00.002-10:00

I've started a painting "class" at the shop.

On Mondays, from 3:00 until closing (6:00) I sit at a table out in our parking lot and paint on the projects I have going, or start some new paintings.

It's amazing, but that short period of time has given me a bit of a creative perk. I feel like I can do all that I need to get done, as well as be creative, just because I've set aside A Time to paint.

I've invited others to come and paint with me. Some have sounded excited about it, but none have shown up so far (just started this last Monday). My idea is to make the class like the yarn-working classes: everyone brings what they're working on or an idea of what they want to make, and then we work together to get there.

I like the informal format. I'm not charging, so I'm free to work on my stuff, not show up, or not care! How's that for lessez-faire instruction?

2008-04-24T11:06:00.004-10:00

Clearly, I haven't been painting... but I've been blogging. Thank goodness for the dual nature of my creative outlets. When I can't paint, I can write. When I can't write, I can paint. Knitting is the thread that rides through all of it.

I read Virginia Woolf recently and was sent into a reverie about women being involved in Great Movements. I realized that I wasn't at all involved in anything great. I have stubbornly stayed in my own little world, trying to be great in my consistency of doing something, anything. The greatness of my movement is in getting my rear to steer toward a blank and to put a mark there.

It may be, years from now, that I am a woman involved in the Great Movement known as intuitive painting (or whatever name we are given by those we can only talk to and not hear from.) It's also possible that I have delusions about being part of something other than my small grinding efforts at a creative existence. My grandeur, it seems, may be simply in my steering: tiny adjustments in course that, over time, determine the direction of something bigger than me. Illusions? Sure, why not.

In the mean time, I must stay with my most powerful question: What's next?

A friend of my husband's is in education, mostly with writing courses. They have a technique that is working and the administration is formalizing it. I hear the death knell. Only when the forerunners of the experience are willing to ditch the good ideas for better will we progress. It is not in refining an old process that we get to the new. We have to be shallow enough to say that our brain children are "so yesterday" in order to get to tomorrow and its needs.

What works is the act of showing up. It is not a matter of technique or skill levels or teachable/learning moments. It is a matter of sincere engagement with whatever is in front of us and finding the way to give voice to our experiences.

The great movements, to me, are the ones that Ask. In retrospect, they may look like great movements with Answers, but they started and grew as questions.

Probity is the key. Oh, I looked up that word and it wasn't what I wanted at all! Probity: complete and confirmed integrity; having strong moral principles; "in a world where financial probity may not be widespread..." Or maybe it was the right word, but I was thinking about probing questions, and being a questioner. Doesn't that sound like probity?! My definition of the key: sitting with the integrity of questions.

My thanks to Julia Cameron for giving me the "What's Next?" question out of "The Artist's Way."

2008-04-10T07:17:00.003-10:00

I took a six week painting course for using mixed media and collage in my work. It was heavenly the first day, setting time aside to be creative. It got stressful after that.

Some Saturdays I couldn't make it to the class because we didn't have enough people working the shop. Turned out most the time that was fine: One of the days we were doing encaustic (which is not my favorite in both the fumes and the results I get). One of the days was our final day, for which I would have rushed a finish and not been satisfied. Another day that I thought I was going to miss, I got to go. It turned out to be helpful in keeping me going rather than just hanging it up and going back to my thing.

So although the class didn't really work out for me, I gained several insights:

keep the momentum going
work with what you have already

And I remembered an agreement that I'd made with myself to put inclusions into my paintings that would make giclees clearly less than the original: bits of tile or gadgets or 3D something so that a photo doesn't do it for the painting.

I also learned that saying I'm going to paint every Saturday morning isn't a real life thing. I can hope to paint Saturday mornings, and some of them I will get to do so. But as with all that I've accomplished so far, it's mostly going to get done in the space between, in the time that is the gap between real events. That's when I get the really important stuff done.

I need to clean my studio, to make the space and have it available for when the time comes. I have learned that the time comes when I show up. Not being able to show up at a class taught me something about doing things another's way. I cannot.

2008-02-25T18:05:00.002-10:00

Okay, Soul Level. Thank you for reading about my little corner of the world.

