The Muse

Most artists I know say they have a muse; I certainly do. Famously, male artists often find their muse in a model and lover. The same is often true for female artists, at least the ones I know.

Just rereading a recent Times article about Gala Dali, Salvador’s muse, model, promoter, lover and wife.  (Reader, please assume no significance in the order of those five roles … just felt like the correct literary rhythm … I leave the ‘significance’ ranking to you.)

Have to admit, there is something spellbinding about painting one’s lover. Rendering a good portrait is always an intimate act. For me, it’s impossible to paint any face and not feel that face … the sensation is not really empathy, it's more like inhabiting the model. As I tell subjects, I can’t paint your cheek without my cheek tingling. When the subject is a loved one —  a family member or close friend … it’s impossible to love someone and not want to paint them.  As for a lover ... I guess I need to paint them, just like needing to be near them. As Dali said of Gala’s requirement that he visit her only by written invitation, “Sentimental rigor and distance — as demonstrated by the neurotic ceremony of courtly love — increase passion”.

Here’s a Dali painting of Gala. Those of you who know me are thinking … ‘oh no … not spheres again!’  Point taken. But maybe that’s something Dali and I share ....

Student Work Completed

Completed landscape sketches with a student. She did a terrific job. I didn't instruct her to make an exact copy of mine, rather to mimic my technique (do what I do regarding brushwork, content development, paint handling, and so on), but use her own judgement in interpreting the subject.  

Oh .... guess you could be wondering ... mine is on the right. She said she felt like wind was blowing the trees, so that's how she painted them. 

Josie WIP

Here's progress from the second session yesterday. When working on such coarse canvass, I like to layer the paint thickly (impasto) ... well, to be accurate, the first few layers have to be thin to insure the integrity of the of the base for the subsequent impasto work. It's referred to as fat on lean. Depending on what I want the picture to convey, I may want a smooth or textured surface ... painterly work generally has a surface dynamic that is energetic in and of itself, and on coarse canvass the evident brush strokes and exaggerated colors can turn out to be tornado irrespective of the subject matter (ahhh ... the days of abstract expressionism). 

Today will be BIG for this little color study. Still a hint of the grisaille underpainting (which I love but will bid farewell very quickly in the session).  Usually when I think 'I will certainly finish this sketch today' that means: I will certainly finish tomorrow.

At any rate, it will be ready for review and delivery this week ... in this case the color study really is a study .... it's a prep piece for a formal portrait of the same subject (different pose). The client liked both styles, so commissioned two. Originally I did color studies to prep for most formal pieces, until the sketches seemed to take on a life all their own, 

all boundaries are conventions

Dreamy morning in the studio.  This year 4th August seems to be a completely 4th dimensional day.  So I’m going with the celestial Cloud Atlas for work … always best to keep my conscious mind occupied so my subconscious can paint.  Inclined toward the movie rather than the audiobook, principally for one of my favorite scenes of all time:

don’t worry, all is well; all is so perfectly damnably well

I understand now that boundaries between noise and sound are conventions

all boundaries are conventions waiting to be transcended

one may transcend any convention if only one could first conceive of doing so

moments like this I can feel your heart beating as clearly as I feel my own

and I know that separation is an illusion

my life extends far beyond the limitations of me

Now let’s see how Roxy (recently deceased) comes to life beyond the limitations of me.

Existential Interiors

Been in an existential patch these past few days ... thinking about art and what it does, and why we attach to it ... and objects in general and why we attach to them ... and that we may,  by simply bathing our treasures in attachment, invest them with some sort of power .... yak yak yak...

A while back I was working on portraits with symbolic interior elements, larger pieces than lately .... allegorical portraits if you let the objects do the storytelling. It's not that I don't REALLY appreciate the work I have now, but I do hunger to get back to something a bit meatier ... on a canvass I have trouble lifting.

In the ideation phase now: here is an experimental interior (photograph) (my bedroom actually)  ... around the idea of  living with art and objects and how they tell our stories... not a new idea certainly, just my take on it. This would be a self portrait if you consider my reflection in the clock cabinet window. I like the layers: the reflection of the subject ... a painting of a painting of objects ... yak yak yak ... 

Student Work

Work-in-progress after the second session on this piece with a student ... she is only 12 years old ...  loves to draw, and is already very good, but has never had any training other than the occasional lessons in school. We are working together on the Look Homeward landscape subject. Since it's the only way I know to do it, I'm teaching her as I learned: Ben Long would paint, and I'd set up beside him and basically copy what he did. One more session should finish these up. Hers in on the left ... pretty good so far for her first landscape. 

Headed Homeward

Paintings delivered and headed home. Looking forward to getting back to this little picture. Decided the Homeward Angel look lonely on that hill all by herself, so sketched in some other grave markers, seven in all as usual. Should be dry enough now to work on ... have a few more hours to decide where I'm going with it ... but this is the good part now ... layering the color and light on that dark base.

Maggie

... just completed. Minor adjustments relative to where she was this morning .... mostly layering impasto white over the painterly color application which defines the structure of the face and expression. With the classical layering technique, the key to rendering white objects ... dogs, clothing, snow, clouds, and so on... is to establish the structure with color and then, wet into dry, layer the white on top. With a course canvass like this one, it's possible to brush the white on with a light enough touch to let some of the color underneath show through, and when it works, the result can be magnificent.  So here is Maggie ...   a week or so to dry, or at least dry enough to ship.... then off to Mississippi ... and for me it's off to the kitchen for a hamburger. 

