Estuaries

Estuaries are ecosystems that can be found along both bay and ocean shores in what is known as the intertidal zone—any area that is regularly inundated by the tide where fresh water and sea water meet. 

Deriving from the Middle Dutch root brak, the term brackish is used for intertidal water which has more salinity than fresh water but not as much as sea water.

During the making of this painting, I was abundantly immersed in brackish water, with tides moving in and tides moving out as I went back-and-forth-back-and-forth between free intuitive expression and thoughtful intentional refinement, feeling at a core level how rich and abundant the multidirectional flow is, every part of the flux vital.

You Need Not Name the Inbreath, Nor The Out
10.5 x 13.5"; acrylic, latex, ink, collage, and oil pastel on drawing paper
abstract landscape
2019

Flood and Ebb

I'd hoped this week to reach flood tide, with the water high and full, paintings completed and framed.

But with the tide as with so many things, I appear not to be in control! I am here in the right now, just the way it is, and the way it is appears to be an ebb tide, with framing steps still in process.

I will be off traveling starting this weekend. I'll pick up the narrative sometime after my return.

A marker to hold my place:

detail

Processing Plant

I am not a fan of processed food.

But the process of creating art? Can't get enough of it.

Love to watch process unfolding live as others paint, love videos of process, love seeing process photos, love the many stages of process in my own work.

Well, mostly I love the process in my own work.

My current salt marsh painting has involved a gosh-darned long but nonetheless engaging process, with multiple practical and artistic dilemmas needing resolution en route once I got clear about where it was heading.

Here's where things stand at the moment in the processing plant that I call my studio. I'm hoping to frame and display what has become two paintings. This will be an at-home job, using simple store-bought frames. The dilemma at this stage is the buckling and warping that resulted from my painting and collaging process.

The buckling and warping do not read as compelling captivating texture. They read as … buckling and warping.

Exhibit below, as seen from the back where it turns out, to my delight, that I can see archaelogical treasures from when this painting was a field of wildflowers.

But I digress.

buckled warped paper, backside of painting

The buckling and warping were front and center when I did a trial run of framing. Further, the mat board didn't lie flat against the paintings, thereby causing gaps and casting undesired shadows.

My first line of defense was to tap artist friend Jen Jovan for ideas. And so it was that I applied gesso to the backs of the paintings a few days ago, let them dry completely, and set up a press under which they continue to sit, in hopes that they will lie flat when released.

You know how some people feel agitated by light touch, preferring instead the weight and comfort of deep even pressure against their skin, a big solid bear hug? I hope my paintings are just like that.

paintings under makeshift paper press

The Latin Root "Cise"

Over the course of a few days, my work in progress made it clear that we were moving from wildflower field

wildflower field

to salt marsh—

salt marsh

—a work-in-progress salt marsh that was asking me to make decisions.

The Latin of the word decision literally means to cut off. Making a decision is about cutting off choices; it is to cut yourself off from some other course of action than the one you choose to make.

Even more literally, in this case, I understood that it might mean cutting this work in progress in half, thereby cutting myself off from developing it in its 18 x 24" size and, instead, developing two 12 x 18" pieces.

I began to entertain the possibility.

Staying Open

Oh!

Where am I?

work in progress, moving across new landscape

detail

Changing Course

I thought I was painting a field of wildflowers.

Work-in-Progress said, Nope.

I mixed up more greens and grays, covered the pops of wildflower color, added texture with gel medium, used India ink to introduce asemic writing, waited for my next operating instructions.

detail; greens and grays

detail; texture

detail; asemic writing

work in progress

In the Practice of It

I took my 18 x 24" page of preliminary mark-making started in early July and ran with it for several days.

I began following an idea of wanting to paint abstracted wildflowers in a field of grasses.

work in progress
18 x 24"; ink, acrylic, and latex

Artist's Statement

From a book not about painting, this statement:

You learn how to do it in the practice of it.


That's exactly what I do when I paint—learn how in the practice of it.

In early July, I turned to a new page in a notebook of Canson 90-pound 18 x 24" drawing paper. I began making marks and mixing up shades of green using yellows and blacks. Practice, practice, practice.