I took a weekend painting class from a successful abstract painter. The workshop was called "Intuitive Painting." I thought I had made up that moniker, but obviously not. I had also taken the man's class years ago, so maybe I got the name from there. I knew pretty much what to expect. Mostly, the class would crack me open and get me flowing some more.

Sure enough, it was as wild and creative as ever. Several students didn't return the second day. They probably would have broken rather than cracked with more prodding, and they may have gotten enough of a peek at creative freedom to develop a taste for it. One woman, a very accurate watercolor botanical painter, was uncomfortable with the silliness. Art, apparently, is serious stuff. Work, not play. She was one of the artists who got one day's worth of creative fiber and started cramping.

The instructor was in a different place in his life than years ago, too. He was "on strike" from painting himself, stating that he needed paintings to sell before he would paint any more. Dang, if I did that, I'd be done. But that taught me something too: make sure I paint in a way that makes it possible to store or transport. And to continue my practice of giving away paintings if it seems like the thing to do. I like giving paintings away because it keeps that dollar crapola out of the mix; a dangerous specter in creating is the idea of profiting from it financially.

Mostly I learned that from the first class I had gotten outside the box and gave myself permission to paint abstracts, come what may. And then I drew around me another box: the this-is-how I do it box. I also judged the box I'd left as old or not for me. Instead, maybe I can look at all these layers of boxes as a scaffold, building the creative in me, and making all levels and skills available to me at any time. I told the instructor about my thoughts, and he nodded knowingly, saying only, "There's always a prejudice somewhere."

So, I came home and painted some more in my box style. Then I started a painting trying to not do it in the box. And I considered adding some images into paintings I'm finishing (the old box: photorealism).

I want to have compassion for the artists who left the class. I want to say I understand the discomfort (which I do). If I were in a stuffy exacting class in using triple 0 brushes to paint eyelashes, I'd run screaming. So, we all have our thing. There's always a prejudice somewhere.

2008-01-01T20:10:00.001-10:00

I was going through my photos and backing up data the other night when I came across the source material for two of my recent photorealistic paintings. I was amazed at how accurately I had reproduced the original photos onto the canvases. Well, that got me thinking about the non-photo-based painting that I do: the abstracts.

With the photorealistic stuff, people look at it and say, "Wow, you really can paint." They say that because they can compare the accuracy of my representation. And let me tell you, we all value an accurate representation. How do we evaluate a painting of the unseen? How do we compare it?

In answer to these thoughts, I gave myself a powerful "what if?" What if my abstract paintings are as accurately representational of what I'm rendering as the photorealistic paintings? Only, my audience can't evaluate that, so I'm going to have to trust this to be true. This "what if" is very freeing for me. It also helps me to realize how badly I want approval, still, for my efforts and intentions.

Another cure-by-words came to me today. The popular opinion is that artists don't really get famous until they die. How about I pretend that I'm dead, and then paint as if I'm popular? It's freeing to think this way. When I'm dead, I have nothing to gain or to lose. I don't need approval when I'm dead, and popularity helps me not at all. There's a freedom in dying, and I intend to use it to it's fullest extent while I am useful.

2007-02-26T17:24:00.000-10:00

Again, I haven't been blogging, but I have been painting. I'll let the picture speak the thousand words for me.

The Birth of a Pearl:
Woman of Color:
Kona Mocha:
Still Your Sea:
Makae'o Walking Path:
Full Spektrum:
Flyers:
Finding My Way:
Earthquake 10.06:
Chew On This (older painting):
Blue Squares (older painting):
Bloodlines:

2007-01-28T09:26:00.000-10:00

I'm scanning a bunch of books on art and creativity before I put them on the floor of the shop. I've gained some good insights that I've tucked away (I should have jotted them down to share with you, but they're tucked in my mind somewhere and will come out eventually...) I've also read a bunch of hooey and rules that have nothing to do with what I understand about creativity.

The biggie that got me (and made me stop reading what this guy had to say) was his comment that art is not entertainment. Excuse me? Why not? I entertain myself both by creating and viewing or listening to/watching others' creations. He was on a roll with the ideas of art and genius and child's play. In his discussion he somehow forgot to let go of the rules.

