Luxuries and necessities

“Luxury is not a necessity to me, 

but beautiful and good things are.”

― Anaïs Nin

I've been thinking a lot lately while doing the many mindless and mundane everyday tasks of life.  Here in Wisconsin, we've had some very ugly times politically, and I've been trying to avoid as much of that as possible.  Silencing all that noise leaves a lot more room for thinking your own thoughts, and noticing the little things you've been overlooking in your own life.  It seems like a luxury sometimes to be silent and allow the mind to drift, but it's really a necessity, don't you think?

Today I happily rediscovered this antique embroidered cosmetic case which was a keepsake I received after my favorite aunt died when I was 11.  It's a little luxury item from another place and time that made me think about the luxuries and necessities in my life.

Just looking at some of my favorite spots makes me deeply happy these days, but I wouldn't call most of these things luxurious.  Comfortable and pleasing to look at, yes, but not luxurious by any means.

I adore this stained glass lamp,

and the many curls of Buddha's head.

A few small pinecones, and the clay turtle I made in high school.

Old and familiar little notes to myself that have kept me grounded for years.

And books!  I'd be lost without them.  In this household, books are definitely more of a necessity than a luxury, to be sure.

Outside, the poppies bloomed very early and did strange things.

The rose bush has never bloomed this profusely before.

While Spring and Summer are in a rush this year, I'm definitely making a conscious effort to slow myself down.

I've written several times before on this blog that I'm really trying to take the time to notice the world around me, and that's more true than ever.  Like when I saw what was left of this tree peony flower.  It only looked like this for a few hours, and I've always missed this stage of the withering flower before.  I think it's gorgeous, don't you?

In some ways, I think I've been following our sweet old Beau's lead as he slows down more and more each day.  We've been lucky with our mild Winter and early Spring.  That's made his life so much easier,.  And longer, too, I think.  But I know this will be his last Summer with us, and that makes each day more meaningful.

Taking the time to be silent and appreciate the little things is becoming a necessity to me, more and more.  I don't need luxurious things, just the simple things I love.

I haven't had much opportunity to make art, but I plan to change that again starting next week.  Finding the time and space to make art is a luxury right now, but it's a necessity too.  I'm much happier when I can be painting or drawing or creating in some way.

I found this on Tumblr today, and it expresses how I feel about art perfectly these days.

I Will Not Make Any More Boring Art, 1971

 John Baldessari

Bluebird Fantasy

"Bluebird Fantasy"

textured acrylic 

on 8 x 10 gallery wrapped canvas

I was happily surprised to learn that this painting sold over the weekend.  Yay!  I painted it a few years ago when I was beginning to experiment with textures, and it will always be one of my favorites.

(detail)

I've left the photos big, so you can click on them to see everything up close.

(detail)

(detail)

I've always really liked how this flower turned out. :0)

Now that several paintings have sold I'll be creating some more items to sell, since wall space has opened up at the little cafe gallery that sells my work.  I like that!

Things are a bit hectic here right now, with my daughter graduating from college and getting ready for graduate school.  It's a wonderful feeling to be able to share these exciting times with her.

Our sweet old Beau-doggy is still with us, too, although last week we had a few days where we thought he'd be leaving us very soon.  We're just so glad that he's still here with us to enjoy another spring, dozing outside when weather permits.

I hope you all have a good week!  

The Art of a Life

I have a confession to make.  Until a few years ago, I thought most diaries and journals were essentially narcissistic and silly.  I thought my own few early attempts were, anyway. That could be because I was told often, by a person who was very important to me in my childhood, that I should just be quiet.  I shouldn't waste paper.   I had nothing important to say, and never would.

Words like that stay with you.

But, thankfully, I realize now that we all do have something worthwhile to say.  I realize now that journaling can be whatever you want and need it to be.  It's all OK.  When I started to realize that keeping journals might be perfect for me, too, after all, I started to research how people journal. And I have found some fabulous inspiration, but none as inspirational as Dan Eldon. Dan lived a full life of adventure and humanitarianism, creating some stunning journals along the way, until he was tragically killed at only 22.

There's a book about him called, The Journey is the Destination: The Journals of Dan Eldon, which was lovingly produced by his mother after his death.

Available on Amazon here

There is a foundation established in his name, Creative Visions Foundation, which carries on his work, combining creativity with activism in a way I've never seen before.

And there is this moving video, found on the foundation website, which was aired on CNN shortly after he died.



I don't know about you, but I am forever changed by learning about this amazing human being.

 "Find your own dance." 

