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.

Tearing It Up

"Deep inside, I think drawing and writing help me remain whole in a world that feels so broken apart" - Rick Beerhorst

You're looking at a small art sketch that totally resonates with me and it's mine. That shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone....especially me, but it does. I practiced a technique I learned last summer in an art class in Cloudcroft. You randomly tear up pages in magazines and then put them back together in a composition that pleases you. This happened to be a very reflective glass and a flower.You then tape everything together and then frame it with small pieces of straight paper. And then paint what you see.

Tearing it up and then putting it all back together again. Taping over the gaps. Re-framing. Taking something destroyed and creating something new. And just like the pages of my art journal, everyday we have a new chance to make something... better.. out of what we had before.

And still, sometimes, I'm self-limiting by my own need to control. What happens to this image when I let go and get messy with it? When I goo-ify it, soften the lines, add circles and smudges? And let the grays go to a beautiful turquoise?

Only endless possibilities.

I'm a possibilitarian.

WOW- that was a blast!

Kaleidoscopic Mind

The older I get the more multi-dimensional I feel about myself. My art is all over the place and it shows no sign of focus on one particular subject. I admire people who are able to focus on one particular specialty like a sport, hobby, job, etc. and get really good at it- like the Olympians. But, I will never be that kind of girl - alas.......but I will have stuck my feet and hands and mind in a hundred different passions that made my life an incredible kaleidoscope. Like that beautiful toy, I find that all my interests begin to overlap the other and enhance the process and the design is ever evolving as my years roll round and round in the hands of God. Sometimes you want to stop the kaleidoscope and hold on to certain perfect symmetry or that moment in time, but only a breath can change the view -and there you go again. I'm not going for balance anymore. For me there's no such thing. But I do believe I'm achieving a measure of wholeness and contentment with the skin I'm in. I realize a creative mind is never at rest. It's always changing- there's a new design everyday within the brilliant tunnel of my own kaleidoscope because I'm handled carefully, yet often by the Master's hand. You can't really argue with what He's doing...you just roll with Him until He lays it down.

original art journal sketch

Still-life and Real Life

This was a quick little still-life for my art journal. I'm trying to draw something everyday. Drawing in my sketchbook is like drinking a cup of tea- very calming.

Sweet Farmer and I have both been a little antsy, the feeling of unnerving calm before the storm- gearing up for spring farming and some other new projects on the horizon. Also, it seems there are so many people we know who are sick or who are breaking up or who have various financial problems......I've felt a sense of uneasiness and anxiety in others, as well. I read this quote today:

"Faith and courage have to be practiced. They have to be experienced to be strengthened. Do one uncertain thing each day. Depart from your safe routines regularly. Take some risks. Chase off your monsters. Recapture your own mental backyard." Dale Andrews

When these feelings come over me - I know what to do. My parents gave us kids the greatest gifts when they taught us how to comfort ourselves and to look to our faith during uncertain times. My mental backyard has a big GOD to watch over it and I rely on Him to guard my heart and my mind. It's not a mindless giving up of control - it's more like an intentional choice to work with Him and experience the day through His eyes -to look at the world from a spiritual unveiling instead of just accepting the world's physical point of view. It changes the landscape for me and I have a more hopeful outlook.

Interpretive Painting

Yesterday, Sweet Farmer and I had a good day. We went to church, out to eat, and then out to watch some mounted shooting competition. I had my camera and caught this photo of a friend.

So today I wanted to interpret the photo. This is a hard concept to get across to my family and friends who are mostly non-painters (you notice I didn't say non-artists) They are impressed when you perfectly draw a photograph. But then why did you need the painting if you had the photograph I ask?

Anywhooo..I'm trying to paint what's in my head regardless of the critics or admirers around me and that's not always easy - just to go to that place...alone....undaunted.....with a raw drive to create my own art.

So, it starts in my art journal. Then I take it to Flickr and manipulate it. How can I improve on this design? What does it lack? And in the process I learn things about design, color, softening edges, adding wavy lines that increase my appeal toward the image because I have no real art education, no mentors (other than my blogging friends) and basically, don't know how to get to where I want to go. But nothing will stop me. It is my photograph, my art, my designing process and there is no failure in finding my own expression. The art will most likely end up in my own home. I have nothing to lose and everything to gain.

And now, I can see the painting on a huge canvas, in acrylic, over my bed- with little adjustments here and there. That is interpretive art as far as an odd chick knows it....today.

My cat

We have a cat that always looks pissed off. Maybe she is but I think the markings on her face give her a sour faux demeanor. But her eyes are incredible. It took her about 3 years before she decided she wanted to be a lap cat. Otherwise, she will tease you for attention and then bite you and run away - her favorite game.

I wanted to try my hand at animal hair again and I'm closer than I was the last time I tried.

Actually this is one of those times when I should have just left well enough alone and been grateful that I got a great photograph. Instead of the red-eye reflection, I got her golden orbs - all without re-touching. Pretty gorgeous, huh? Could you believe she was a very sick little kitten that Sweet Farmer found in the road?

This is a good time to show you a little sketch I did from an interesting wine label. I believe it says "Castle of the New Cat" once translated from French.

As anyone knows who has a cat knows- su casa is gato's casa - that's Spanish for "it ain't your house - it's the cat's" -