Why would someone say that Art Is Not ...anything? Isn't creativity the nothing that is something and eventually everything? It would make more sense to say that Art Is Nothing than to say art is not entertainment, or not decoration, or not play, or not whatever. There is pure potential in Nothing. Nothingness is the space in the bowl that holds the soup, the cereal, the flowers, the rocks...

The idea that something is Not ties in nicely with my latest questions about being judgmental and evaluating. The words good and bad, like and dislike come so easily to me. They open and close doors in my mind like a strong wind. But what if in our need to find patterns and categorize we lose by shutting out?

What if trying to say what something is or is not were used only to include and not to exclude? For example, what if we could only say what art is and could not find validity in saying what it is not? Would that solve the judgment/values battle that pulls us apart inside ourselves and between us?

2006-11-21T09:15:00.000-10:00

I have strayed from abstraction. I wonder if it is a change in approach due to the normal changes in the course of a painter's life, or if it is a change in response to popular opinion. I am concerned that I'm leaning from the pressure of positive responses to the images I've created where people can say, "Oh, that's a nice _____." With the abstracts, most comments I receive sound like, "Wow, that's really beautiful. What is it?"

The "What is it" is getting me. When I painted "Life's Little Irritations," I simply named the title for what idea I was translating into an image. How do we answer the question as abstract painters: What is it? My most accurate answer would be that it's a combination of oils and pigments that I placed on a prepared cloth using a bunch of hairs held together on a stick. That's what all my paintings are, with sometimes a shell or tile or something glued to the surface as well.

I'm really liking the idea of adding a dimensional inclusion to the paintings for one reason: it makes giclees clearly less than the original. In the movie Multiplicity, the copies got weaker. I remember in my office days putting a sticky note on my master copy so that I wouldn't use it to write on and end up having to copy a copy. I'm using the tile, shell, bits of something unphotographable to make a sticky note on the master. Copy away, but the original IS different. The original is different if simply by the answer to What Is It? A copy is a mechanically printed facsimile on paper or canvas. Not oil, pigments, hairs, stick...

2006-11-16T05:24:00.000-10:00

I haven’t been blogging, but I have been painting.

I finished Life’s Little Irritations.

And quasi-finished Regrets Vanish.

I started painting a horse in fog on Mana Road, from photos I took some years ago. It will be interesting to paint all in greys.

And I started a coffee farm for a fellow who wants to buy the painting with Kona Coffee. YEEHAW. I painted fast on this one.

And here is the beginning of a piece that I didn’t know what it was about, so I just got started. Come to find out, it’s about Generosity of Spirit. I’ve had my share of miserly older women in the shop this past week, and it started me thinking about my own penny-pinching ways. The opposite of generosity must be fear, because I see such fear in myself and these mean-spirited people. One woman had a well-defined list of supplies to get for her husband. He was in a car accident some time ago, which she told me repeatedly, and they didn’t have money, also told repeatedly. I didn’t want to sell her anything because her objective was very clear: she didn’t want to spend any money on art supplies. We ended up with no sale because she requested assurance that she could return everything she had chosen to purchase, very little of which matched the list. I told her not in this case: I would accept no returns. She dropped her shopping basket and left. It was one of the best decisions I’ve made. Her mana (energy or demeanor, spirit) was poison to a place of abundant creativity, and she was immune to any comfort I would hope to offer her. I saw much of myself in her and hence am thinking about how to curb that tendency while still in the earlier years of my life. I’ll think about it while I paint.
The biggest question about this painting now is “What will her hand hold?” At first I thought about a gold coin, or light. But maybe an abstract symbol, an assemblage to represent generosity of spirit? What symbol can communicate this?

2006-10-31T14:55:00.000-10:00

I didn’t get to paint today. It’s like saying I didn’t get to see David today. It’s not a pleasant feeling for me. If I manage to paint every day, the flow is quite manageable and pleasant. When I stop, even for a day, it is unnerving and uncomfortable. I sound like an addict. But seeing David is an apt comparison. I love David. And it is love that informs my activity of painting.