Every Artist Has a Secret

Looking at Maggie in the (almost) light of day, I can see she's not quite finished. But there are some things that are working, so that's good. Many artists, after they've been at it a while, secretly use patterns or symbols in their work ... sometimes visual devices or mathematical relationships. Whistler had his butterflies.  Mine is hearts. OK ... teen-age-girl-cheesy ... I admit it. There's actually a very grown-up story behind it, which I'll share another time, maybe after adequate coffee. But, especially with these little pet sketches, I always hide a heart ...    

Maggie ... very close ... but need to sleep on it

Before the Painter was the Quilter

Mother’s recent move unearthed several long-packed-away boxes … one with an oddly random collection of objects from my past. If we had to label the box, it would look something like this: Things-Cindy-Made-or-Things-that-somehow-relate-to-Things-Cindy-Made. In-her-twenties-or-earlier. Plus-the-blond-ponytail-from-her-first-haircut.

Pictured on the garden seat at my makeshift kitchen island desk is small quilt …. looks like it was actually intended for this purpose, but obviously for a rectangular seat. For some reason I felt compelled to sign and date this ordinary little thing. CLS 1981. That was the year I graduated from college, and the summer I decided not to go to MBA school, instead to spend some time reproducing antique quilts, and ultimately to go to work for a television station, which was surely more educational than graduate school. Didn’t start painting till I was 40 … and not really professionally for several years later.

On the table you can see images of Roxy … today I'm starting a fairly large, classical (formal) portrait. Going to try to activate the surroundings with energetic patterns and colors … but not so garish as to spoil the Classical Mood ... thinking of the subject’s surroundings as wall paper, but still suggesting an interior space … something meeting in the middle. Well, at least that's the plan.

Yellow Sky after The storm

Here's a little landscape sketch, oil on paper. Paper is ok as an oil painting surface if it's triple primed with gesso. Make sure you prime in alternating directions ... 1st coat horizontally, let dry; 2nd coat vertically, let dry; final coat horizontally again, and when it's dry to the touch you can paint. And use a good paper .... this is a marvelous French watercolour block ... lots of tooth.

I'm seeing some interest in landscapes these days, which baffles me. Landscapes seem like something absolutely anybody can do, especially this sketchy style ... easy and fast. Honestly, I think it took longer to set up the easel on the porch than it did to paint the little picture .... and I was rushing to set it up, to catch the yellow sky before it went dark. The yellow sky is a favorite symbol for me .... saying true love is a force ... and after the mayhem of this violent storm look what happened ... the sky turned yellow.

Maggie in progress

Such a sweet girl from Mississippi. A birthday surprise.

Normally I try to paint subjects looking directly at us. Guess that harkens back to childhood .... constant insistence by my father that I "look people in the eyes when I talk with them!" Later when I was older the lesson morphed into this: listen to what people say .... but moreover, watch them .... micro expressions, hands moving, muscles twitching, skin colors, energy colors .... actions intentional and otherwise ... the place where truth blasts out louder than words ever dare to tread .... or as Daddy would say "don't listen to him -- watch his feet".  

But Maggie .... well, she seems to express her real identity gazing heavenward. At least that's how it looks to me. So eyes-cast-heavenward it is for this little portrait.

Starting with the traditional red clay ground on rough canvass, glued... with hide glue of course ... to birch plywood. Primed with lead white. Lessons drilled into me from the Florentine tradition, like those from my father, are hard to shake.

Look Homeward Doodle

Thinking of including gravestones on the Look Homeward painting.... maybe three markers below the three trees. Of course, an angel sculpture might work, but it's not a huge painting so the figure would have to have a fully articulated profile... minus the coffee ring. 

Look Homeward, in progress

My student had a stomach bug, so decided to take the morning off and play .... in this case "play" means start a little landscape. A nearby cottage. Actually, it's surrounded by other houses, but from this perspective it looks distant and solitary. As inaccessible as a forgotten dream. Perfect.  

You might ask why a just-started-painting is already signed and framed. Well .... I'm painting over a self portrait from 2010 .... one that always bothered me, and I seem to like it less every year. This morning it absolutely shocked me .... who is this person! Guess it's time to go, huh. Normally people yell at me for painting over paintings ... but not today ... so long ancient-portrait-of-me-I-never-liked-anyway. Sometimes it's good to see that the former things have passed away.

The Divine Miss T

Signed, framed, and ready to ship to Nashville ... Art and Invention Gallery's fabulous 15th annual Tomato Art Festival. Last year "The Doctor is In" won a merit prize ... which is better than it sounds considering over 500 professional artists entered, with only ten prizes awarded. This year ....  sending Missy Tomato ... The Divine Miss T .... not that it's about the competition .... BUT.... go for the gold, Missy ... bring it on home!

Low Country Boys

First two of a family suite .... darling boys shown with stylized landscape elements. 

Missy ... almost done

....just a little bit more to do.... there is glittery wire wrapped around the headress, and can't really paint that until very last ... after the feathers, butterflies and beads are dry. 

Missy in Progress

Beads and butterflies today ... our Missy Tomato!

Missy WIP

Just started Missy for an upcoming show in Nashville. OOH La La .... the Headdress. Feathers ... check. Butterflies ... check. Beads ... check. Some shiny funky wire .... check. Giant orange rose ... check.