Outer Eye, Inner Eye

My outer eye says, What on earth is that? Total fail.

My inner eye says, Oh. My. Gosh. You nailed it! You have painted a perfect representation of who you are right here and right now. There you are, in paint, on paper. 

---

Alrighty then. Glad I got that out of my system.

work in progress
4x5"; unstretched canvas
working title: q&q cut-up #6

I Wonder / Q&Q Cut-Up #5

Where does art come from?

I hold the question in wonder.

But I don't need an answer.

Wasn't here two days ago.

Is here today.

Happens over and over again.

A Happenso Bookmark
1.5x6" bookmark; acrylic, pencil, ink, collage, and oil pastel on unstretched canvas,
mounted on heavy card stock
abstract
2017

Scrappy

I work on another bookmark today, a scrappy little one.

I scissored Quick & Quixotic into 10 pieces in October, and this morning the second of two narrow cut-ups pushes itself into my field of vision, as does a bunch of rectilinear scraps that had become paper 'tiles' in the service of an entirely different studio undertaking.

I decide to run with what's calling out to me.

I puzzle over how to bring a skinny, muted, kinda blah strip of unstretched painted canvas together with slick black & white tiles from a printed postcard that had featured strong graphic design.

blah strip of canvas

I fiddle with glazing medium and a catalyst tool to add texture to the canvas. I add color with a matte knife.

work in progress
1.5x6"; unstretched canvas
working title: q&q cut-up #5

I snip, arrange, and reconfigure the bold black & white tiles. Then I push all the tiles aside. 

I set everything on a tray and opt to let the gathered elements percolate overnight.

Start Where You Stand / Q&Q Cut-Up #4

Napoleon Hill's directive is to start where you stand.

Gotcha.

Here's where I stood, where I started:

Here's where I stand now, with a bookmark and a gift tag:

A Rug of Hooked Fabric Scraps, Rose and Green and Purple
1.5x6" bookmark; acrylic, pencil, ink, collage, and oil pastel on unstretched canvas,
mounted on heavy card stock
abstract
2017
[gift]

1.75x1.75" gift tag

Haiku inscribed on back of bookmark:

Start where you stand, on

a rug of hooked fabric scraps,

dance the live-long day.

Do Not Wait

In 1937, early American self-help writer Napoleon Hill published Think and Grow Rich. Much of the book's content focuses on increased income, but what caught my ear when I learned about the book in a segment on NPR, and what Hill himself insisted was a philosophy that could help people succeed in any line of work, and do and be anything they could imagine, was his saying:

Do not wait: the time will never be 'just right.' Start where you stand, and work whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along.

That's my art life! I start where I stand in any given moment and work with whatever I've got.

I have to say, though, I hope to find 'better tools' tomorrow! Today I started playing with another one of my quick and quixotic cut-ups and just could not get into a groove.

Work in progress, work in progress.

work in progress
4x5"; unstretched canvas
working title: q&q cut-up #4

Stopping in at Camp Briefly

Blink!

Where did August go? And September? And now October?

Back in August I set up some painting starts to take to camp for an inquiry into using negative space.

The earlier history of one of those starts:

8x10"

One quarter of the above:

4x5"

Last seen (and never posted here, I just realized) looking like this, still back in August:

Revisited yesterday and today, and now mounted on matte board, ready to head to a new home:

Grandma Moses Hangs Towels on the Clothesline at Camp
4x5"; acrylic, grease pencil, collage, ink, pastel pencil,
and oil pastel on canvas paper,
mounted on 8.5x11" matte board
abstract
2017
[gift]

Haiku on the back:

Inner tube, inner

life, laughter, Camp Takodah

gives rise to friendship.

Q&Q Cut-Up #3

A quotation caught my eye at the library today, something 'prodigiously talented and successful musician' Leonard Bernstein evidently once said:

To achieve great things, two things are needed: 

a plan and not quite enough time.

My plan is to show up every day in my studio … and I never have quite enough time.

Perfect!

Way, way, way back on September 22, I started scribbling on a piece of 16x20" unstretched canvas with a PaperMate pencil, a grease pencil, pastel pencils, and a graphite crayon.

Working a few minutes at a time over the course of many of the days between then and now, I eventually cut the work in progress into eight pieces, one of which became the 'starting' point—so to speak—of today's completed painting.

Sleeping in the Room with the Drying Herbs
4x5"; pencil, pastel pencil, ink, and acrylic on unstretched canvas
abstract
2017

I love the softnesses and breathing space in this piece.