You could also ask David, “Do you like her better on days she paints?” In fact, do that for me and let me know what he says. I’ll bet you lunch it’s yup.

I certainly like me better when I paint. I’m more fun to be with, because I’m engaged in doing something fun! No brainer...

Wading For You All My Life:

2006-10-31T14:38:00.000-10:00

This new painting is about myriad irritations. I was immediately surprised by how appealing and inviting the starting sketch and underpainting came out. I expected it to look, well, irritating. If this painting comes out attractive, it will be a testament to the transmutative power of creating. It will also be a strong argument for working on “off” days, since it could prove that any circumstantial/emotional condition is bark for the chipper.

2006-10-31T14:31:00.000-10:00

Today I did the underpainting and then the daubing of loose colors for Regrets Vanish.

Later I succumbed to popular opinion and blended the pointillized colors.
I wanted to regret that move, but it doesn’t fit the title of this piece for me to do so. Besides, I can recreate my intended pixelized effect later as I adjust the colors and get the focal point targeted.

I envision the focal point at her forehead, just between the eyes and above a bit. I want to pixelize at the fringes, at least, to give the feel of disintegration, vibration across time. This “person” is representing a mote, an atom, which when observed is not where it was supposed to be because I’m observing it’s past in targeting a space in which to find it. Said another way, to paint this image with the intent I have in mind, I need to anticipate only a second after the time of doing, to paint the next moment and thereby capture the now and immediacy of the gaze. Was it Rodin that achieved movement in his sculptures by placing anticipatory postures in the forms? This is what I am trying to express.

With how I have talked around these ideas I wish to portray, I am even more grateful for the wordless medium of painting to express this for me. Call it what you will... I just hope I can capture what I mean to.

2006-10-31T14:06:00.000-10:00

Today’s painting is going to be called “Regrets Vanish.” This is the sketch for the idea... not exactly an abstraction, but somehow it is. The look in the eyes of the reference photo were so refreshing, so of the moment. Out of everything I portray in this painting, I want to capture in the eyes the sense that the old is gone, the new not a concern, and a moment of being is enough to erase all the should/would/could have’s. Wouldn’t that be nice? For regrets to vanish...

2006-10-26T12:50:00.000-10:00

When we paint and draw, we simplify objects to lines and shapes. Later, we make them look less flat by creating the illusion of form.

When we abstract something, we use lines, (like sticks, swirls, curves, and dots); shapes (like circles, triangles, and squares) and forms (sphere, cones, and cubes) to create an image of something unseen. Abstract paintings capture a sense, a feeling, an intent.

Sorrow:

Some artists say that figurative art is more difficult for them to do because the artist is trying to make it look “right.” Other artists say abstract art is more difficult because the artist has nothing to look at to follow. (Not all figurative work is photo-realistic, and not all abstraction is without reference.) I think that they are equally difficult, or easy, depending on how you look at it.

I prefer the struggle involved in creating abstract art because I am eager to see what emerges, what this invisible thing looks like, and what I can learn about me and my beliefs as I work to create. In a way, abstract art helps me to see more clearly what I think of something.

When others view abstraction, the most common response is to try and see Something Recognizable. We might hear, “is that a nose?” or “I think I see a face there, no, well, part of one.” We do like to see the human form. Whenever we look we are matching curves and lines to our interests. But abstract art only works like that in small measure. Too much trying to “see something”, and you’ll give up in frustration (try a Pollack). The easier way to view abstract art is to soften your focus from the details for a moment and get the emotional gist of the piece. Does it remind you of anything? What does it move you toward or away from? What draws you in, and why?

So, words other than “nose” and “face” now apply. Even “I see ____” doesn’t really work on a literal level. With abstract art, it makes sense to say “I feel, I like...” and “this is uncomfortable, it feels like...” or “I just want to stay here, it gives me a sense of...” If we use “I see” in reference to abstract art, it makes the most sense meaning “I understand.”

2006-10-26T12:49:00.001-10:00

If we look at a painting with the question, “What is it?” in mind, then we have already narrowed the field of possible experiences from the viewing. Some questions open the view, and are just like the conversational skills we know to use when we want more than one word answers.

