February 23, 2024
Off to the Races
Countless process questions and what-if’s roared off as I worked on this piece.
what shapes?
what color palette?
portrait or landscape?
what level of detail?
how to create contrast?
how to create balance?
how much reliable pattern?
how to disrupt pattern?
how to move the eye around?
what marking tools?
how to respond to ‘mistakes’?
text collage or not?
In the end, I opted to include text collage. In my stash of fodder, I bumped into the words OFF TO THE RACES and kept coming back to consider them. The idiom spoke to the visual energy and movement that manifested on this bit of card stock as I began making decisions and committing to answers to my what-if’s.
It also also spoke to the process of energetic creative engagement and increasing satisfaction I experienced as this piece evolved.
Finally, it nudged me to poke through my personal archive of quotations collected from reading I’ve done, succeeding in locating the following particular words from Ouida Sebestyen’s IOU’s, a young adult novel I read 35 years ago:
Inside his head,
questions like race cars
shuddered in a row,
waiting to roar off.
Suddenly he let the first one go.
3.5 x 5″; acrylic, ink, water-soluble pastels, and collage on card stock
CutUp
2024
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6 responses to “Off to the Races”
Two of my favorite words: What if? As a matter of fact you might not believe this….but it’s the title of my post tonight.
Those “what if” questions are what send us places we might not have gone had we not been open to possibilities!
I love the colors and shapes in this piece. The white really sets off the tone on tone shapes and I adore those pops of purple!
Your ability to have…and find the perfect quote at the right time is pretty fun too!
Can’t wait to read your post tonight!
Being open to acting on what if is such a gift in my art making. (My non-art what ifs in this moment: What if I let myself NOT tend to the tasks I have stacked up beside me on my desk right now? What if I go downstairs to relax with a book instead?)
Your feedback on the visual language of this CutUp affirms several decisions that started as what ifs : ) Thank you!
Thanks, too, for your appreciation of my matching collected quotations to new situations which, as you recognized, involves both HAVING the quotations collected somewhere and then FINDING the one I want!
Oh my, Dotty! Here’s what I love: right off, I’m in a teal period so I love the color choice with all its hues; the shots of purple ( I once had a purple period, too, many years ago
) randomly placed made the piece sing. I kept zooming in and wandered about with the marks – comb?, dry brush?, very slender tree twig? To me, it’s water and energy. I just love it and need to come back to it. Will you frame it? It would honor the piece. Will you offer it for sale?Oh my, Roseanne! Here’s what I love, right off: your robust delight in this CutUp!
I painted up several sheets of collage paper in the teal family with different values way at the beginning of this series of CutUps, and it’s been fun to dip into that stash more than once.
I smiled at your mention of having a purple period previously. I was just recently recalling a purple maxi-coat I purchased senior year in high school shortly after my family moved to London. Loved that coat. I felt so hip and fashionable! Have no idea when I let it go, nor WHY!!
The background marks were made by scribbling loosely/freely with a running-out-of-ink broad-tip Sharpie paint pen, and swiping over the scribbles lightly with a soft cloth. Next, on the shapes, loose swirls with a fine tip ink pen, followed by the bold white shape outlines made with a fine-line applicator bottle. Finally, I added the purple, blue, and white ‘smudges’ using Neocolor II water-soluble pastels—they took on a textured look because of the brush I used when painting my collage paper.
Water and energy—I love that perception!
I WILL offer it for sale. I’ll text you.
THANK YOU for loving this piece with me
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