All in the Family

 Look at these brothers and sisters all together, wouldya?!

inspired-by-scribbles series

–––

Yammer, yammer, yammer! They're all asking for solo portraits. Okay, okay!

In the Lab

the creative adventure  

of any one painting

even if

declared complete 

cannot be separated 

from the ongoing 

never-to-be-completed 

work-in-progress 

of becoming the artist 

I am 

(always) 

becoming.

Be the Mad Scientist of Your Own Life,
Each Experiment One in Meaning-Making and Discomfort-Embracing
7 x 8.5"; acrylic, oil pastel, and collage on paper
abstract scribble inquiry
2023

Egg On My Face!

Oh my gosh! I stop in my tracks this morning while preparing breakfast when Maisie Dobbs, Psychologist and Investigator par excellence in the crime novel I'm listening to via audiobook, says to her companion, "I believe I may have over-egged the pudding."

Over-egged the pudding!

I love me a good idiom, and I am particularly enchanted by British ones.

This over-egging-the-pudding idiom exquisitely captures the downfall of many a painting that is spoiled in process by an artist's trying too hard to improve it.

…

And by artist I mean myself!

There may be just a wee bit too much egg in this very pudding right here. Just sayin'.

Being Right Here Right Now Is a Wide-Open Door to Discovery
7 x 8.5"; acrylic, oil pastel, and collage on paper
abstract scribble inquiry
2023

A Little Smile of Discovery

I took Nicholas Wilton's 2023 Art2Life Free Online Workshop this past week, during which several live painting demonstrations took place. 

The funny part was that in one case I found myself becoming one with the artist at hand doing the demo. As she made certain marks that created instant impact—most often because of very pleasing contrast, my own (empty) hand involuntarily stayed in motion continuing to make more and more of those dynamic marks … even when she did not!

I broke into a little smile of discovery. I have new insight into how some of my paintings turn into chaos that leaves me not knowing how to navigate. I now see new choices about how to direct my energy. With any given painting, I might choose to put no brakes on making marks that are exciting to my eye, for the sheer joy of expressing myself in that way, end result be damned! But I might not. I might choose to limit or subtract some of my runaway mark-making for greater impact to see what I learn. Win, win.

Fun!

All the Living We've Ever Done Happened in Some Now
7 x 8.5"; acrylic, oil pastel, and collage on paper
abstract scribble inquiry
2023

Stuck, Unstuck

Jan Frazier writes in a recent teaching:

That word reality tends to be surrounded

by unwelcome associations and feelings.

Isn't that telling?

The last thing many a person wants

is to be reminded of reality.

And yet what gets called spiritual liberation

is about coming at last

to rest in what is real.

Imagine:

that relaxing into the truth of things,

without recoiling,

is utterly peace-inducing.

Yesterday, I could not for the life of me relax into the truth of things—the truth that I didn't like the paintings-in-progress in my studio, that I couldn't make sense of what I as doing nor where I was going, that I didn't know what to do to fix the messes, that the paintings weren't going to resolve on their own, that I had to find the courage to take a step, that I had to risk whatever would unfold. I could feel recoil and resistance in my body. Discouragement. Fear. 

I was stuck.

---

And then I wasn't.

I awoke (awakened!) this morning relaxed in the truth of things. By early afternoon I took that peace-inducing relaxation into my studio and began playing.

I'm Saying We Don't Have Forever. For Anything.
7 x 8.5"; acrylic, graphite, pencil, pastel, and collage on paper
abstract scribble inquiry
2023

The Layered Look

I have to laugh sometimes at how many gosh-darned layers I wear in winter, not just for outdoor walks that require SO much more time than popping my feet into flip flops in the summer and heading out the door in seconds but also just to stay warm IN THE HOUSE!

I guess my extended series is wanting to stay warm in winter also. Otherwise, why would I be dressing them up in layers?

detail photos of cozying up in collage

 

Expansion

I'm sticking my neck out here, taking steps to expand the series I recently completed.

Or have not yet completed, as the case may be!

work in progress: first scribbles, paint, and second scribbles
on paper; potential collage out on the table

What Looks Like a Scribble

What looks like a scribble may actually be a prayer, a hymn, a moment of grace.

What started as a scribble here, and a mostly dissatisfying one at that, has now—with all that has unfolded in the past two weeks and with my hand's suddenly finding a way to do the work of my heart—resolved as a prayer. A hymn. A moment of grace.

Passing Briefly Between Two Worlds
5 x 7"; ink, pencil, water soluble pastel,
and acrylic paint markers on a dictionary page
abstract scribble study
2023

Dear Heart

Playing with softnesses, scribbles, cursive manuscript handwriting, veiling, metallic markers, a fine-line applicator, and a make-up brush.  

Figuring out what I can and cannot do as I go along. 

Looking after I leap.

I Owe It to Myself Not to Protect My Dear Heart From the Ache of Loss
5 x 7"; acrylic and ink on paper
abstract scribble study
2023

A Series, in Spite of Myself!

My history with painting in series is on the sparse side, but lookie this! A series of four!

Fourth in a Series

Here's the deal: Painting is the act of creating problems to solve.

I don't think I knew that's what I'd signed on for when I began painting, but I do think—to my surprise—that's what continues to bring me to my studio over and over again.

Problems that lit me up today: matching color-mixes I'd first concocted and used up days earlier, establishing balance, creating cohesion, and determining the ins and outs of how to infuse that black handwritten-words scribble into the textured mixed media of the lower right quadrant.

Fist pump of YES to all of that!

Chop, Swell, Breaker, Trough
5 x 7"; acrylic, graphite, ink, pencil,
oil pastel, and collage on paper
abstract scribble study
2023