Try using open-ended questions when you view a piece of art. Ask, “How do I see this differently from another person?” Or maybe, “What do I see in this painting?” You could ask “What is different from how I would have viewed this 10 years ago?”

Yes, these questions are all more about you than about the work of art... which is actually what any work of art and your response to it was about anyway.

The Space Between:

2006-10-26T12:49:00.000-10:00

Self Portrait:

There are as many means of making abstract art as there are artists. An understanding of the process can greatly enhance your visual experience of the resulting product.

My first official abstract was done as an assignment. I had no clue where to begin to generate the painting, so as my professor talked, I did some sketches of a brochure she had for a new vehicle. I used the ellipse of a tire, the parallel lines of a side window, and then stared suggesting movement with shapes and lines. From the starting suggestions of a concrete image, I was able to extract some basic shapes and go from there.

Other paintings have arisen by thinking of an abstract noun such as the idea of joy, or inspiration. I then drew sketchy lines on my canvas with charcoal, holding the seed idea in mind. I later chose paints and techniques to finish the painting consistent with the initial idea.

I have also painted pieces of music, strong emotions, or any unnameable difficulties in my life. Abstraction is ideal for these processes because it bypasses our symbolic system and touches those spaces within us that are wider than words, deeper than designs, and more insistent than photo-accurate images.

2006-10-26T12:48:00.000-10:00

Abstract art: Yoga for the mind. Aka: what do I say about That???

“Whoa, that’s so good!”

“I don’t like that.”

Such comments abound when viewers see a piece of art work. There are problems with such analyses, however. Unless you purposely want to tend up in a debate, you might consider some other comments. It may seem strange that a person might not automatically say “whatever they want” about a work of art, but consider for a moment that the works are an artist’s creative brain child. Just as, even with your right to freedom of speech, you wouldn’t blurt, “That’s the ugliest baby I’ve ever seen.” Or “I don’t like her.” you do well to moderate your opinions on art.

The benefits are manifold. Your own perceptions can expand with a more gracious vocabulary. Other shy, blossoming, or practicing artists are surely within earshot and will be either inspired or discouraged by your contribution. If a butterfly on one part of the globe affects winds on another part, our words have even greater ripple effects. Additionally, the artist of the work you are evaluating could potentially hear or read your comment. So, to help the arts develop, even through baby stages and awkward growth phases, you need some words that will help and not harm.

Here are some seed ideas that you can use to grown your own phrases:

“I see _________________ (eg: reds, resting/fighting, in a dark surrounding)”
“I like how ________________(eg: the lines move/don’t move; the colors blend)”
“This makes me think of ______________” or “...feel ___________”
“I wonder how this painting developed.”

Questions are always helpful because they open the mind to the possibility of not-knowing. We usually want to know, so practice this posture for a stretch!

2006-10-26T12:47:00.000-10:00

“Does this qualify as an abstract?” My artist friend asks me. He wants to enter the piece in a juried show – for abstracts only. At first look, his paintin of surfers reclining on a beach doesn’t seem astract. After all, I just told you what the images are. I went to the internet to find definitions of Abstract Art and foudn the since the surfers, beach and water are loosely depicted more as simple shapes and lines with the emphasis on overall design, that the painting could be called abstract.

The definitions of abstract art are as various as the form itself. In a very broad definition, all art is abstract, since line, shape, form, and color are the elements of the designs no matter how representational a piece is intended to be. At the other end of this continuum is non-objective art where the representation of “real” objects is completely absent.

The most helpful definition I found from tvdecorators.com where abstract art is said to be an art expression in which the artistic values reside in the forms and colors rather than in the reproduction or presentation of subject matter. Where the expression resides...

2006-10-26T12:46:00.000-10:00

Abstract Art

The abstract work of art is participatory. The artist has given the audience a gift of trust. The creator trusts the viewer’s individual perceptions. No one, creator or receiver, need say “this is This” because abstraction shows the illusion. We may look at a painting of a farm working pitching hay into a pile and say “this is farm life” or “this is hard work” or whatever. The illusion has been so complete that no one undoes the contraction to say “This is a stretch of canvas, coated with various colors of paint to represent ______.”

