It started as a free-form release of energy after I completed an intensive online class last fall. I let go with color and shape, line and scribble, paint and pencil, ink and stencil all over a 9/12" sheet of paper. Then I cut the page into 9 pieces.
Over the past six months I've picked up one and then another of the pieces to develop them to completion. Several remain.
This week I selected one from the remaining and engaged in call and response: the painting would call out in some way, I'd respond, it'd call, I'd respond. At least once, I let the piece sit overnight before I could hear any call, offer any response. Bit by bit, it came together. I added collage. Had to sit awhile longer to see if I'd finished.
In the end, I impulsively picked up a texture sheet, spread a touch of paint on it with my finger, and stamped it in several places.
Risky.
But the right move. Suddenly the painting was singing its own song and it was time then to select card stock and mounting paper.
From a casual beginning, with no idea how it would unfold, this painting became a card to celebrate a wedding. And isn't that how a relationship becomes a marriage? With color and scribble, attention to one thing and then another, call and response, occasional overnight refrigeration, multiple micro-decisions, impulsivity, risk, no real idea how it'll all unfold, and singing its own song?
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| Oh, Honey! 2.75/3.5", acrylic, ink, pencil, pastel, and collage on drawing paper, mounted on card stock abstract 2017 [gift] |
8 comments:
I love your "call and response" sometimes I call and call and there is no answer... feel empty at those times... I'll just leave the line open.. it will come when it's ready!!! What a lovely gift!!!
I totally hear ya, Carol, about those times when the call-and-response is one sided! Leaving the line open is always good! Thanks for your comments; they always cheer me along.
how incredible! the art, your words...the process that became a metaphor for a wedding. "call and response" - such a perfect description for the ritual of creating! the piece is divine, dear dotty!!!
Jen, thanks for your comments (today and so many other days—always welcome). I agree, call-and-response describes so much of what the creative process is for me.
Yup, this has party painted all over it. LOL! Fun!
PAR-ty!
I love the similarity between artmaking and marriage ;-)
: )
Painting is the same as life right across the board, as we come to learn through painting every day.
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