How Does Your Garden Grow

Remember that nursery rhyme—Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?

I snapped a photo of Dave's garden on the autumnal equinox, knowing full well that painting the riot of foliage and commingled orange mums and pink-purple asters wasn't going to be easy.

Quite oppositonal, that patch of garden.

I put up a good fight and found myself happy just dipping my brush into paint and brushing paint onto canvas. The window was open, the sun was shining, the air was warm, the physical act of painting felt delicious.

But what a contrary riot of foliage and commingled orange mums and pink-purple asters!

Here's take #1.

Dave's Garden, Equinox
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
floral
2015

Hiding in the Shadows

Couldn't resist a second response to the Daily Paintworks shadow challenge. Surely the silhouette of my daily paintings propped in my family room window qualifies as an odd shaped shadows!

Many challenges here. One example: how to take what shows up in my home as a gray shadow on a light gray carpet and create any visual interest. Already did dark gray shadows on my lighter gray driveway!

So, now my family room has a tangerine floor covering lit by the sunshine streaming in one of its south-facing windows, and the unlit portions—those areas where the walls of our home cast "shadows"— show themselves to be blueberry.

Dabbed in a little tinting and shading to evoke a feeling of Berber carpet texture, called it an abstract day!

Hiding in the shadows, perched on the ghost gallery window sills projected onto my family room floor, stand the following:

Evening Walk, Kelley Point Road
Wanderlust
Rock-Solid Sunshine
Evening Barn
Jones Creek
In the Fullness of Summer

Backlit Gallery
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
abstract
2015

Simple Simon

Such pleasure at my easel, playing simple and quick. No fussing. Just a big ol' brush, some medium magenta, cadmium yellow medium hue, ultramarine blue, and titanium white, and an urge to bask in summer's last gasps.

Don't even particularly care for asters all that much but, on a sunny blue-skied dry-aired afternoon with first-day-of-autumn looking over my shoulder, grabbed up an armful of those spiky little blossoms in my mind's eye and put 'em on canvas way larger than life—again, looking at them from underneath.

Downsida Dis Aster
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
floral
2015
sold

In the Playground

Laurie Mueller's paintings are lively, colorful, and expressive. She recently painted some daisies from an on-the-ground-under-the-flowers-looking-up perspective. Totally love 'em!

So, you guessed it—headed out to the garden, got down and dirty, and took me some pix.

Went to my studio with a few intentions: big brush, gestural strokes, bright underpainting of entire canvas. Often when I paint, I lose myself in a scene, as though I were there. With my flowers, I got absorbed in the act of painting. Felt very aware of how different that process is for me from a year ago.

Last summer, I would never have thought to paint my canvas a deep orange before starting. I would not have painted without sketching first. It would never have occurred to me to let the underpainting pop through vividly. I would have painted the sky first and then superimposed my flowers. I would have used a small, small brush more than once, holding it like a pencil and essentially using it to draw.

Instead, with my flowers, I was in playground mode, running around playing with new techniques. Had fun messing about. Thanks, Laurie, for sparking some experimentation in me!

Downside of a Black Eye
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
floral
2015

Train Leaving

I've been participating in Leslie Saeta's 30 Paintings in 30 Days September 2015 challenge. Because why not? I already paint every day anyway. Didn't find out about the challenge till almost midmonth, but no problem: join any time! paint as often as you can! no rules! no such thing as cheating!

New art, new friends, comments at my blog, commenting at others' blogs.

Watching what catches my eye or heart or both.

Discovered Gwenda Waterink whose work is not like anything I've ever done. Kinda like it, kinda like it a lot. When that Gwenda train rolled into the station I thought, I'm taking that train, and I stepped off the platform.

Pulled out a sketchbook. Oil pastels. A collection of pens. Told myself I'd ride the train for no more than 30 minutes.

Totally fun.

Combined early memories of elementary school worksheets (lines, letters, shapes, colors) with the spirit of my granddaughters' homeschooling (broke "the rules" by using my non-dominant hand for the whole exercise and coloring out of the lines).

