Expanding Modular Painting Frame to Backing

This fifth day is the beginning of the resolution. The backing door skin plywood gets dabs of colors repeating the dominate colors. The textured tops of the deep cradled boxes are further developed. My intention remains to make compartments that differ but offer multipal possibities for harmonious combinations. They are to remain my happy colors.

Play Day

My visions is about dividing space up into compartments and then spinning out of their boundaries finding connections. I am seeking a thread to hold the parts together like a poem. I don't like it when people walk past with out seeing. I want to share my fun.

I feel satisfied that my family loves my play art. Maybe that is as far as this will go.

McKenzie's arrangement of squares. She thought the suares could also be a tic-tac-toe game.

The Display Frame says my husband is being made into much more than he anticipated. He thought it was a single time only gallery display of seperate pieces to be sold separtately. He is only somewhat flattered that I think he deserves equal colaborative credit in this new experimental painting/sculpture art form. There are problems to be solved in its construction so that all the squares blocks and window openings are equal. It remains to be seen if the boxes will vibrate outwards until they fall out.
My daughter and grandchildren deserve credit for their enthusiasm. And thank you to Martha Marshall of http://artistsjournal.blogspot.com/ for her enthused comment.
Today I am moving the blocks around into many configurations. Many posible ideas have come to mind.

Day Three of Modular Frame Wall Hanging

The flatt colors painted on the inside of the boxes contrast with the organic nonobjective paintings.





The flat colors repeat the architectural frame.

My happy colors

This is my first day using color on my modular cradled wood boxes in a frame. Tomorrow I will paint the inside. For these ones are not only interchangeable but they are reversible.

Modular Wood Deep Cradled Box Frame

My 2008 project is an interactive abstract. I invite the viewer to participate by rearanging nine six inch square cradled boxes. Today I put the third layer of gesso on each box. Tomorrow I will start in color.

Demonstration at Pegasus Art Gallery

The Saturday before Christmas was a splendid time to paint at the front of a frame shop meeting other artists mostly. Here is my work table in front of my exhibit wall. I demonstrated using one part acrylic medium diluted with two parts water. Here I did a series which was not a production line as it might appear to some. Each one is totally original and plays off of the others. I worked on all of them at the same time so as not to get obsessive over any one of them. The advantage of working on a group is the creative advantage of coming up with fresh new impulses. When I started to get overly picky in one spot, I could leave it for awhile and when I came back the paint was dry enough to approach it in new ways.

Preparing"Hidden Drangons", a January exhibit

Here are some of the paintings that I am preparing to hang at Sam's Station. I am grouping them by placing stacked small paintings between large ones.

December 26th I received an unexpected call from the gallery representative for Sam's Station. I will not be able to hang the exhibit on January 2 because the owners of the restaurant are closing down for the first 9 or ten days of January to go on vacation. So now I will have more time to organize this exhibit. I was not at all upset because next time I say I will do a January exhibit, I'll have it done before Thanksgiving. It took me quite awhile to select work and give titles. "Then and Now Self-Portrait" has several dragons hidden in it and I have titled it "Self-Portrait/Dragons Reflecting 1962"
I had fun with some of my other titles like:
Dragon Eyes are Blue Birds
The Ocean:My Cup Dragon
Peace Rose Thorny Horn Dragon
Dragon's Hidden Coral Garden
Tooth and Spike Kissing?
Sparkey the Dragon Pup
Fir Bough Dragon Whispers to Dragon Cloud
Misty Dragons Meander Between Mountains
Time to bake cookies for tomorrow's afternoon opening at Pegasus Art Gallery in Corvallis, Oregon

Rethinking Then and Now Self Portrait

On the left is my memory of a self portrait painted when I was 19. On the right I reflect on me now. This appears to be considerably changed from yesterday. Mostly I made color adjustments to reproduce what I really painted. "The Then and Now Self Portrait" is acrylic on an 18 " square canvas. After Rains's impression that I painted myself too old, I changed my posture giving myself a neck.

My Then and Now Self Portraits

My most important self portrait painting is lost. Perhaps it no longer exists. My lost self portrait has gained more importance to me as I grow older. I did it my Sophomore year at Portland State College as a third hour assignment. I had a great deal of freedom to do the self-portrait as I wished. The colors I selected were the ones Mary Hearn, another student, used in a painting of a dieing pine tree. I loved the fiery oranges so much it reminded me of my small family tree. I didn't want to look at myself in the round mirror at my back. I felt invisible as an aspiring emerging artist. My face and body melts into the atmosphere. The most important part of me was my determination and the paint brush and colors.