~ Dan Eldon

 

Why not?

Many years ago, before I started painting again, I met a very interesting older woman. She had jet-black hair and wore hot-pink sneakers. Of course I had to meet her! It turned out that she was an artist (of course!), and she invited me to her home to see her art and her studio. Looking back on this chance meeting all these years later, I finally realized something. I really think meeting her changed my life. Although it has taken me a few years to actually act on what she taught me.

She moved away, across the country, years ago. But I sometimes still think of her fabulous paintings and wall hangings, and of a phrase she used often while she was enthusiastically talking about making art, fully living her life, and learning new languages well into her 70s. Her favorite phrase was, "Why not?"

"Why not!"

I often seem to stand in my own way, rather than to boldly move forward in certain aspects of my life. Art is one of those aspects. The last few days, when I think about the different directions I'd like to go in artistically, I've been hearing this woman's voice say emphatically, "Why not?!"


Why not, indeed! Why not just go for it?! Finally show my colors and bloom where I'm planted.

Why not?!

So, I'm going to be *BOLDLY* experimenting with some new directions in art. I don't know how much I'll be showing here for a while, but I will be back with new art when I start to get an idea of where I'm heading.


In the mean time, I discovered this wonderful video today. The artist is Sarah Kiser, and her work just makes me happy.




She also has a website:
http://www.artbysarahkiser.com/

“The best way to know life
is to love many things”
~ Vincent van Gogh
found on Tumblr

Past Present Future

St. Bartholomä
watercolor

Sometimes seeing who you were in the past helps you figure out who you want to be in the future.

Melk, Austria
watercolor

I came across these two little watercolor sketches this week. I painted them back when I was still afraid of the juicy power that watercolors can have. If you let watercolors have plenty of water, room to explore and the time to find their own way, that is.

They were on the first page of one of several little journals I've started and stopped over the years. A bad habit. I start with be best of intentions, and then over-think what the journal should be used for. I become overly-critical of myself, and then that's the end of that.

Finding that journal, and those two little paintings of places I had visited long, long ago, led me to look into my digital photo files. Just to see what else I'd forgotten about myself.

angel detail

I found special angels I painted for special people a few years ago. But instead of looking at the entire painting, I felt compelled to focus on details.

angel detail

Details I liked the most.

angel detail

Details as delicate angel wings.

Looking at who I was, and what I've accomplished in the past, has helped me focus on the details of what I want to do in the future.

angel detail

I want to keep making art, but take it more seriously. I want to create with my heart, and from my heart.

acrylic detail

I want to embrace color. Vibrant and happy color.

acrylic detail

And I want to allow myself to soar to new heights, with reckless abandon. To finally cast aside, for good, the barriers I always seem to set up for myself, and celebrate a new-found feeling of complete freedom.

This past week I also gathered together some little books to use as art journals, since I finally have a clear vision of what keeping a journal now could mean to me. There's a wonderful book, An Illustrated Life, by Danny Gregory, that I've been reading, too, which has shown me just how amazing keeping an art journal can be.

I finally get it. And, more importantly, I finally get me.

"Deep inside
I think drawing and writing
(will) help me remain whole
in a world
that feels so broken apart."
~Rick Beerhorst

(of Studio Beerhorst)
as quoted in An Illustrated Life

Weaving and letting the light in

Woven painted muslin with some random stitches

(work in progress)

I'm not quite sure where this is going, but I know I will be stitching on it some more. Right now I'm loving the rough edges.

And while I've been doing this bit of intuitive weaving and stitching, I've been allowing my mind to drift. A wonderful feeling! It's led me to think that this might be the perfect time for me to weave a new way of looking at life, as well. A new way of looking at the world and my art, and who knows what else?

This weaving and stitching is letting the light in, in more ways than one. . .

I'm also still enjoying meandering through blogland, visiting blogs, maybe even commenting, if I can find words. I'm not forcing the words to come out so much right now. And yes, our old Beau-doggy is still with us. He still has more good days than bad, although he is eating less and less, and sleeping more.

This weekend, I plan to visit this exhibit on contemporary Wisconsin textiles at the Museum of Wisconsin Art. If it's anything like their other exhibits, it will be fabulous.

Wishing you all a happy week!

Bouncing around

Clematis
watercolor, watercolor pencils, Caran d'Ache
8x10

Here's the last of the 5 watercolor flowers I've been working on. I should really call them water media paintings, since I'm not using only these lovely Windsor and Newton watercolors.