Now I've stepped back off the train. Wonder where I am.

Worksheet
6x9", mixed media on Aquabee paper
abstract
2015
$54

Optical Illusion

This little playground experiment was quite satisfying. I started with loose ideas in mind but quickly got absorbed wandering around inside my imagination. It was like painting a dream that keeps shifting shape and meaning. No way to really know when I was done except that I guess I woke up from the dream!

In the short time that this piece has lived here in my home with me, it has seemed a bit like an optical illusion. Sometimes I look at it and it feels flat, just a series of horizontal stripes of barely differentiated widths. Other times I walk right into a fully realized landscape and think about leaning over to pick up a pebble to toss into the water.

Either way, the process and product scratched an itch.

Wandering Around Inside
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
abstract landscape
2015

Nowhere on My Radar

Painting this little scene was nowhere on my radar when I woke up. Nowhere.

Poked my nose into this week's challenge at Daily Paintworks: Can you find an odd shaped shadow and make it the center of interest in your painting?

No idea, but what the heck? I'm game.

Lush groupings of giant dahlias grace various locations in our gardens. With camera in hand and the shadow challenge in mind, I noticed how one of those sizable aggregations shaded our driveway. Snap!

Instant abstraction. Engaging challenge. Monochromatic montage.

Had to laugh that the pesky chipmunks who tunnel under our driveway indirectly provided some visual interest for my painting in the form of patched cracks—first time I've ever appreciated their handiwork!

Had to smile that a few dahlia petals had dropped into my scene as well, giving me a bonafide pop of color.

Driveway Dahlias
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
abstract
2015

Casting About

Feeling a little unsettled in my painting the past 5-6 days, casting my line, catching this and that.

Today, reeled in a slice of early September wetlands here in coastal Massachusetts.

Gessobord, a #12 bright, a photo reference. Quick sketch of the sausage shapes first, then on to paint. Alternated between occasional glances at my photo and letting the emerging painting itself direct my hand and brush.

The photography end of things is a challenge. So much to learn about how to get good photos from which to paint and so much to learn about how to photograph completed paintings.

I like the light happy feel of this painting, the energy it gives off.

Corn Dog Grass
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
nature
2015

Home Sweet Home

Two stories here.

First, Cabin C—home sweet home at Takodah for a week this summer. Meg and I wrote to registrar Sarah in advance of family camp to make our bid for an older cabin with the hinged shutters that have to be propped open with sticks from the ground. Camp without those shutters? Not camp. Camp without meticulously selecting those sticks? Not camp. If you've been following this blog, you know I struggled a few weeks ago to paint a portrait of Cabin C—with its shutters! with its sticks! Turns out the best of those paintings was still only a rough draft. Turns out I had to paint a few camp clotheslines, with cabins in a supporting role rather than in the spotlight, to find my way into this totally satisfying portrait with Cabin C front and center. Camp!!!

Second, Sylvia—whom I met a few weeks before our respective weddings 40 years ago. Our friendship hit the ground running and that friendship is still home sweet home for me despite our having lived 1000 miles away from each other for 33 years. If Sylvia weren't my friend, I don't think I'd be painting (another story, another day). If not for an email discussion with Sylvia the other day, I don't think I'd have figured out how to create depth and contrast in a scene that was predominantly green. I rarely think about, let alone consciously apply, my rudimentary knowledge of warm and cool colors. But Sylvia got me thinking. She brought me home!

Camp!!!
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
architecture
2015
[not for sale]

Enough Already!

Let me just start by saying that my granddaughter Emmy! was born with an exclamation point after her name.

I had the fun of watching her draw pictures at a picnic table outside Hobby Nook at Takodah in August one evening after dinner. She grabbed a marker, turned to her older sister Caroline, said, "How do you make a horse?", didn't wait for or receive a reply, and proceeded to draw five or six horses.

I invoked Emmy!'s forge-ahead spirit today. Gessoed over In the Wake, Thinking about Watters which was already painted on top of In the Wake, Long Lake; turned my canvas upside down; didn't wait for or receive divine guidance; proceeded to paint; enjoyed working quickly; put away my paints in less than half an hour. Done.

