Postcard, Maybe

I might send this in as a postcard to Wet Paint's Summer Postcard Project or I might not, but at least I painted today! The cut off is for postcards received in the mail by 08/02. If I send it, I am cutting it close. The bird feeder turned out better than the bird. It's challenging to work on such a small piece.

#248 - Cabin Hummingbird - 4" x 6" - paper

This was a second attempt. The first attempt is below. Somewhere it just went wrong, so I used it to practice my greens. Even so, I did not capture the bright emerald green of the hummingbird, but I tried.

Stalking The Hummingbirds At The Cabin

I took another painting hiatus when I was at the cabin. We arrived on Thursday and left on Monday and I painted only one day. While I intended to paint every day and certainly brought up enough stuff, it just didn’t happen. The reasons were mostly because of other good things happening, but there was a little shyness on my part. I actually drew more days that I painted.

Last year, at the same cabin, I remember struggling (in a good way) trying to capture the angles on a bird house. This year, I revisited the same struggle (still in a good way) trying to figure out how the overhang of the roof related to one part of the cabin. While I enjoyed being with many of my favorite people in the world, I also enjoyed the brief moment of solitude, when I was working on this. While I still have a long,  l    o    n    g,  l          o          n         g way to go in my drawing skills, I felt better equipped in giving this a try.

Here are a few of the scribbles. Ignore the two cartoon sketches. A friend used my sketch pad to do some doodles.

I continue to be surprised at the things that I notice. I've been going to this cabin for at least one weekend per year for over 20 years. On this trip as I was sitting waiting to use the bathroom (which did not happen that often even though 14 people were sharing one bathroom), I was stunned when I noticed the patterns in both arches in the stone fireplace, as well as the two larger rocks on the outer edges where the shape transitions from being rectangular. I found myself looking at the fireplace in a new way.

Last, but not least, I spent significant time stalking hummingbirds. At first, the hummingbirds were eating mostly from the flowers and they moved too quickly for me to get a good picture. Plus, I hadn't figured out what settings and modes to use on the camera. After the hummingbird feeder was taken down, cleaned, and filled with fresh food, they started going there more and more. There were at least two of them and they spent a lot of time trying to chase each other way.

I became obsessed with getting some good pictures. This included sitting in a place during meals with a clear view of the feeder and my camera nearby, after meals, hanging out inside by the window and waiting (and waiting, and waiting), and also sitting in a chair outside. My friend's Penny and Chuck also did some chair-sitting and picture-snapping too. It was wonderful being in a such a beautiful place with time to devote to this indulgence. One thing I learned is that I don't have the patience to regularly photograph nature. No one who knows me will be surprised by this.

Still I got some good pics (cropped only, not edited).

There were other good opportunities to photograph birds. One morning, two friends noticed a large shadow from a bird flying overhead. They jumped up to see what type of bird it was and where it was going. It landed in a tree. Fortunately, it hung out until I woke up and was able to take some pictures.

Up the road is an osprey platform and early one evening when the light was good, I walked up to take a few pictures.

Since I was at a cabin on a lake, my last picture has to be a loon. Each morning, the first thing I did was grab my 30 year-old pair of binoculars and my 1 year-old camera and go down to the dock to see what birds were on the lake. The first morning, I startled a snowy egret. The rest of the mornings, I saw things like mergansers, gulls, and loons. One morning, I counted 10 loons in a group feeding. Even with a 60x zoom point and shoot camera, the birds were too far away to photograph. On the last morning, several of them were a little closer. I still needed to be at full zoom. I got very lucky with this one.

Self Induced

Blog silence does not necessarily mean that I am away from home. However, that is exactly what it  meant this time and the last time. Between the 4th of July holiday, the vacation in Hartford CT/Springfield MA, and, returning today from my friend’s cabin where I've been the last 5 days, I haven’t been home or worked much in July.

While I love going away on vacation, I do suffer from self-induced stress associated with getting ready to go away. Some is carryover from my first job out of college which left me with a permanent hatred of packing. For the better part of two years, I had to pack every Sunday to travel the next day. The most frequent exception was if I was out of town for 2 straight weeks rather than 1, which meant I was already out of town. Although, I landed an assignment where I was home for maybe 2 months or so. It got to the point that I would do things like get my bike boxed up and mailed to my work site, if I could figure out a way to get it stored over the weekends when I was home.

These days, it just seems like there is a lot to do before leaving with having to do things related to the house, yard, garden plot, cats, and so on. Of course, I also always manage to add to the list at the last minute.