Mary and I traded paintings and my self portrait hung in the dining room of her folks for years. Now what happened to it is a mystery.

I thought the image of the lost portrait was so clear in my mind that I would not have any trouble in repeating it. Plus it would be most interesting to contrast the old portrait ideas with how I see myself now as an artist. Painting me as I see myself now was easy. But recapturing the idea of the early portrait was not. I started out putting liquid acrylic on with a palette knife. Well needless to say the liquid acrylic did not behave like the oils in 1962. Furthermore, I am not using cadmium colors anymore. But eventually I succeeded in rendering my memory of the essential portrait.

While I painted I went off on some interesting false starts. My posture had to be tightened up to make me more tensely upright. For awhile my arm was up and I remembered that in other portraits during my child rearing years I took the stance of a painter orchestrating my canvas as a conductor. In my college portrait I was holding my brush in a vice grip as though it were all my life. Then I was 19 almost 20. Now I am almost 65.

After nearing the completion of my portrait of the past, I occasionally made a few marks on my portrait of now. As I painted the hands I was surprised that I made a more relaxed hold on the brush. How could I be more relaxed? I am just as determined. I was thinking how much I am the same today. I paint in a similar style. I paint colors the way I feel them emotionally and not by trying to match nature. I still feel invisible to the public. But I am my own judge with confidence that what I am doing is right for me. I am more contemplative and reflective.

My Wall at Pegasus Art Gallery with display racks

My deep cradled boxes are displayed on a wood shelf rack 27" long, 6" high, and 7" deep.

Pegasus Art Gallery's owner was good to hang a third show on my wall this month. I demonstrated watercolor on absorbent ground today and will demonstrate again next week.

#2 New Year's Dragon

"#2 New Year's Dragon" is one of three dragons painted last Saturday. Tomorrow Saturday, December 15, 1-3 P. M. I will be doing another demonstration at Pegasus Art Gallery, 341 SW Second Street, Corvallis, Oregon. Artists and collectors welcome!

New Year's Dragon

'New Year's Dragon' is acrylic on museum board16" x 12" . I was demonstrating at the Pegasus Art Gallery opening last Saturday. There will be two more Saturday openings before Christmas. Saturday December 15, I will be demonstrating the watercolor and acrylic on absorbent ground board. I am also demonstrating my journey into a painting where I move the paint around.

Opening of Painting Exhibit

My wall is to the left when entering the frame shop at Pegasus Art Gallery in Corvallis Oregon. Today was an opening. There will be two more openings before Christmas on Saturdays. Early next week I will be changing the exhibit to keep with the theme of rotating exhibit. There will be more dragons. Next Saturday I'll be ready to talk about my dragons. I'll be bringing my extra yummy chocolate chip cookies and fresh fruit. To see the individual pictures larger click on the photograph.

Yesterday's frustration : today's multiple accomplishments

"Grandma Riding Sea Dragon", acrylic on museum wrapped canvas, 40" x 30" is for sale $400. For while there was a second dragon in the far lower right. As I mentioned earlier the woman talked back to me. Finally she became engaged in riding her dragon.

"Dragon's Shadow" is acrylic on museum wrapped canvas, 36" x 24" x 1 1/2", for sale, $400. "Dragon's Shadow" was at first non-objective. After many starts I became worked up with emotion. I worked towards express myself with energetic spirit. The title came after it was finished when I thought the dark looked like the distorted open jaws of the dragon.

Should these Dragon paintings be made to relate?

Working in a small enclosed area I thought my dragon paintings would just effortlessly flow into a visual harmony. But to my amazement I must force them to have a thread that connects. Sometimes I think I must wreck an already done painting to stretch it beyond where I have been.

Although I have not been showing many finished paintings, I am working hard at it.

"Ignighter the Carousal Dragon"

Yesterday at the Albany Carousal Wood Carving Workshop a half dozen Albany, Oregon artists, who get together to paint once a month, had our most exciting meeting. After a tour of the workshop and Denzel Carousal Museum led by Gwen Marchese, I chose to sketch the dragon now laying on his side in the process of getting his first coat of paint. Here is my beginning on za painting with new dragon energy. This is just what I needed because I was not entirely happy with some of my other dragons. As I work on Ignighter my other dragon paintings are getting a lift.