I like some touches, don't like others, same as with the first two versions.

Discoveries over the course of these three studies:

1. I know for sure the sunset in Maine was most spectacular live, and I think it is more spectacular as a photo than as painted by me.

2. I didn't ever find a solid center from which to paint this scene. My hand, I suspect, took direction from loud chatter in my head, unable to tap into a quiet place in my heart.

And so … I really am done.

---
postscript discovery:

3. A week after painting my three versions of In the Wake and drafting this post, I find myself far more delighted by each of these paintings than I was at the time.

In the Wake, Emmy!
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
skyscape
2015

Stylin'

What I'm thinking about today is style. Went to my studio wanting to paint in the style of Alyssa Watters.

Cape Path, Alyssa Watters

Her big impressionistic brush strokes capture my attention again and again. When I look at her work I think loose, bold, fun! I have three of her birds framed and hanging in my home.

I took In the Wake, from yesterday, and treated it as a sketch today, an underpainting. I went in on top with quicker strokes and more paint on my brush than in my first go-around. For a few moments, with the blue of the sky and at other points in the journey, I had loose-bold-fun! flowing from my hand. But I got off track. Could feel tight-fussy-trying pushing its weight around.

Think I'll play with this again tomorrow. The thing I keep coming back to is How will I learn to load my brush with more paint except by loading my brush with more paint? How will I learn to make big bold unfussy brushstrokes except my making big bold unfussy brush strokes? 

In the Wake, Thinking about Watters, a study
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
landscape
2015
[not for sale]

Dawn to Dusk

Moseyed by paintbrush today to Long Lake in Naples, Maine, to paint an evening scene.

Last summer, friend Ann texted me a photo from her vacation cottage with the words One morning in Maine, alluding to Robert McCloskey's children's book of that name. I painted the scene and gave it the same title.

One Morning in Maine
8x10", acrylic on unstretched canvas
landscape
2014
[not for sale]

This summer, Ann texted me a photo with the words One evening in Maine. Wanting to break away from my detail-oriented easel time of the past few days, I set an intention to paint more loosely and impressionistically. Picked up my brush.

Here's what I got, in probably 1/20th the time it took me to paint last summer's moment at Long Lake.

In the Wake, Long Lake, a study
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
landscape
2015
[not for sale]

Lined Up Learning

Another series: clotheslines!

Didn't set out to create a series but found myself pulled in by the way painting one thing—clotheslines, in this case—offered up a focal point that opened doors to discoveries other than the clotheslines themselves—in the case of this series, the particular setting of each clothesline.

I photographed the clothesline represented in Tryin' to Dry in Time because of the shadows cast by the items on the line and the lack of anything particularly challenging in the background. The scene offered up a good way to get my feet wet, and I (re)discovered how important it is to paint what I see in front of me vs. what I see in my mind's eye.

Dappled Drying also had distinct shadows cast by the hanging items but had a challenging backdrop. The huge gift was discovering how to represent some of the iconic elements of Takodah cabins, including the way light and shadow are so intrinsically a part of what makes the simple cabins visually interesting.

With the above paintings under my belt, I moved on to Hanging Out at Cabin C. The scene had no distinctive shadows cast by the drying textiles but by now I recognized the great light and shadows it did have. The ironic discovery of this painting is that it captures Cabin C far more robustly than my previous "portrait" of the cabin. Go figure!

Hanging Out at Cabin C
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
architecture
2015
[not for sale]

At Cross Purposes

Started to my studio about a week ago with an idea in mind. An idea, as it turns out, needing a fair amount of drawing first. Drawing took time and attention to detail that felt at cross purposes with my need for a feeling of spaciousness.

Set the drawing aside for a different day.

Picked up a new canvas. Blocked in basic shapes. Painted quickly and from feeling.

Felt spacious.

So spacious, in fact, that I "came to" with a start when I remembered it was the day I'd meet with my first tutorial student of the academic year.

I anticipate a year of needing to develop a deep and active practice of finding spaciousness and balance as I move between my study (top of the stairs, turn right) and my studio (top of the stairs, turn left).

