Blog

  • Frustration

    I have a tendency to get lost a lot in terms of my artmaking ... and quite possibly, also in my lifemaking. Okay, let's be real - I totally get sidetracked a majority of the time. I blame it on a bunch of conflicted star signs, for my birth chart is one gigantic contradiction. As an artist, I guess they would say this is an important part of the journey ... but it is also incredibly frustrating. I've run into some roadblocks with my current paintings. Yes, I've never painted with oils. Yes, I took a class to learn. Yes, I should give myself and break and just let the process teach me ... but it's more complicated than that. When I paint, it is very much an extension of myself and I very much like it to look like my work. I can see what I want to do in my head, but my skillset isn't full yet. Also, I've become increasingly frustrated with painting realistically from photographs. I remember having this struggle before. Why am I painting from a photograph? The photograph already exists and is perfect, so why the need to replicate that in painting form. For some, this works. But for me, I don't think it does. My imagination wants to take over. So I've got to let go ... and just let it go. See where it can take me. Because sometimes you have to get really fucking lost in order to find yourself again.

  • Process

    Past to Present. I heart this medium so much.

  • #artcamp

    The days and nights are still cold here ... although each day seems to turn a tiny bit warmer. I've started my own version of art camp with the kids ... little lessons with lot's of exploration and messy materials time. It started as a way to help occupy my 20-month-old while stuck inside and has progressed into a really cool way for me to practice 'teaching' little ones about making art and being creative with various tools and techniques. That Master's degree I always talk about ... the one I want to earn someday ... I'm seriously considering applying for a graduate program with ties to art education and community arts ... with an eventual lofty goal of working within some realm of advocacy for the arts in education. It makes a lot of sense right now. In the meantime, these photos are a sample of what we've been working on.

    photos: 1. becoming your art  2. homemade play-doh with brown rice flour and jello  3. homemade sidewalk chalk paint and getting messy with cornstarch  4. creating textures with watercolors and salt  5. observational contour line drawings with permanent marker and acrylics  6. simple printmaking with potato and hand stamps

  • New Beginnings

    These days, I can't seem to get the type of images above, out of my mind. They are quite a departure from anything I've done before, however at the same time - they are not. I feel like it has been here all along, but has taken time and a lot of growing up to get here. And right now, the thing I am most looking forward to (besides Spring finally showing her pretty face) is the oil painting class I just signed up for. Learning how to paint with oils is going to be a challenge, for sure. The process is one that takes time and patience (a trait which I do not naturally possess). It's important to keep learning, to be a perpetual student, to keep working at your craft. I want to make refined works, moving on from the amateur endeavors of my youth. I am at a place now where I feel ready to turn this corner. It is all new and it is exciting, yet at the same time it is frightening. I see arrangements and wall installations and small paintings on masonite. I see progress. And I see a new artistic chapter about to open.

    All images via Pinterest.

  • Ahhhhhhh ...

    This is how I'm feeling lately. Everyday. Always. It's March now, yet Winter still has us in its grasp. The routine of our days has become just that. Routine. It's mundane and it's boring. And we are all bored. Even the kids. I dream of a place where we can spend each day outside, basking in the warmth of the sun. But that is just that, a dream. And for now, we are all going a bit stir crazy. This is what happens when you don't have any time to yourself. I am a mother, a wife, an artist. Many times, the artist needs to be put first in order to satiate that need to create and explore. All times, the artist gets put last and at the end of the day, no time exists. This makes me incredibly cranky ... and in turn, not the best Mom I can be. I have wanted to learn how to paint with oils forever. And they are offering a Spring class through the Recreation Department. It is affordable, unlike most continuing education courses ... and although it may turnout to be quite amateur ... it will give me the time each week, out of the house, without kids hanging all over me, to learn and to explore and to paint. Hopefully, it will also give my future goal of Graduate School a bit of a jumpstart. I still have that goal in mind, as I believe it will give me the time I need, to take this further.

  • Little Bits

    A glimpse of what I've been up to lately ... have somehow found time to work painting into the daily domestica. So many ideas, yet as usual ... not enough time in the day. Little baby will soon turn 2 and then 3 and then preschool. Only a year-and-a-half until I am able to carve out some "me-time" again. Gotta keep focused. Soon enough, soon enough.

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