Granny Riding Sea Dragon

( acrylic on stretched museum wrap canvas 40" x 30") for sale $400

Before granny had a wet suit and she was just misty energy, my husband said the painting was too indefinite and he couldn't tell it was a granny riding a dragon. He had no idea I was painting ocean. So I thought he must be right. And I made the dragon more solid. But granny started talking back looking at me in the eye over her glasses as if she wondered what the heck she was doing on a dragon. I turned her head more in the direction she was going. The reins were loose and held as if she thought the whole pose was silly. Her legs were crossed because she needed to go to a toilet.

So in the wee hours of the morning I was awake wondering about how I could change Granny's attitude. I could appease her so she would look like a thrill seeking granny full of zest for adventure that was a fleeting vision in the misty stage of the painting. I decided to uncross her legs and put her firmly on the serpent's neck. I'll paint over her sagging flesh and give her a becoming wet suit.

Our Flight to Save a Blanket of Memories

Acrylic painting on stretched canvas 18" square
"My Dragon Defiance and I" is the second page of my second Granny Diane Book "When I get to be Older". I sat a grandson in my lap as the story developed and my grandchildren take the lead. The first page was published Nov. 5. In the new book I picture myself telling my stories to family and friends gathered around the flickering light of a camp fire.

Our Flight on a Dragon Named Defiance

to Save my Memory Blanket

Lord Loss sends me a mighty challenge.

Lord Loss steals and turns into dust my most precious treasures, treasurers that keep my memories alive - not just any memories. They are secrets of living that my parents taught me.

My father's Siberian horse blanket is one of my treasurers. Father and I sat on the blanket on the bank of a river when I was a baby. When I was eleven my parents and I huddled under it inside our home made camper tent at Yosemite. Mother sewed canvas tarps to drape over our 1934 Chevy Coup to make a tent.

Now that I get to be older, Lord Loss is making father's blanket fall apart. The story of the blanket has never been told and will be lost unless Lord Loss releases the blanket from becoming dust.

I can not defeat Loss alone. I must get the help of my grandchildren. But first I must have a dragon. Lord Loss can only be defeated I believe with a splat of paint from my most mighty paint brush. Plus a grandchild and I must be riding between the humps of a camel dragon. I'll paint a dream of a dragon I'll call Defiance. On his back I'll place my father's Siberian Horse blanket. Holding my biggest brush up high, Defiance, my youngest grandson and I will ride off to the Valley of Never Dry to bring Lord Loss to his knees. Will this plan work?

Lord Loss begged us not to slap him with paint that would never dry. He said, "There is only one way to preserve the blanket. All your grandchildren must draw or paint the blanket and together all of you must solve the riddle. What is the meaning of the four bear claws, one in each corner, and the trees in the center?

Well what do you say? Shall we paint pictures of a horse wearing the blanket? Maybe that will help solve the riddle. If the blanket is then restored we will let Lord Loss go.

( to be continued with the art of my grandchildren and readers if you know anything about Asian weaving and symbolism, please help us out)

Resolving loss from aging

THE REST OF THE STORY
Getting to be older is frightening. It means loss. Loss of personal belongings that remind one of the past. Loss of old mementos is inevitable as I down size my worldly possessions. This week my allergic husband wants me to get rid of my father's Siberian horse blanket. It is of unknown fiber - possibly anything from reindeer, dog, camel, goat, or yak or a combination of all plus a little grass that got spun into the yarn by some herdsman tending his flock. The blanket still smells faintly of the Asian high plateaus. How can I get rid of a precious family heirloom? Even if I manage to keep it, it will not hold together for long. Its warp of rotten cotton is breaking apart. I want to see it every day because it is memories of my father.

The blanket was rugged masculine beauty. Father brought it out of Asia (our families adopted home for generations). When he arrived here to study at the University of California, Berkeley in 1929, father came as a true olden times Asian traveler with this blanket and the clothes he was wearing.

What was once a tragedy is now an opportunity to write a creative story and paint a fantasy.

3rd day #1 Golden Dragon

As soon as I posted yesterday's "Golden Dragon" I decided it was not done. Plus the idea of making multiple paintings of the same image is like painting for a market repeating the same thing until it degenerates into non feeling, unexciting, unmoving trash. I am having second thoughts about this series as new inspiration comes.
I am sure there can be an argument for repetition, and for some subjects it might even bring on creativity. So I ask you my readers if you have good experiences with series painting. Do you do theme based series or repetition of same image series?