Criss-Cross Applesauce
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
nature
2015

Training my Eye

Have to work really hard to train my eye on shape and value. Really hard. Have to work really hard to keep it trained on shape and value.

This painting was a mess for so long. Thought I might literally pitch it in the trash. But I kept nudging myself along:

What shape? Paint it.

What value—dark? Paint it.

Light? Mix a color. Paint.

Mid-tone? Do it.

All of a sudden, I felt sun on my skin. And a slight breeze.

Could hear voices from down at the waterfront, a cabin door slapping. Felt gravel and pine needles beneath my feet. Breathed in deep drafts of clean air.

Smiled.

Dappled Drying Time
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
architecture
2015
[not for sale]

Being Brave

Even after completing a painting a day for over 100 days, still find myself scared to start sometimes. Today was one of those days.

Scared of what? Of nothing more than not being happy with what shows up on my canvas, I guess. The product.

Don't know if scared is the most apt word, but there ya have it. Sometimes it's hard to start.

That said, I keep starting.

Today I tackled wet stuff hanging outdoors to dry. Had been wanting to paint clothes on a line for ages but hadn't found many clotheslines, let alone one with good lighting or setting. Forged ahead anyway.

Now I have a first clothesline painting. Started with my reference photo upside down to once again push my brain to see shape, color, and value rather than physical things.

This scene was at Takodah. Let me tell you about wet items on clotheslines at Takodah. They're lucky if they ever get dry, hanging as they do mostly under trees. I have visceral camp memories of trying to tug cold clammy resisting bathing suits onto my body.

This little clothesline, with its towels, seems to have found enough sunlight to cast shadows. Lucky people in that cabin!

Tryin' to Dry in Time
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
2015

Painting Love

One of the characteristics I love most about my sister-in-law, Linda, is the wide-eyed, wowed-by-the-world child in her. She laughs easily and with complete abandon. Puts on no pretenses. Fully enjoys the simplest of pleasures with uncomplicated delight.

Linda moved into hospice care on Sunday. Yesterday morning I painted some love to send her.

Six decades ago, in kindergarten, I drew a self-portrait with Crayola crayons for my first report card. I've copied that self-portrait in paint two or three times this year, most recently yesterday.

What better way to send my love to Linda than kid-to-kid?

I Love You, Linda
5x7", mixed media on watercolor paper
children
2015
[not for sale]

Make Believe

All around me I see lush hydangrea shrubs in bloom. Paint me!, several of them have yammered. However, despite their persistent demands, I've had such trouble finding any lighting or backdrop that speaks to me.

really?

Suddenly I remembered I can create whatever I want. I can make believe!

And so I have.

I pulled out a matte knife and a brush. Upwards of ninety-five percent of this painting was created by scraping a knife or dabbing a #16 bright. Almost no brush strokes at all. The hydrangea bushes in my neck of the woods are not set against vivid red-orange of any kind, but look at this paniculata!

Strutting the Red Carpet
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
floral
2015

South of the Border

My friend Martha, with whom I became friends when we both found ourselves at the American School in London for our senior year of high school, grew up in Southern California and has an affinity for south-of-the-border culture, color, flora, and flair.

She recently sent me a photo of a Mexican Shellflower strutting its stuff in her Portland, Oregon, garden. With a little south-of-the-border flair myself, I swished my flared skirt with a twirl, swished a bunch of water on my canvas, let my paints dance and swirl, and lit up a late-summer afternoon with abstracted vibrancy and energy.

Olé!

Martha's Mexican
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
floral
2015

Getting the Boot

Summer's endless, right?

Until it isn't.

Driving to a beach picnic at Wingaersheek, got a distinct hint that summer's gonna get the boot.

Painting this scene of the woods along Concord Street in Gloucester presented several challenges for me to play with. A rock wall and a profusion of untamed green growth for starters.

It also offered up the repeat gift of teletransportation. While I painted—from a photo at home in my studio—I was on Concord Street. Breezes cooled my skin. Pine needles stuck to the bottom of my flip flops. The light got in my eyes a couple of times. I watched out for cars.