This time, I packed my painting stuff the night before, including palette paper and extra stuff so other people at the cabin could paint if they wanted, when I decided that I should do a few postcards for the summer postcard project for Wet Paint. 

Suddenly, the morning we were leaving, I was cutting out 4" x 6” pieces of paper, mounting them, and priming them with gesso. I was hoping to get people to join me. As I was doing this, I felt my stress level rising, until I caught myself (and laughed at myself).

In the end, I mostly took another painting hiatus, although I did paint a bit and I drew a bit, as well. Here is one completed project. I don't like it, so I'm not sending it in. This one is from a picture I took at the cabin last year.

#246 - Hummingbird at Cabin - 4" x 6" - paper

I started another one, which I may or may not finish now that I am home. There's a tight time deadline, since any postcards must be received by Wet Paint by 8/2 and they have to arrive my mail. This one is from a picture my friend took this year at the cabin with my camera.

#247 - Unfinished Chipmunk - 4" x 6" - paper

While I have enjoyed being on vacation, it's good to be home. Since I don't have any other travel plans, I intend to get back to painting daily.

Back To Daily Painting

I started up my daily painting habit on Monday, although since I was back to work I didn't have much time in the  mornings. I started this one on Monday and finished it last night.

#245 - Ella, The Beautiful - 8" x 8" - paper

This is Ella, my cat with all of the health conditions. She has been doing a bit better since we've been treating her for hyperthyroidism. Several weeks ago, she was very cooperative about having her picture taken, plus the light was good. I want to do another large painting, probably in August, so this is a preliminary painting in my normal size range.

More About Vacation

Re-entry. Coming back from vacation always involves a re-entry process, especially with being gone for 10 days.

I have more to share about my vacation out East.

While I was at juggling convention, I got hooked on a new prop and skill. Going forward, I suspect that my juggling bag will forever include a 4 foot long piece of rope.  Throwing and making knots is a blast. When my hubby and I saw that someone was going to do several knot throwing workshops, we went to Home Depot and purchased some rope before the convention started.  On the first full day of the convention, we walked around the perimeter of the space to check out the vendors. That’s where we met Greg. His juggling club had a table and he had a number of ropes on the table. I asked if he was the workshop instructor. He was not, but he was willing to show us some rope tricks.There was another guy, Jeff, who did two workshops on knot throwing.

I became hooked. I practiced while walking back to the hotel. I practiced in the aisle at the theater before each night’s show would start. I taught others the tricks that I had just learned. One day on the elevators, another juggler wanted me to show him a trick that I had just done. I wasn’t even out of my hotel room for 5 minutes when that happened. It was great!

What was especially interesting was that it came fairly easily. In the past, it’s been much harder to mirror what someone else is doing when it involves twists, turns, changes in direction and multiple steps. A few times, I did have to reposition myself next to and slightly behind the person to see what they were doing, but for the most part the visual translation (even when I was in front of the person) just sort of clicked. Most of the time, it felt like brain was saying “okay, I’m ready to take in and use this new information”. My husband also noticed this and commented on it.

I honestly believe that over the last 2 1/2 years I’ve been working at learning to draw and paint, my brain is slowly rewiring itself and getting better at processing visual information in a different way.

The other thing that happened was that I successfully packed and flew with my painting supplies without any sort of paint explosion or disaster. I consider that a success. While I didn’t forget anything, next time, I should pack few more paper towels. In a weird way, it felt good to set up my palette knowing that I wouldn't use all of the paint.  I have materials to support me, not the other way around.

I am most comfortable painting in my little corner of the basement, so it was also weird to paint in a hotel room. The table and chair situation was not exactly comfortable and the light was horrible. Still I did it. My first opportunity was on day 3 of the convention when my husband went off to mid-morning workshop. I stayed in the hotel, set up my paints, drew out a picture, and completed about 75% of a painting. I finished the painting the morning we left.

It felt good to paint. It was relaxing and I needed that since juggling convention is one big non-stop ride on the over-stimulation bus.

#244 - Hammett - 8" x 8" - paper

On Vacation, In More Ways Than One

I was gone on vacation from July 13th returning today.  That also resulted in a vacation from painting daily. Early on, I decided that I would be okay with painting or not painting, since I was going to be busy with visiting family for several days, and the rest of the time at a juggling convention.  Still, that decision did not take away all of the regret of breaking my daily habit.

