1965 "Tucson Brick Works"

" Patagonia, Arizona" 1966, acrylic on canvas, 3 feet by 5 feet, at "Rain's" Tucson home

This is one of the first watercolors I did when my husband was going to graduate school at the University of Arizona. It is now in "Rain's" collection and has the honor of being hung in her Tucson home. I have just packed my watercolors as well as my acrylics for our trip south to Arizona.

Thank you "Rain" for supplying me with these excellent photographs of my work. After not seeing these paintings for a long time and it is important for me to see them to see the direction of my development.

1966 Desert painting

As far as I know this acrylic painting aproximately 3' x 5' is not for sale. It is an honor to have it hanging in Rain's Tucson home. Maybe the desert paintings I will be doing this month will be one step closer to non-objective. My painting journey is cyclic and I think my early work is like my current paintings.

Ideas from Kim

Kim Rodereffer Funk has a great blog with some ideas for painters. What I like about them is that they start the intuitive juices flowing. This wonderful bog is at http://kim-creatingspace.blogspot.com/. She suggested weaving two paintings together as a good warm up exercise. So I thought with all the studio clean up that I am doing I could use a little brushing up today. This is made of a portrait that probably was not my mother at the nursing home and an ink drawing mother and I did together. This little tribute to my mother is not for sale but might make it in some show with experimental or symbolic works.

The eclipse and thoughts of the future

The moon and the eclipse may not be what is energizing me to take stock of what I am doing. I started looking at my life and progress in painting before my current solo exhibit. But then again maybe the cyles of life does have direct bearing on my thoughts.
This painting is for sale. "Moon Eclipse" is watercolor with matte medium and acrylics on a wood 7" x 5" deep cradled box. $98

This is a still life I set up for some Albany artists who came to paint and have lunch. We are toying with a name for our group. Shirley suggests Kaleidoscope Artists. I put my foot in my mouth saying that I couldn't spell it. But I like the word. I think it describes the diversity of possiblities we have.

I used to fancy myself as an artists' artist. In a few instances I am sure I have influenced some. My blog might help me in that direction. But I would also like to sell some. It is not my greatest love to market my work. I really like to demonstrate that I just don't hack out my paintings and want all to know the depth of my involvement. So I think for me showing my work along with my process will mean that my art will find new homes where they are fully appreciated. I do plan to put early work and paintings I did in collaboration in on-line galleries this year. I am also wanting to get my work out to venues farther away from home this year with my solo exhibit in Keizer my first step. But I am not going to make paintings just for sale. First they must be for my own satisfaction.

Window frame, book, modular

The grid is the number one greatest invention in the history of man. Perhaps when all anthropological studies are complete, the one area inwhich mankind can be considered distinctly different from other animals is our invention and applications of the grid. An example being the fold lines of a book signature, a sheet itself which when folded and cut becomes one unit of the book. Books are one application. Here I am symbolizing the story line weaving through the book pages of the book maker's signatures of 16 pages. For those who have not been following my blog I have been painting various sides of the cradled boxes which can be rearranged into the modular frames in endless combinations. I hope to go beyond an exercise by also expressing symbolism, mystery, awe, and emotion.

What do I do with all the puppies that didn't sell?

I have stored all quarter sheet watercolors in graocery bags. For several years I stored them and now I can go treasure hunting through them. The "Red Sea Anemone" was one of the daily paintings I did with my mother during the last years of her life. On this one my youngest granddaughter painted the yellow first.

One of my treasurers is a painting that I did on the Santiam River while my husband was fishing and moving down the river. I am thankful to the cross sectional collage that maps my development. The exercise of seeing an overview of my work helped me to appreciate this one.

In addition to the treasurers from the two bags of paintings stored away for several years, I placed paintings were sorted. Some were cut down into post cards, and some were ready for the gesso recycling journey. The ones covered with matts have been croped and will be posted on a gallery on the internet for sale. I think I have hundreds that mother and I made and someone would like to have some of these bright and joyous paintings so they will be for sale too.

Where do I get my ideas?

My collage is changing daily as I think about all the sources of my creativity - strong impressions. Some of my strongest impressions come from early childhood. Some more come from working with my children, being outdoors in nature and making things out of clay. I believe all artists could map their development on the egg cross section as I have. It might be instructional. For me the collage diagram gives my body of work structure being an intuitive artist finding meaning for my work in the process of making it, I allow myself to persue many directions. To see an enlargement please click on the picture.

Painting the infinite in the manner of the Chinese

1996 Watercolor painting is primarily an arrangement of zigzag perspective. At the time I wasn't thinking I was painting like a Chinese painter. Then well known watercolorist Carolyn Lord from California picked up on the Chinese concept in this painting. Since then I study "Principles of Chinese Painting" by George Rowley. It is an exceptional book to ponder.

For those of you who not have been reading my blog for awhile, last month I started an artist statement with a visual collage of my development. The metaphore I used to organize my photos was a cross section of an egg. The center was the major impressions that are food like an egg yoke for my painting. The white is pictures of me at work from childhood until recently. The space around the egg contain paintings representive of my linear and dragon-like paintings. The watercolor is in this detail of my development collage.

Diptych Modular, painting outside the box

I started thinking of how many possible arangements could be made from this diptych if I turned it four ways interchanging all squares plus leaving the back painting open. I think it must be a calculous mathematical problem and I do not have a quick exact answer. But it must be hundreds of thousands. Today I painted the inner layer of the white modualr and also some of the concave sides of the boxes. It now occurs to me that this could be a mini artist's body of works. A slot could be made in one side of each cradled box and more paintings could be inserted. I could invite people to participate in this modular. I could teach people to paint and arrange colors without them ever having to wet a brush. It would be real paint and not like the light in acomputer monitor.

I am thrilled with finding a special meaning. The femine spirit as I began this a week ago was looking through the window with wet eyes. It was hard to tell if she was on the inside or the outside. I do not want to paint exclusion. So here I paint my femine spirit becoming. I am painting outside of my box.

In 2003 I made this cut-out after Matisse's cut-out dragon in His "The Thousand and One Nights". This is a dragon trying to expand beyond his confinement. I was painting my mother's spirit in her last days in the nursing home. I showed her Matisse's cut-outs and made some similar ones to hang above her bed where she could see them. The Diptych Modular is partly finished and will have a similar feeling and symbolism.

Continuing the same modular

Here is the first modular frame with borrowed boxes from the diptych. Surprising how different the mood is by changing the panels.

I paint abstracts very much like I do representational and fantasy. Often colors are mixed on the surface of the painting. They are adjusted by layering. sometimes I do not like the textures that build up.

Two more modular frames

Having a little difficulty staying with the abstract and symbolic. I was tempted to put a face looking through the window but will have to store that one away when I have a real reason to paint the emotion of exclusion.

Tomorrow I'll start the second modular.

My Solo Art Opening in Keizer, Oregon

Granddaughter helped meet the few guests to my art opening. She took pictures and interviewed me taking notes. We all had a marvelous time. I also want to thank the members of The Keizer Art Association. They did a splendid job hanging my art. The bright paintings were at home in the well lit white walled gallery.