Heart and Art, Unlimited

Live on FaceBook on New Year's Eve, Amanda Evanston offered an end-of-2020 activity which I watched even though I was away from home and not able to participate.

But this week I cut a heart shape from cardboard, painted it, tore some strips of colored paper, wrote words of gratitude, folded the strips, wrapped the heart with string and ribbon, tucked in my gratitude and more, and now I have a little magpie nest of love and gratitude, so much gratitude that it cannot be contained! It is popping out in all directions, boundless!

painted cardboard heart

strips of colored paper
inscribed with words of gratitude

folded strips 

Tying My Laces and Walking Out of Myself
Into This Sunny Winter Day
7 x 7"; acrylic, paper, ribbon, cord, and cardboard
in shadow box
mixed media Valentine
2021

detail

detail: side view of gratitude
popping out in all directions

Faces 1

Blind contour hilarity on top of chaos layers!

Letting go, letting in!

Ferocious facial fun!

works in progress:

The Glorious Impossible

Handpainted paper, scissors, mod podge, and a new day.

Exquisite tension.

The glorious impossible.

The Glorious Impossible
playing with handpainted collage paper on a book page
abstract
2020

Collage Paper?

I like engaging in what I think of as the 'exquisite tension' of working a crossword puzzle or writing a haiku, accepting and embracing the limits and working within them assiduously to bring into bloom what the constraints call for—a six-letter word for prehistoric monument, fourth letter m, for example, or using five + seven + five syllables to express a thought or feeling with tight precision.

Here at Lyme Camp:
• limits—plentiful
• assiduous effort—plentiful
• tension—plentiful
• exquisite—less plentiful, since exquisite is in direct one-to-one correspondence with my acceptance (or lack thereof) of limits!

Two days ago, I worked within the begrudgingly-tolerated limits—cursing them more than once—of a few minutes, a few tubes of paint, an old book, and my finger as a paintbrush.

Collage paper?

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Gratitude/simple pleasures:
• shoveling snow—purposeful, productive, practical exercise! fresh air! beauty every which way!;
• two surprise packages for me in the mail; and
• the grace of Meg's and my laughing in surrender last evening at the day's messy mix of foibles and accomplishments and rough edges and tendernesses and wooziness and failed efforts and vats of soup and indecision and tears and hugs.

Inexquisite Tension
playing with acrylic on a book page
abstract
2020

Keep Me Ready

At Camp Takodah, campers offer up a prayer at breakfast every morning, each one opening his or her heart to keep me ready to help others at some cost to myself and send me chances to do a little good each day.

I wake at Lyme Camp with that prayer in my heart, not knowing how I will be of service but trusting that I will, living in mystery rather than mastery. I set practical intentions to have at the ready should the clouds of overarching unpredictability part to let space open up for them, and then I surrender to the moment-to-moment flow, wholeheartedly doing what life asks of me. 

Gratitude/simple pleasures:

• deep blue fathomless skies, bright sunshine, and just barely enough warmth for just barely enough time in just barely a big enough patch of light to meditate in the shelter offered by the back deck this afternoon;

• readiness to grab the chance to put paint and pencil on paper again today; and

• Meg's eyes, clear and luminous as she sat in a patch of early morning indoor sunshine chatting with me.

Send Me Chances
playing with acrylic and pencils on a book page
abstract
2020

Lyme Camp

You might remember that I went to Takodah Family Camp in August 2015, 2016, and 2017 with my daughter Meg and her family. Now, unexpectedly I have taken up residence with them again, this time at their home in Virginia, for what we are calling Lyme Camp in recognition of Meg's recent diagnosis.

Takodah Family Camp runs for a week. My participation at Lyme Camp began mid-December and doesn't have a set end date. I didn't think Lyme Camp was going to have any kind of arts program but it must have had one in the past because, in poking around, I discovered some basic supplies and materials. I also found an ember of creative energy eager to be fanned.

Gratitude/simple pleasures:

• an unexpected few moments in which to move paint onto a book page with my fingers, in which to grab a cray-pas and a charcoal pencil and a marker to make a few scribbles;

• cubing beef; chopping onions, celery, and carrots; and gathering garlic, thyme, and parsley for an instant-pot stew; and

• a prolonged all-family belly laugh as we lingered at the dinner table last evening.

Whether I Can Unlock the Door Remains to Be Seen
playing with acrylic, marker, charcoal pencil, and cray-pas on a book page
abstract
2020

Here and Now 1 January 2020

Here and now.

Michelle Gives Me a Starting Place
playing with acrylic and pastel on a book page
abstract
2020