The family members I visited live in Hartford CT. It was great to see them and we did a number of fun things. In the short time we were there, we went to a play, In The Heights, and went to three museums, the Mark Twain House, the Harriet Beecher Stowe House (which is the next house over from Mark Twains’s), and the Hill-Stead Museum. Each was a great experience. It was my second time going to the Mark Twain House. We mainly went to the Harriet Beecher Stowe House since it was convenient, but I am glad we did. The tour was more about the historical context of her writing Uncle Tom’s Cabin than the house and it was very interesting.

The Hill-Stead Museum was amazing. It is located in a former family home. The home is a huge Colonial Revival home lived in from 1901 to 1946 and converted to a museum in 1947. Under the terms of the trust that created the museum, the property is being maintained and shown with no differences from when it was the family’s home. Imagine an L-shaped room for lounging and entertaining which includes a Steinway piano, a number of paintings, sculpture, vases, drawings, and other decorative items. When I say paintings, I mean exquisite ones including Manet’s “The Guitar Player, Degas’ “Dancer’s In Pink, and two of Monet’s haystacks.  There was another huge painting by either Whistler or Manet, but there were so many throughout the house I already forget which ones were in which rooms. You can position yourself in this room so that you can see all of these large, major paintings at the same time and the piano. That is just one room in the house.

On Sunday night, we checked into the hotel where we were staying for the juggling convention. Since there are only limited convention activities on Monday, that left us with a day to explore. The two museums I wanted to see were closed on Monday. The concierge at the hotel recommended the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge MA. On Monday, we drove up to Northampton for a little shopping and lunch and drove the backroads to Stockbridge, which took us through part of the Berkshires. It was a beautiful drive.

This was another good museum. In the paintings by Norman Rockwell, I enjoyed the overall paintings, but found myself drawn to the small details. There also was another exhibit called “Keepers Of The Flame” which focused on and traced back painters focused on the narrative tradition like Rockwell, including Wyeth and Parrish. We also got to see Rockwell’s studio which had been moved from its original location.

While all of this was pretty nifty, the lack of daily painting plus looking at the works of famous, professional, accomplished master painters allowed doubt and insecurity to start to creep in.  I believe it’s actually one of the reasons that I do paint daily. As a habit, it becomes something that I just do and I don’t waste time pondering should I continue or not.

Wednesday at the juggling convention provided a fix. Michael Moschen was giving a talk on creativity. Michael is a juggler who won a MacArthur Foundation genius grant in 1990 and has had a deep and profound impact on juggling. He talked quite a bit about process and made it clear he was talking about his process that works for him. He talked quite a bit about not knowing and that this is both a good and important place. I took notes and one part that stuck with me was when he said that in the creative process the goals are to move, journey, embrace, open up, and hope.

How cool is that, getting to hear someone like that talk about creativity for 90 minutes?

Overall, I left feeling fine with not knowing what I am doing or where I am going. I’m fine with being a hobbyist who is serious (and happy) about her hobby.

Woodpecker In Winter

When I needed something to paint, I looked at pictures and decided to paint the first one which appealed to me. This winter, I took some pictures (thanks 60x zoom on the camera) of a little woodpecker tapping holes into my neighbor's tree and one of these pictures caught my attention. It might have been the fact that it was over 90 degrees outside at the time with a miserable level of  humidity in the air.

I drew this one and started the trees last night and finished it this morning. When I stopped last night, I was not pleased at all. In fact, I would have given it a negative 12 on a scale of 1 to 10.  I'm not sure why the negativity dial in my mind was on maximum last night. This morning when I looked at where I had left off, it didn't seem so bad.  Now that I'm done, I can say that it's not going to go down in the record books as one of my favorites, but it was a reasonable attempt.

My takeaway is that I need to work on my self-talk. When I'm in the middle of working on something, I need to change the commentary in my head to something along the lines of "I'm working on this piece. I'm not done. The time to evaluate it is after I'm done and have taken a break".

#243 - Woodpecker In Winter - 8" x 8" - paper

Bridge In Minnehaha Park Revisit

It's July, so it's time for this month's Art 4 Shelter painting. I decided to revisit the Minnehaha park bridge with a different cropping.

With limited time, it took 3 days to finish. Here it is after two.

I finished it last night.  In hindsight, this composition draws my attention under the bridge. Sigh.

#242 - Minnehaha Park Bridge - 5" x 7" - paper

I'm still not sure about using the small brush to show the bricks in the bridge (at least I didn't paint each individual brick), but I don't know how to approach it otherwise. I like the trees and water. This is the first time I've painted water where I think it looks like water and implies movement. For some reason, the patterns in both the water and trees "made sense" this time, so it was easier to be truer to the values, especially with making the light parts light enough (relearning this crucial point for about the 199th's time at this point in my learning process).