I've also been using Derwent watercolor pencils and Caran d'Ache watercolor crayons again, bouncing around between these three water media at whim. I've found that I really like to switch between painting and drawing to get the result I'm looking for.

(detail)

So now I'm ready to bounce over to something really different. A new idea is brewing, but I don't know exactly what form it will take yet.

Someone else who is bouncing around at times is our old dog Beau. (I wrote about all his health troubles a few posts ago.) Automatically giving him two pain pills a day is helping him quite a bit, but I still don't like the idea of an animal being constantly medicated. He's so smart, though. Because he can't count on his hind legs all the time, he has started to sometimes use them together, rather than one-at-a-time. So when he wants to run a few steps, he actually hops, or bounces, with his hind legs together until he gets his legs going the "right" way.

All I can say is that animals are amazing! Bouncing is working for our old Beau, getting him where he wants to go. Bouncing around seems to be working for me, too.

I'll also be bouncing around the internet in the next week or so, visiting all my favorite blogs. It's been too long since I've taken the time to do that, so I'm really looking forward to it.

"Change
is a bouncing ball
on the circumference of a circle."

~ Kin Hubbard

Authenticity

Crocuses
watercolor, watercolor pencils, Caran d'Ache
8x10
(SOLD)

This is how I've decided I wanted to paint crocuses this time. There are already many others who can paint them to look more authentic. But, I'm trying my best to be authentic to myself in all things these days, so this is how I paint crocuses. Today, anyway. These things can change quickly, when you're listening to your inner self.

I've been thinking about authenticity a great deal this last year or more, but the video I shared in the previous post has really had me thinking about it more than ever. So have all the lovely comments that the last post inspired. Thank you for sharing your ideas about introverts and extroverts and everything in between.

In this world, where everyone seems to want to label everyone else, and where the extremes and extremists get all the attention, I feel we need to be reminded that people and ideas are not only black or white, right or wrong, right or left. Just like no one who is truly mentally healthy can be only an introvert or only an extrovert. Fortunately the vast majority of us fall somewhere along a wonderful spectrum.

spectrum

We are all unique, with our own glorious combination of genes, and ideas, and influences that makes us who we are. I hope we can all start to celebrate who we really are along this spectrum of possibilities, by being as authentic as we can be.

“The privilege of a lifetime
is to become who you truly are.”
~ Carl Jung

Something new, a thank you, and a question

Bleeding Heart
watercolor and Caran d'Ache
8x10

Just a quick post to show you #3 in my new series of watercolor flower paintings.

I also wanted to thank you, all of you, who commented on the previous 2 posts. Thank you!

I always wonder how best to acknowledge all you lovely people who leave these nice comments, and I'm going to try something different. I noticed that blogs with the comments embedded underneath the posts now are able to reply to each comment individually, right underneath the comment! So I think I'll try that with this post.

Please let me know what you think about this. Do you return to blogs to see if anyone replied to your comment? Are you having problems leaving comments in this new format?

*** Update 3/10: Thanks for the comments! I'm changing the comment form back to the way I had it before. The popup window, without the reply buttons under each comment, seems to work best.

Time flies

Purple coneflower and Monarch butterfly
watercolor and ink
8x10

Another new flower painting, done in watercolor and ink. I used the photo below as a reference, and just noticed I took it in August of 2009. It seems like just a few months ago. . .

A touch of Spring fever

Pansies
watercolor
8x10
(SOLD)

I decided a few days ago to paint some flowers in watercolor again. I painted watercolor flowers for quite a while once before, a few years ago. It's been especially fun this time, because painting with watercolors is so different from painting with acrylics on canvas. I've had to get used to the way watercolors move like they have a mind of their own all over again.

And I have discovered a hidden stash of gorgeous frames I forgot I had! So I've decided they need to be put to good use as soon as possible. More paintings to come!

Subtle changes

“My soul is impatient with itself,
as with a bothersome child;
its restlessness keeps growing
and is forever the same.
Everything interests me,
but nothing holds me.”
~ Fernando Pessoa

I've added a few more details to the stitching. Subtle changes which pull it together a bit, so that it could potentially stand alone, or work as part of a larger piece.


I'm ready to move on, for now. Although I'm not sure what I'll be doing next. Something different, or maybe just subtly different. I'm taking a bit of serious quiet time to try to figure out where I go from here.

“Without great solitude,
no serious work is possible.”
~ Pablo Picasso
(both quotes found on tumblr)

P.S. I'm also still working on getting my online "stuff" in order, so if I disappear from here or there, it will only be temporary. In case you don't know what I'm referring to, I explained it at the end of my last post. 'Til then!