This was no "theoretical" transfer of matter or energy from one point to another without transversing the physical space between—I tell ya, I painted en plein air.

September 1: I'll Give You a Hint
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
nature
2015

Yin and Yang

Hate to throw away unused paint left on my palette. Save the littlest bit.

Eventually end up with a crowded unwieldy mess.

Yes, mildew might have been known to grow on my stay-wet palette. More than once.

But!

That precious mess gives rise to apparently opposite or contrary forces that are actually complementary.

Had to refresh my palette today. Therefore, had to use that leftover paint.

More bookmarks!

Taped watercolor paper in place, opened the door wide to discovery and investigation, tried my wings with some fauvism, played with a matte knife, experimented with styles and ideas from other artists whose work has drawn my eye.

Yin and yang.

pigsty palette

pigsty of taped paper prayers

Paper Prayer 13
2x6", acrylic on watercolor paper
abstract
2015
[not for sale]

Paper Prayer 14
2x6", acrylic on watercolor paper
landscape
2015
[not for sale]

Paper Prayer 15
2x6", acrylic on watercolor paper
abstract landscape
2015
[not for sale]

Paper Prayer 16
2x6", acrylic on watercolor paper
abstract skyscape
2015
[not for sale]

Out in the Sun Too Long

Grabbed new gessobord, two brushes, and a matte knife to play with the scene from Little Neck Road again. Might have stayed out in the sun too long.

Fun, though, to make discoveries while pushing and pulling paint around with a knife.

Wide Open Summer
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
seascape
2015

Sticking my Neck Out

Out on Little Neck Road, you can get a bit of height from which to look down over the Ipswich River as it finds its way to Ipswich Bay. You can see mud flats at low tide, boats and boaters in motion, the bay off behind a neck of land, and summer cottages crowded there, sticking their necks out to catch the view and breathe in the salt air.

I stuck my neck out this morning to try to capture that view impressionistically. Most fun for me today was to get the huge wide open sky in place in moments and to create dozens of cottages with just a few strokes.

Now I'm itching to paint the scene again with half the strokes and twice the expressionism.

Little Neck Road
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
seascape
2015

Profusion

Dave's gardens are a huge gift each year, gussying up our yard to a fare thee well—blackberry lilies here, rosa rugosa there, coneflowers cavorting in this spot, dahlias dignifying that, phlox primping in front, sedum strutting in back.

In late August, summer runs wild in those gardens with a riot of color and texture and fragrance and tangle and boast and profusion.

Recently, a troupe of orange cosmos has been dancing exquisitely in a side garden, glowing when late afternoon sun passes through translucent petals. Leaves and stems leap every which way as the supporting cast.

Had to paint the stage production.

Summer Gone Wild, Dave's Garden
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
floral
2015

An Island in the Afternoon

In the afternoon
there is an island
of an hour or two,
an extra day in the day.

     —Michael Cadnum, Breaking the Fall

Yes! Reveled in an extra day in the day early yesterday afternoon!

Went to my studio barefoot, opened the window wide to the delicious late summer air, picked up a brush, mixed a color, painted from a place of peace and vacation within me.

The struggles I'd been having with ideas about how I might paint Cabin C fell away. Took playful liberties with color, played with more brushes than usual, and dipped into the playground of gesture vs photographic realism.

Now I'm going to curl up on my bunk in Cabin C for siesta.

I Want to Stay at Takodah
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
architecture
2015

Taking a Break

Decided to take a break from my tussle with painting Cabin C.

Did a little time travel back to the sun's setting in early June a year ago behind a shed in back of our vacation cottage on Prince Edward Island. The even-ing of the sky is inviting me do some internal even-ing.

Taking the cue that rest might be in order, I'm going to tuck in and let go of Cabin C until I've got some restorative z's under my belt.

Tucking In, North Rustico
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
skyscape
2015

Workout

Ya know the space between a rock and a hard place? That's where I am.