18 x 24 " start

detail

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detail

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Following My Nose

Eighteen months ago, in March 2018, I started playing with a huge sheet of foam core given to me by a friend when she moved to a new home previously owned by an artist who'd left some materials behind. I covered the foam core with a thin slapdash coat of gesso, penciled off a grid of 40 six-inch squares and various rectangles, adhered tissue and magazine collage randomly, and started playing. I considered the 'canvas' to be an erasable space, so to speak, where I could follow my nose to try out this and that.

activated canvas

After a few months, I ended up with a 'patchwork quilt' painting roughly 3 x 4 feet in size. 

close to completion

Fast forward to May of this year when I took a photo of one patch and used it to make an email birthday card for a friend. She asked if I still had the original painting and if it was available for sale.

Yes, I still had the original. 

Was it available for sale? Uh … sort of.

Well, you know me: I'm all about cutting up my paintings. Even, it turns out, my paintings on foam core! I pressed my husband and his skill saw into service and proceeded to keep on following my nose. 

The Song of the World So Often Rises
in Places We Had Not Thought to Look
5.75 x 6.5" in 9 x 9" frame
acrylic, ink, and collage
abstract floral
2019

detail
left to right: birch frame, green mat, cream mat,
whitewashed 1927-dictionary-page collage,
painted edge of half-inch-thick foam core, and
The Song of the World on surface of foam core

Better Later than Never

Look what I picked up from my studio table today—a paint quilt exercise I did in 2016!

monostripes paint quilt; exercise for online Jane Davies course
October 2016

I'd uncovered it two weeks ago—in a folder in a stack of folders in a drawer—and set it on the table. When I received a postcard from my granddaughter Emmy two days ago, the exercise jumped off the table and begged to be prepped for her.

Here's what I wrote when I created this start three years ago:

In traditional pieced quilts, fabric is used from cast-off clothing that is still good enough to be repurposed. The quilts are a means of making something useful and often beautiful from leftovers. They are improvisational in the sense that the quilt maker does not buy new fabrics for the quilt.

A 'Paint Quilt' such as the one featured above is a piece made from leftover paint from another painting. No planning ahead, no squeezing out fresh paint. I was directed to use only paint leftover from the monochrome-stripes lesson I'd worked on.

As I noted at the time, I didn't 'finish' this piece in any way, and it read as unfinished when I looked at it.  My intention was to play with it further, possibly cheating by squeezing out new paint, and for sure using ink or pastels before later sending it as a postcard.

Well, sure enough, today I 'played with it further,' and made it into a postcard—three years 'later.' No new paint per se. Just paint markers, pastels, and collage. Off it goes to Emmy!

Life's Simple Pleasures
4 x 5" postcard, acrylic, pastel, and collage on card stock
abstract
2019

The Quantum Leap

Here's what's resonating, lifting me up:

To tap into the creative power 
of our minds, 
we must release 
our belief that
we need to know 
how 
first. 
We must make a quantum leap 
from separation thinking 
into the unified mind 
where all things are known.
As we make this leap,
we must trust that, 
in the moment we choose it,
we will create, receive, 
or teach ourselves
the tools we most need to learn.
                              —Tatiana Sakurai

I am trusting.

Monhegan Island work in progress,
incubating

Monhegan Island work in progress,
incubating

Monhegan Island work in progress,
incubating

Up the Dirt Lane

For three mornings, this was my practice: walk up the main dirt lane of Monhegan Island from my cottage to artist Judy's with complete sensory delight in early morning sun and early morning air; paint and talk and observe and ask questions and stumble along with brush in hand on the big tarp-covered deck in summer’s full glory, barefoot, with salt air and the sun's keen warmth kissing my skin; and two or so hours later walk part-way back down the lane to meet my dad for coffee at the Black Duck Emporium. 

on the way to Judy's

on the way to Judy's

on the way to Judy's

on the way to Judy's

I intentionally brought not one single supply other than a pad of Canson paper, opting to step out of my usual habits and away from my default comfort zone. 

I landed precisely in my discomfort zone. 

I felt awkward, herky-jerky, at sixes and sevens. But I got some paint on paper. 

some paint on paper

some paint on paper