# 1 Golden Dragon

"#1 Golden Dragon", 40" x 30" is a two day painting. I painted outdoors in the drippy stage of applying acrylic mixed with transparent matt medium. On the wet surface modeling paste was spread with comb texture. I was sculpting the paint. Over night the painting dried in the garage and then I brought it in the studio just newly arranged for inspiring me to do dragons. I painted on the floor to help me get distance to spread the paint with gusto like I was a child. Today I feel great working in my new direction.

The Battle of the Blue and Yellow Dragons

"The Battle of the Blue and Yellow Dragons" illustrates a myth. When the earth is sleeping and people are weary of the draught, people hope to see a yellow cloud dragon in battle with a blue sky dragon. The fighting dragons make thunder and lightening which brings the rainy season.

Once a Bedroom - then a store room - now a studio

Working on my dragon series, I am bringing into my studio a batik silk gown and Siberian horse blanket - both family heirlooms. I am wearing a silk batik jacket from the Salvation Army as a smock. I do not have an easel as I am tapping into my childhood memories and often do that best by painting on the floor.

I am retreating from the kitchen, living room, dining room into my own space. My husband deserves to have his own space and our common area. I deserve to have my own space to judge my work for myself. I never believed I could view my large paintings in such a small space. Now with the paintings in close proximity of each other I can work towards the flow that interconnects the series of dragons I am doing.

When I get to be older "I'll join with others"

When I get to be older I will tell tall stories around a camp fire. The stories will make us laugh.
The next few paintings will continue my "When I get to Be Older" series, a story started early this year. This painting is acrylic painted on a wood board cradled box 12" square.

What I learned from teaching a workshop

Yesterday I taught a watercolor workshop at the Oregon Hatchery Research Center at Falls Creek located between Waldport and the town of Alsea. I was surprised by what I learned from the students - 25 or more in the morning and 9 in the afternoon. I thought if my students were primarily 12 years through 30 I would present my approach as extreme plein air painting useful for boaters and trekkers. If the class was mostly older I would present my approach as safe, fail proof outdoor painting. And I wouldn't expect my participants to be able to balance their painting on top of their watercolor box while standing and walking about. There were babes in arms on up in age, to my delighted surprise. The class was a family orientated social event. So I shared how I started painting outdoors on Humbug Creek, Oregon and how I remembered it very well when I went back 40 years later. I could find the very spot and remember it as though I was there yesterday. I said there were many reasons for painting - not just for making pictures on the wall. For example painting makes memories more lasting. Painting together in families makes painting a bonding process. Plein air painting can be a way to being more closely bonded to a specail place.
After an hour I did hear a complaint. A lady about my age said she had taken a few other watercolor workshops and she was always given some kind of trick that had instant satisfying results. I didn't offer any tricks. I had only named a few approaches like counting the things you liked in the landscape and then rearranging them on your paper. Or first do outline drawing in ink or charcoal pencil and then coloring it afterwards. Another approach would be to focus on one thing like tree bark or rocks and take notes of colors and textures that you might use later like in decorating a room in your home to bring the outdoors into your life everyday. The lady who wanted a trick didn't want to go outdoors or look out the window. She chose to copy a photograph and she complained that her painting was overworked. She asked me if I overworked my paintings for earlier she praised my shoe box memory accordion folded paintings were so fresh. I assured her that I did overwork my paintings. I had no solution for her.
A man with two teenage sons showed me his efforts. He was somewhat satisfied that he had painted the memory of the morning colors that he saw driving to the workshop but he did not capture the look of the mists. Here was a problem I could give help on. A white charcoal pencil drawn over the paint instantly put a mist over his hillside of fall colors.
In other words I learned I could help students when they had an observation in nature that frustrated their atttempt to picture it on paper. Students need to start by seeing and then I can suggest a technique to make it appear in their painting. If they expect a technique that will make an image of something for them, they will skip the all important step of seeing.

Fall Creek Fish Hatchery Watercolor Workshop

The children set the tone of the class and I learned from them.

The adults were delightfully directed towards wonderful intuitive painting by their children while they helped their children with some technical issues of painting.

Sarah Runyan was pleased to learn that folding her watercolor paper she could then paint two or more memory paintings when she is outdoors. She did a tree at Fall creek and also the memories of the colors she saw driving to the fish hatchery.