The good, the bad, and the ugly

 The good - I'm finding such joy in picking up the needle to stitch whenever I have a few moments!  "They" say not to stitch too much on muslin, since it puckers easily, but I'm finding the roughness of the stitched muslin very appealing.  Beginnings can be rough, after all.  When I began to stitch, I thought this would be a very simple piece, with very little stitching, but it's not turning out that way.  In fact, I think this is the beginning of something much larger, although I don't know what that is yet.

These two paintings sold recently!  I'm very grateful to all who were involved in the sale.




                                                                                               

The bad - We had to take our old Beau-doggy to the vet last week, after a pretty rough week for him.  It turns out that, in addition to the arthritis we knew he had, he also has dementia, cataracts, more bladder stones, possible epilepsy, and worst of all - a fairly large tumor on his spleen.

We have been through three surgeries with him, and he is no longer a candidate for surgery, so at this point we will never know if the tumor is cancer. It doesn't really matter anymore.  Thanks to daily doses of medication and pain pills, he is comfortable and still finding joyful moments in his day.  It's a daily vigil, though, to check his gums for signs of internal bleeding from the tumor.  We are taking it day-by-day.  Every day together is a blessing.  And when his time does come, we will work with our wonderful vet to make his final moments as comfortable as possible.

The ugly -  This part is something I really didn't want to write about, but it is finally time.  I have been blogging since October 2008, and for the most part it has been a real joy meeting people and forming genuine bonds with quite a few very special people.

However, four times during this period I have been the target of bullying, threats and criticism, if I did not do what someone wanted me to do, in the way they wanted me to do it.  And, frankly, I'm tired of it.  I have a life beyond what I share here, and that life is my priority.  I know most of you will obviously understand this, but apparently there are some who do not realize that they have no right to make any demands on me.

Enough said.  Onward, to better and more positive things!

"There are better things ahead

than any we left behind."

~ C.S. Lewis

Boldness and distraction

a spiral of French knots

There's been no time for painting so far this year.  During my free moments lately, I find comfort in stitching.  And I find that my stitches, which were very tentative at first, are becoming bolder.

Things are still not back to normal here.  I'm still very distracted.  All in knots.  There's little time for blogging while I spend as much time as possible with our old Beau.  Looking deeply into his eyes, waiting for him to tell me when he is ready to go.  He may still rebound.  I hope so. . .

The flower on my muslin has chosen to be a lotus, a very symbolic flower, which stands for rebirth and enlightenment in some cultures.  Very appropriate for me right now, I think.

The spiral of tiny star-shaped stitches has overshadowed the ink, which whispered "begin begin begin" when I first started working on this piece.  If you look closely, though, you can still see glimpses of those first whispers on the cloth.

But in the center, the embroidered word has become bolder.  I'm not sure if the spiral begins with the word and works its way outward, or spirals inward toward the word.  Both, maybe.

I've never really had one word that spurred me on for an entire year.  This year might be different.  I think "Begin" is a perfect word for this year.  This year I'll focus on beginning all the things I've put off for years.

In fact, it might be my word for life.  Begin.

Up and down, round and round. . .

(detail of muslin with acrylic paint, ink, wool, embroidery floss)

Up and down, round and round - that's a pretty good description of my life (and moods) lately.  Other than some creative cooking, I haven't had much opportunity to create lately.  Just a few stitches to start embellishing the piece of muslin that I've become obsessed with.  

(detail of muslin with acrylic paint, ink, Inktense pencils, embroidery floss)

Our old dog, Beau, now only eats if we entice him by hand-feeding him first.  Even this takes time and patience on our part, since he is slowly reverting back to the timid dog he was when we adopted him from the shelter.   He is slowly forgetting what he learned during his time with us.  He is forgetting that he learned to feel safe and confident and happy with us, and that the dog food in his bowl is his to enjoy.  It's sad to see him old and confused and in pain.  It's sad to know that our days with him are numbered.

Unfortunately, there's been very little time in my life lately to read and comment on blogs and elsewhere online, either.  But after next week, I think I'll have a bit more time again.

Thanks to all who commented on my last posts.  I may not get around to thanking you each personally, but I value all your comments more than you'll ever know.

In the mean time, I'm really loving this change from painting and drawing on paper and canvas, to stitching on muslin.  More changes are coming, too, I think, but I'll still find my way back to painting those portraits that I love.

I have a feeling this will be an interesting year, and I'm working my way into it slowly. 

"Take a breath,

take your time, 

spread your wings

and rise."

~ Counting Crows lyric