Want to paint the cabin we lived in at camp, Cabin C. Went to my studio full of ideas and enthusiasm. Had fun creating an impression of the cabin with just a few strokes, but the rest of the painting was jarring and off.

Wiped it without even photographing it and painted something else entirely to clear my head.

My brain won't let go, though. It is crazy-busy working through how I might paint that cabin.

Puzzle to solve: want to incorporate stylistic touches I see in other painters' work but have no idea how or even if those other styles might fit this scene.

Puzzle to solve: something in me is tight, wanting to magically "get it right" instantly. I hear Dr. Phil asking, How's that workin' for you?

Had the idea to switch to watercolor paper and treat my next go at Cabin C as a study. Bumbled around. Learned some stuff. Set it aside.

Grabbed a scrap of card stock. Flexed my creative muscles again. Learned some stuff. Set it aside.

Did a third rep. Learned some stuff. Set it aside.

A few discoveries:
• haven't found my center yet, my inner place from which to paint;
• am less bothered by missing the mark when I paint on paper;
• had fun cutting out the cabin from study 1 and just working on the fore- and background in studies 2 and 3;
• think the colors in study 1 might work.

For now, enough of this workout—I need a shower!

Cabin C study 1 on watercolor paper
[not for sale]

Cabin C study 2 on card stock
[not for sale]

Cabin C study 3 on card stock
[not for sale]

Networking

On the way to get my car on closing day at family camp, I snapped a few last photos—mostly closeup shots, thinking to maybe abstract them on canvas later.

As I went to paint from one of those reference photos today, it did not escape my notice that on the last morning of camp what caught my eye was a network of roots—tree roots that have been quietly in place and growing since before I first set foot on Takodah property nearly 60 years ago, a physical network underlying my own emotional roots at Takodah which have been quietly in place and growing for most of my life.

Let me just say here and now that my roots in painting are not nearly as well established!

It was all I could do to send out even a tender root hair or two today in my studio. Started with an idea other than the roots, an idea that never found purchase. Wiped off my canvas, applied a coat of gesso. In painting my second go-around—the roots—I found myself in a messy middle ground, somewhere neither freeingly reckless nor satisfyingly intentional but that was nonetheless—and I borrow the name of a particular type of root system here—adventitious.

All part of establishing my root system, I'm thinking. I'm drinking in nutrients in big gulps.

Camp Root System
6x6", acrylic on canvas board
abstract
2015

Matins

At family camp, I usually get up before most others and walk down to Mem Lodge porch to sit on a wicker-seated rocker to watch the sun rise. It is in this location that I most often experience at a gut level the earth's turning rather than the sun's rising. Takes my breath away every time.

I used a reference photo from Takodah to trigger my memory of one of this year's sunrises. I used a photo of a painting by Anne Wood to nudge my painting hand and mind into a creative space. I blocked in shapes and colors with both photos upside down. Then I turned the photos and my gessobord 180˚ for adjustments and flourishes.

Good morning!

Morning, Mem Lodge Porch
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
skyscape
2015

Transformation

At camp, technology—though it does infiltrate—is not the order of the day, and we dyed-in-the-wool Takodians in particular make an effort to keep camp as pure and back-to-basics as possible. To my amusement and delight, however, when I showed new friend Jane one of my painted bookmarks color-paired with the book I was reading,

she stopped in her tracks—"I have to break my rule and use my iPhone to take a picture!" Given her enthusiasm, I set out today to clear some leftover paint from my palette by creating a bookmark for her. The process included the ugly-duckling distraction of the tape that held the watercolor paper in place followed by pulling off the tape for a magical transformation. Can't wait to see what book this swan pairs up with.

ugly duckling

Jane's Swan
2x6", acrylic on watercolor paper
abstract skyscape
2015
[not for sale]

Things Lookin' Up

I want to stay at Takodah, in the dear old camp I know …

Yup. That song rings true every time.

In my studio today took my brush to Takodah, stepped out of my cabin beside A-Field, stood at the edge of an overhang of trees, looked straight up.

Over my Head, on A-Field
6x6", acrylic on gessobord
abstract skyscape
2015