Digressing

My art may be digressing a bit I'll admit, but I think I missed or skipped over a crucial period of just pure playfulness. This month of scary, daring stuff has been good for me.

After I struggled over the church painting, a good blogger friend, who must have recognized that I was agonizing too much over my art (actually many of my friends saw that in me and suggested I let go)suggested I read, "Life, Paint and Passion". Thank you so much Anetka for taking me there. It has been a great reminder that the process is as important, or more so, than the product.
If you didn't care what anyone thought about what you wrote, painted, dreamed- what would you dare to do? We were taught very early to live in our square bland boxes of no imagination. Many can no longer respond to the gift of creating. It's like it went to sleep or was buried deep in the recesses of doing it "right" and doing it "this certain way" by "certain rules". This month for me is about taking back the joy of simply putting words to paper, paint to canvas and let that white void be a playground of wild abandon. I've got to dare myself and scare myself, and climb out of my box, and question everything. There is NO ONE to impress, if you really think about it.

Thank goodness I've reached the age of digression.

P. S. Linda at Vulture Peak Muse gave me a beautiful award that honors our sister-hood in this blogging community. She knows I don't like chain-letter type awards - but this one is special because I truly do feel that the people I've met through blogging have been a very special group of ladies that have encouraged me and thrilled me with their endeavors and everyday lives.

Thank you to all those "regulars" that add their sweet comments and enrich my life by small little affirmations. Thank you for taking the time to stop at my front blogging porch to smell my flowers and wish me well.

The Real Me

It is rare that you will ever see an actual photograph of me on this site. Not because I don't think I'm pretty. I'm very pretty on the inside (little known fact that I won Miss Congeniality at the Miss Fort Stockton pageant), but photographs always show the outside and that can be quite ghoulish.

But since it is my month for scary, daring things- I thought I would share my pic for October.

No, actually this is a very fun little photo site called picnic where you can download your own photographs and art and add fun Halloween effects to them. It can be quite liberating for those who have a ghoulish side that never shows up in photographs.

No, actually this is the real me -just ask Sweet Farmer on one of my bad, evil days. But then, he likes me bad and scary sometimes.

Psycho - delic bat friend

I hope you can see my little bat friend in this art. I have really been into bats lately- maybe because things are a little batty around here. Two or three more weeks of "EXTREME Farming- The Reality Show" and we'll be back to a slower normal.

But anyway, little time for my art so recently I painted this bat in my journal. I swear to you it was the ugliest painting I had ever done. I thought about putting it up on a post because after all I'm doing scary things. They say that painting a really ugly painting can be very liberating. It was. I said, "So there, I don't give a rip - I just wanted to paint when I was too tired, too frazzled, and with little time. But honestly, the little bat kept calling to me over the next few days and saying, "come back and play with me".

So, I couldn't fix the painting because he was done with gouche watercolors in blacks and greens and oranges. So I took him a messed with him digitally and I like the little fellow all psycho-delic.

I've said before that art is one of those things in my life that I can change the reality at any given time and it is quite empowering. So I can go from Yuck to Yeah with a few quick tricks.

A Very Scarey, Very Bad Day

Okay I like being scared. But I don't like nightmares.

I had one yesterday.


Regulars here know how much I love driving my Caterpillar Challenger winnower (cuts hay and small grains). Well, this is what happens when you leave an $80,000 machine sitting on the edge of a circular field with a large pivot sprinkler worth $100,000 going around the field.

This is after they stood the large sprinkler back up because it crawled up the side of my winnower and then toppled over. Breaking the last section. Sweet Farmer found it first and called me. Now this is a man that has not ever (I'm not exaggerating) been angry with me for 11 years. He was very angry! I could tell by the way he just kept asking me, "WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT?""

I cried until we couldn't talk anymore. He came home completely over it while I cried every time I thought about it. Then we spent the rest of the evening talking about what's really important, telling me stories of how many other people in this valley have made the same mistake, and thanking God we have insurance on everything!!

It turned out not to be as bad as first thought -less than a $1000 mistake. (GAG) And you know what is funny (like sad, boo-hoo, ha-ha crazy funny). Just 10 minutes BEFORE Sweet Farmer called me with the nightmare call, he had called me to tell me that he had been paid on some odd jobs and gotten some checks out of nowhere. Then he said," I'm just going to give them to you so that you can have - what do you call it, ""guilt-free"" (luxury items) money to spend for Christmas or whatever you want to do with it. I told him I didn't really need it, but he insisted that I should have this nice little sum just for non-discretionary spending, which I do anyway, but sometimes with a little guilt. (I can hear my father grinning)

Later that night - I said, "I sure am glad you gave me that "guilt-free" money and we both just laughed and hugged.

Yes, Sweet Farmer still loves me after all this. And I can still call him Sweet after scolding me like a child when it was just an accident.

"No blood was flowing, no flesh was burning" as I heard King Henry VIII tell his last wife on my IPOD today while I cut hay again in my sadly, dented Catepillar winnower and spoke with insurance adjusters from my cell phone.

Scare Yourself

This isn't good but it was fun. It's a little mixed media piece in my journal. We have been working really hard on the farm, getting the last cutting of hay out and planting fall crops so I haven't had much time for my art.

My calender for this month has a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt that says: "Do one thing everyday that scares you".