Workshop Lecture: Outfitting for Extreem Plein Air

Ten Essentials For Extreme Plein Air Painting

1) Drinking water

2) Protection from elements,

Sun block

Extra clothing, rain gear, wool stocking cap, wool gloves

Hat with brim

Sun glasses

3) Compact paints, pencils, pens with protective zip lock bag

4) Paper or canvas in zip lock bag

5)Waste water or solvent container

6)Safty articles

Whistle, walking stick if hiking, life jacket if boating

matches with fire starter, map, first aid

7)knife, pencil sharpener

8) Rags, kleenex

9)Extra Food

10)Light weight pack or fishing vest with a special pocket to keep car keys

fully equiped 10 pounds maximum

Tomorrow I will demonstrate my gear for painting on boats or hiking at the first Salmon Festival at the Oregon Hatchery Research Center at Fall Creek. Click on the photo for a larger view of the extreem plein air essentials.

Heron Contemplating

"Heron Contemplates", 7" x 5" is watercolor and acrylic made permanent with UV protecting varnish. I used pencil and watercolors first and then acrylics. The watercolor is painted on absorbent ground on wood and then deeply cradled.

Siletz Canyon Gulls

"Cleaning Station Gull" is looking up for few scraps of salmon. It is acrylic paint on cradled wood, 5"x7".

Sun light on the sea gulls is dramatic aginst the shadowy canyon mixed with ocean air dampness. I love the atmosphere. "Siletz Canyon Gulls is acrylic and interference acrylic on cradled board 7" x 5".

Hunter's Moon and Crows

A pair of crows hung out around Coyote Rock at Kernville, Oregon. Getting up one morning I saw them just before daybreak flying with the full hunter's moon in the background. "Crows' Moon" is acrylic painted on cradled wood, 7" x 5".

Spider Gliders over the Siletz River

They are tiny, almost transparent gliding with the breeze on their silk strand. I have always been amazed by spider weavers but I see a new treat. So new to me I am amazed and enchanted to see the sun lighting the critters' silks as they move from the high tree boughs with so many strands helter skelter moving in front of the sun and then gliding this way and that until they come down, down still bright with light passing the shadowy fir forest to meet the river and then the air picks them up again. They glide past small flies and birds and past fishermen too. Sometimes a spider silk catches me. Oh well, if only my interpretation of their beauty in paint would succeed. I didn't capture the spiders flight on film although I tried.

A Day in Our Motor Coach at the Oregon Coast

My prize of the day is "Breaker Foam Dragon" - a break through for me. I have been painting over and over "Sea Foam Dragons" not getting the feeling I want of playful happiness. "Breaker Foam Dragon" is mixed media with interference and regular acrylic paints on a 12 ' square cradled board.

At 7:00 A M my husband served me oatmeal with raisins. He then busily prepared to go fishing while I have hardly finished breakfast tea. Our windows were steamed and dripping wet. I couldn't wipe them enough times, so I turned off the heat and opened the windows to a beautiful sunny day. I took a few photographs of the oil slick on the marina. Did chores.
9:15 AM I left to do grocery shopping in Lincoln City, Price and Pride Grocery Store.
10:45 AM, I was back at the motor coach . As I was setting up my paints I waved at my husband as he trolled by. I moved the crab pots on and around the table to make room to paint outdoors. I just started painting and it was noon.
12:00 my husband came back for lunch. We had Hebrew Kosher low fat hot dogs and honey crisp apples.
1:00 We walked Gleneden Beach. A sick seal was on the beach yesterday according to another beach walker. We saw the remains of a seal pup. Mostly the beach was bare except for course sand with small grey pebbles.
2:45 my husband made pop corn and we broke out the lawn chairs for the first time since we came in mid September. We soaked up the 72 degree weather.
3:00 I set up my painting again on the outdoor table and had the best most successful painting session. My memory was fresh from our beach walk and the little drawing I did on my wood block when we first walked onto the beach.
4:00 I started dinner. Roma tomatoes on local lettuce from the Barking Dog Organic Produce Farm. A slice of bread with toasted cheese and big shrimp.
5:30 Finished up my blog
This evening I will enjoy the mild weather outdoors and at 8:00 PM my husband and I will watch Dancing With the Stars.
My day is the best day in awhile. It has been so wet and gray. The fishing was poor and most of the other Rvs have drove away leaving the resort very quiet and peaceful.

Walking Softly: Carrying Big Canvas

Rain's blog http://rainydaythought.blogspot.com/ had an entry about things to do and see before I die. Her blog was linked with http://www.nobodyasked.com/ My dream is to walk softly barefoot in the sand and create an energetic canvas. Seeing as an artist and creating your own vision is what I do and dream I will continue doing. This is also the twelfth dream in my "When I Get to be Older" book posted on my second blog. Walking softly: Carrying Big Canvas is a new vison of a painting I did two years ago. It is acrylic on museum wrap canvas 2' x 3'.