Bringing Warhol Home

I recently had the privilege of visiting an art gallery at the Bellagio in Las Vegas that was showing original Andy Warhol paintings. I've never been a BIG fan but I am a questioning, wondering, curious kind of gal and so I visited the show and parked my original judgments at the door. I decided to view these paintings with fresh eyes as if I had never seen pop art or the posturizing of images and portraits. Like a man who goes to a mountain top and carries away a gift under his arm, I carried out of the gallery what I learned - a new tool, a new brush stroke, a new way to add pizazz. I took it to my plain old self-portrait.

I painted this self-portrait in acrylic last summer at an art class at the Roswell museum. I was never really happy with it- although it was a fairly good likeness, it was flat and boring to me. I did the best I could with what I knew to do, but I wanted the painting to have more poP!!

I think all it needed was a little warholing.

I'd be curious as to which you like better.

Every gift I collect along the way is making a difference in my seeing eye and ultimately my own artistic skills.

Contemplating Las Vegas

We're back from Las Vegas. We had a great time but we ate too much, slept too little and walked our little feetsies off. We stayed at the beautiful Caesar's palace.

My favorite place to eat was Payard's. Sweet Farmer looked a tad out of place in this beautiful French pastry shop- (I know he only ate there for me) but he did agree there was quite a difference in a flaky, delectable cheese danish made fresh by French chefs than the ones we buy at Sam's!

My next favorite thing was the Bellagio gardens and conservatory and art gallery. I got to see original Warhol's and Lichtenstein's.

We did our part for the stimulus package! Most of Las Vegas is fake and too ritzy and manufactured for my taste- I can't help but compare it to the simple vistas of Africa - but there is beautiful art and fascinating images and lots of life's questions to contemplate. Like why do you need 3 toilets (one a bidet) in a room with one king size bed? And who was the first person to try marble floors? And why do so many people come to Vegas to put money in machines and on tables that rarely offer them anything back? If you've been to Vegas you probably have a few questions of your own .....

Having Fun

I haven't been much of a blogging buddy but I've been having a great time. We've been hanging out in parks and trees and working on the farm.

I even got attacked by a mad goose -but it was so worth it for the memory that will forever be seared into two little boy's minds.

We tried to study the constellations but found that the flashlights we were using to read the constellation books were more interesting.

We tried to hunt Easter eggs, but riding the golf cart was more fun.

I've been drinking cokes and eating candy and and sleeping while holding someones little hand to make them feel safe.

All you need is a couple of little boys to remind you what perfect Spring weather is really good for.

I'm going to Las Vegas next week with sweet Farmer to recover from Spring Break with the boys.

If I Were A Painter

If I were a painter I would paint the TRUTH. It is so much more colorful than the bland, washed-out world of the un-TRUTH. It is so much more passionate and sensual. It is so much more powerful and acidic and explosive.

Could you handle it? Would it frighten you or draw you in? Would you linger there in front of the image trying to accept what your seeing mind is telling you? Would the price tag be too high for you? Would you set out to create your own version of the TRUTH?

Would you recognize the TRUTH as fine art?

(a work in progress)

The Gracious Host

I like to try my hand at creative writing every now and then and I am making a collection of certain short vignettes. But unlike the Brazilian wax story, this is not about me and it's not suppose to be funny, but it is another story about stupid things women do......so I guess it could be me... if I'm not careful.


He climbed on to her back and took a firm hold.

She hardly knew when he began sucking the life blood from her as he was adept in this symbiotic relationship and could make his small incision as precisely as a skilled surgeon. She would find him now and then, and in her searching, run her tongue over the smooth contours of his body, and she liked that better than she hated the wound.

When her mother called she would ask about her parasite and the girl would always say that he was doing "his thing" and her mother would be happy and respond that she should feel lucky she had someone to share her life with.
Once, he ventured into the open and embedded himself in the smooth contour of her lower right cheek. She spied him as she walked by a mirror, and bending closer with her breath against her own image, she peered intently with a strange excitement, and realized he looked like a beauty mark and added some mystery to her otherwise plain face. But remembering suddenly why she hadn't chanced her image in awhile, she saw her white-washed pallor was now an ashen gray and that sick feeling hit her hosting heart like a stone. She hurriedly pinched her cheek and then twisted the skin between her fingers until she saw the red stain rush to the rescue.

As for now, she knew, she was everything to him.