But in abstraction, we are uncomfortably reminded that the medium is just a messenger, not life.

We want so badly to believe our ideals and romantic notions of life that we would find a work of art using manure, straw and splinters unappealing – although it is a concrete representation of farm life than a contented farmer bathed in warm light with a gentle kitten nearby and no odor, no blisters, no fatigue or grimaces.

This is, in part, why abstraction feels so raw. It is.

2006-10-25T09:01:00.000-10:00

Kanvas Karma

There's a self-determination about a canvas that the artist cannot go against. It is like the grain in wood. It is a direction the canvas will take, and I am bound to work with it or ruin it.

Ruin means, simply, that I don't like the end result, or the progress, or the process required of me to engage this particular canvas. I have learned to tell which canvases will not take to my re-visions. It's my ultra-experimental canvases that balk at being reinvented.

I tried doing a plein air painting on one canvas, at midnight, with a full moon over our town. It was a great adventure. It was a lousy painting. The midnight painting itself was done over a cast-off painting I did inside a coffee mill, trying to capture the essence of the place... So it was already a do-over. My final revision was overpainting in rich blues with magenta blends on the surface. Later, I painted calligraphic strokes of fluorescent yellow and something else. My husband said it looked like a cocktail party. A loud one. I hung the canvas for a while, seeing if it would grow on me.

One veteran painter told me that the painting cannot be easily parted from its frame, that a marriage results which we do well to honor. The same can be said for the original painting and the canvas. Do-overs cause a multiple personality in the canvas that mirrors its deepest schizophrenia.

My latest do-over involved the experiment of gesso, then sharpie marker writing of poems, then an over-painting of whatever image I choose. I did two of these, intending to do more if they came out with a pleasing result. The first I tried with pastel in the image, got the proportions wrong, hung it for a while and watched people wince... and moved on to the second which inspired several others to paint. So, back to the first with gesso, and I intended to paint a "spear" to go with the painting of a "shield". The motivation was certainly contrived. I don't care for spears, weaponry, or such arts. I'm bigger on the defense arts. So, the spear went south on me just after the gesso and sculpting medium dried. I tried underpainting to give it a chance and it grew more hideous. It was, after all, just a do-over and it would not take on the mask I was hoping to impose.

Some of the paintings I'd like to do over are redeemed by time. If I can tuck them away for long enough, I see them in a new light. But most just find their way to the rubbish. There is nothing for it but to start afresh. It's the way of those canvases to find their homes with the mold sooner than others of their generation.

2006-10-24T17:12:00.000-10:00

Getting started.

How do I start an intuitive painting? I follow my bliss. I start with what canvas or surface pulls me to create something on it. It's like an undertow, and I just let go and ride it. Then I start to get clues as I progress.

On one recent painting, I got the canvas as they arrived at the store and one in particular just called to me. Next I got the color scheme while resting in the office, my feet up, and the phone sitting nearby with its metallic greys and black. So, I did the underpainting as far I knew to go. Then I felt stuck.

A customer came in and asked for sinew to stretch a hide on a shield. I realized then that I was painting a shield! It was a mystical shield and a symbol of protection, using many different motifs from many different cultures.

That's how it is for me: all suggestions and hints. Then when I get my trickle of clues, I jump in with me and who I am and all of a sudden, I'm painting.

2006-10-22T09:22:00.000-10:00

disclaimer:

I know nothing about nothing. I just paint.

When I write about intuitive painting here, I'll be telling about the process that I use to get past my analytical mind and evaluations in order to create from my gut and heart. It's also my belief that any creative endeavor can be done intuitively.

I chose to call this method of painting intuitive because it is not guided by a visual or symbolic logic as much as an internal directive, a sensing, wondering and questioning.

My focus is on the process. I end up with paintings at the end of the cycle of creation, which is bewildering to me. What next? So, I keep three or four paintings going in the circuit so that I don't end up with all completed at the same time and the starting gate before me again in full force. I've found this a very effective way to keep the intuitive pump primed.

Please enjoy my random thoughts on creating intuitively.