To go along with my spooky theme, I think being scared and scaring ourselves by stepping out of our comfort zones is a good thing to be reminded of and practice every now and then. I scared myself most of the month of September as I finished that painting for our church foyer and Sweet Farmer also taught me how to plant with a Global Positioning System. That scared the beejeeweez out of me because I could just see everybodys fall crop failing because of me. But I learned it and he was so proud of me that he took pictures.

I learned just in time as two of our farmhands quit because they wanted to move to Las Vegas and one has rotator-cuff issues and the other got sick with pneumonia last week -that leaves me and Sweet Farmer at one of the busiest times of the year.

Sometimes being a little scared and learning something new makes all the difference in our future successes.

I think I'll continue scaring myself through October, at least.

When was the last time you scared yourself by getting out of your comfort zone?

Wonky Stuff

Shocking?

Good. I did this drawing with colored pencils when I was first learning to draw about 3 years ago. I actually painted this same design on my face for Halloween one year and put my blonde hair in a banana clip and sprayed my "mane" black. (Not recommended if you are truly blonde- it takes forever to come out even though it was temporary hair paint). No one recognized me. It was crazy fun.

Anyway, I've spent weeks painting doves and trying to make something beautiful that I've decided that I will devote October to my darker side. Not as in "evil". I have many sides. I think that's why my art is all over the place. I love to paint wild, wonderful, wacky things because sometimes I just have to let that wonky weirdness in me howl at the moon. And what better time than spook month- October.

I challenge you to share some wild, wonky stuff and and come howl at the moon with me.

It's finished...

It needs a few more minor touches but it's finished for the most part. I thought I would be elated but mostly I'm just very tired. I don't even know if it's good anymore. All I know is that it is the very best I could do with what I know right now. I gave it everything I had, and all the talent I could muster. I had to accept at some point that I couldn't make it the perfect gift. I wouldn't make it the perfect painting. It is just a painting by a very new artist, an amateur with a warrior's heart. It is what it is. You can't imagine what your comments and encouragement did for me! I would have given up many times along the way without your help. Honestly.
This piece taught me that I had romanticized a lot of the artist's process - that he happily painted his huge canvas, knowing exactly where he/she was going and whipped the final product out with joy and glee and a delight to all. It is a wrenching process, a struggle, a long, long climb and finally you reach the top of the hill and you have to sit down and rest for a moment, catch your breath, before you can really enjoy the view.

All I can hope for is that it brings beauty and joy to the space, and honors and blesses those I love.

The Ugly Stage

The painting is at a really ugly stage. It's too stripey, darks and lights aren't defined, no real direction...still. It's like it's turned 17 and gone really rotten like a bad teenager. I want to cry. I want to kick it out. I don't know why I even shared it with you because I'm ashamed. I wish someone else would come in and raise this child.

But I've learned that paintings go through ugly stages, just like people, and that you can't give up. That you have to keep with it until you and the painting emerge. And just like a bad teenager, once it begins to bloom, you can't over-parent them, over-work them- that you are part of the process, but you are not all of it. I need a miracle. I'm expecting one any day.

HELP Please!

OKay. Honestly, from the bottom of my heart- I reeeally need your help.

As some of you who follow me know, I have been commissioned to do an art piece for our new foyer at my church. I know in my heart of hearts that I am not ready for this. I've said it many times to those who asked it of me but they are just sure that I am the one to do the painting. So I said "yes" expecting that God will help me. Trusting Him a lot more than I trust myself. But God will find me working and with your help....

Many of you have seen versions of this piece because I have been practicing for the canvas. This one is on watercolor paper and is about 16 X 20. On Friday I start the 30X40 canvas which, by the way, will also be the largest piece I have ever done. It will take me several days. It will not look exactly like this but this piece holds the essence of what I will try to achieve in the larger piece.

This is where you could be sooo valuable to me. I want you look at this piece and give me your totally honest opinion. I need to see what various reactions will be as this is the way different people from my congregation will view the painting. I know everyone won't like it. YOU DON't HAVE TO to be my friend. What I honestly need is some real critique, real opinions. I have no teacher close, no art student friend - I'm by myself -and I need to bounce this off several someones. Would you please consider commenting and giving me your impressions and opinions, if you are an artist- real suggestions and critiques? You've done it for me before, but I've never needed it as bad as I do now. I would be immeasureably grateful.

By the way, the foyer has been decorated in wood tones, copper, stone elements and has a lot of east light. The decorator person (also a church member) asked that I use some metallics if I could fit them in.

Treasure The Everyday

In honor of the new season, i wanted to do a fall painting. Plus, i had a small box from Golden of sample gels and paste and a new bottle of Gac 200.
(These are all polymers that mix with acrylic paint for different textures and different results.)
All these, and some new acrylics and a museum profile canvas box (10X10)made for a very sweet day yesterday. For the life of me, i wasn't smart enough to photograph it to show you all the fun textures and molded stamps hidden throughout the painting.

So many of you have followed this journey with me of learning to draw and paint. You've seen me

make lots of studies of popular artist and try to re-create, in a more humble version, something of what I saw in theirs. But now, I'm trying to create without looking at anything - painting intuitively, they say... and it's a lot scarier but so rewarding, when after much effort you begin to see something that would actually attract you if someone else painted it. All the studies and all the practice have helped me to begin to make my own stuff. I'll always be a student, but I feel like i'm looking over my safe nest, getting strong enough to take flight. Your encouragement has meant everything....without it, i'm certain i wouldn't have had the courage to keep pushing myself out of the nest.

But if this isn't something that makes you smile, maybe you will enjoy what is playing on my front porch as we speak.