A silly painting.

Diane and I are off to NYC tomorrow to see some art. Looking forward to a long drive, great conversation, great art, good food and wine, leaving the city inspired and at the end, on the way home, my first meeting with my new mentor.

tuesday

sunday morning

small bits of paintings I am working on.

friday!!!

Moving things around, listening to the stories that they tell.

November 11,2010

Had a great meeting with my mentor yesterday. Spoke a lot about putting things together. The distance between people and the connections that are made when these distances are explored. I have many characters. Now I am going to arrange them to tell their stories. I have always liked working small and been attracted to possibilities. Relationships of parts to a whole is exciting. I think the struggle that I have always had with painting, in the sense of a large final work, is the finality of it. It is what it is and it will hang on a wall equidistant from another painting. The figures will remain in their postions forever and though they will be interpreted in different ways they will be still contained inside of one space. They will speak together but they exist only that way and they feel self contained. I am attracted to that finality and its cleanness and wholeness, but I have a hard time thinking that way. Working small allows me to explore possibilities to represent time in a different way and to explore the relationships between separate parts without having them fixed or contained.

I am excited right now. I have so many things to play with to explore. Sculpting is very exciting for me. I can explore the same relationships in those forms that I am obsessed with in my characters. The two separate parts, figures and sculptures are informing each other in a nice way. I was thinking, if I can say what I want to say with these abstract shapes, then why do I need the figures. But I do need them. They have been with me for so long and there is a truth in them that I want to continue to explore. That being said I want to paint arrangements of the sculptures and explore where that leads. They can both exist. They are two languages.

I also am excited about an assignment that Evelyn, My mentor suggested: Represent something personal and emotional about familial relationships in a dry, straightforward way so that the emotion exists in the content rather than the execution. An interesting assignment that has opened my head to a whole new range of possibilities.

Well the kids are excited we all have the day off together, the pleasure of both being teachers, and we are off to enjoy the sunshine.

busy busy

Painting. I'll post some pictures tomorrow. I'll be up painting late, the house is quiet. Listening to The Ghost of Tom Joad.

new painting

A new painting. They are coming together, things are coming together.

tuesday Night

yes dear.

late nights.

messy studio.

sunday morning

just painting.

Avoiding writing a paper.

paintings

I have a hard time with painting. It feels like it is always trying to be too finished and important. It feels deceptive to me. It feels strange to cover up and suffocate a nice piece of wood. That being said I really enjoy looking at the paintings of others and I do love the actual feel of painting. I also like the "objectness" of it and to contradict myself I like the "finishedness" of it. I just don't feel right when I do it, or really after I do it.

It is Sunday morning I have a paper hanging over my head, loads of laundry and a busy week ahead. and two kids that are fighting over a radio, one wants to listen to Michael Jackson the other to Guns N' Roses and me, well I'd prefer to listen to the birds.

sunday morning

I am loving painting over people and having them disappear and then reemerge. It seems to make them truer when they come back each time and then at the same time less true. Like a word that you say over and over again. In one way it becomes more powerful and then in the other it loses its meaning.
So that you can picture: my studio is a mess, and my cat Ryman is sleeping on the edge of the keyboard basking in the sun and my family is ready to go swimming.
Here goes.

wednesday morning

nothing finished to share.
just process.
Summer days are long, the evenings and mornings seem to fly by........

sunday morning

wednesday evening

A new piece.
I begin each day with a stack of newspapers searching for images. I cut them out, place them together, paint them and create small collages. Then I create larger pieces that are based on them. I am really enjoying this way of working. I like that there are new papers everyday. I like that I have to search for images. I like having to say what I need to say with what is there before me. I like that what I need to say is there before me.

monday

saturday morning

I live between two extremes.
Completely filled or empty.
I would love to know your thoughts on the first one. I made it quickly and very instinctively last night.
When I say very quickly I am sure it was hours, but whose keeping track?