I painted both the trees and water fairly quickly without multiple layers of paint or getting too fussy, so I think they look more "alive". Once I go down the rabbit hole of overworking an area, I can never get a sense of  "freshness" back.

Oh No. Not That Again.

I did another set of timed paintings. I'm back to the paint stroke direction quandry, among other issues.

#241 - Onion 4 Ways - 8" x 8" - paper

What I find interesting is that with simple objects, there is no place to hide.

Garlic - 4 Ways

In the most recent set of painting classes, one thing I learned (or learned again) is how helpful it is to mix in a few exercises from time to time. It helps prevent bad habits or getting stuck. I've been feeling as though I am regressing to a tight and fussy place, so I decided to do a page of timed paintings.

#240 - 10 Minute Garlic Paintings - 8" x 8" - paper

 The first one was in the upper left hand corner. I literally felt like a deer in the headlights. It took me 2 1/2 minutes to draw, but I did stay within the 10 minutes. I used a size 8 brush. The right side and bottom is not very true to form.

The second painting was even tougher. In the timer app I use, I thought I had saved settings that included a 10-minute timer with 2 1/2 minute interval reminders. Nope, the interval reminders have to be turned on each time. Since I was not watching the timer and I did not use time well, here is the 10 minute mark. I gave myself some additional time to finish. The colors look very different since this photo was in the basement while the above photo was in natural light.

For paintings 2 to 4, I switched to a Princeton Snap Bright size 10. Actually, I was going to do each one with a different sized brush. Once I picked up this brush, I wanted to continue to play with it. Swoon. This brush is probably 2-3 millimeters wider than the normal size 10 brush I use.  While it was a challenge to use it in a 4 inch by 4 inch space, I really liked how this brush felt and picked up paint. When using it for the backgrounds, it just felt good. For the smaller bits, it felt like being in the kitchen and using a 13 inch chef's knife when I normally use a 9 inch one. It will take some calibration, but I see potential and fun with this brush.

While I'm not fond of any of the results (which is not the point of doing this exercise), I really enjoyed the process of doing these timed paintings. It was both engaging and energizing. After the long string of painting landscapes from pictures, it was good to try and use a viewfinder again (frustrating, but good), use a different paint brush, and just change things up.

One other thing......I get the letters from the Painters Keys by email. They are also available on the web. I really like this part from the 07/03/18 talking about master.

"In George Leonard’s remarkable little book, Mastery, he draws on Zen philosophy and the martial art of aikido. He shows that the mastering of any non-trivial activity can be plotted on a graph where relatively small gains are made at intervals, followed by slight declines — and then by prolonged plateaus where nothing much seems to be happening. Those who become masters, he says, are the ones who learn to live with and accept these plateaus."

To me, this sums up the reason to keep up my daily painting practice. If I want to see any improvements over time, I need to just keep painting. When the end result seems terrible, I need to paint the next day anyway. If I'm in a rut, I need to do something different, but paint anyway. Just keep painting. Just keep painting.

Noticing The Light

One thing that happens since I've started painting is that I will just notice that I like how the light is hitting something. It draws me in and I have to take a picture. This mostly happens when I'm at home with the cats. There's just something about natural, indirect light.

Ella was sitting in the chair in the kitchen with her body face towards the big windows, which she does not do very often, so there was natural light hitting her face and body in an appealing way. I ended up with 8 or so pictures of different facial expressions and/or angles of her face. She has always had these amazing ears. She is sixteen years old and has a number of health issues, however she is still so beautiful she can just take my breath away.

One of the pictures might become my next big cat painting. Since she is a gray cat, it really helps me to paint using a picture with good light.

The Last June Landscape Painting

On Saturday, I got together with friends to paint outside. I can't wait to do this in the fall. We went to Minnehaha Park. While it was a very warm weekend, it wasn't too bad in the park. It helps not having any buildings around, plus there was a breeze. In typical fashion, my brain went into overdrive and anything I know about painting flew away. One suggestion was to focus on a very small composition. That is good advice and I will it a try next time. I hope to go out to paint plein air a few times by myself before I get together with friends in August to paint outside. We will see how that goes!

Instead of showing Saturday's paintings, here's what I finished today. It was painted from a picture. I drew it out on Friday, so it counts as a June landscape painting.

#239 - Bridge In Minnehaha Park - 8" x 8" - paper

I decided to show the stones of the bridge using a number 4 brush. I think it looks a  bit cheesy, but you don't know unless you try these things! I like the person and umbrella on the right (the red and white one).

My commitment to work on landscapes for the rest of June is done, so I need to figure out what to focus on next. Since I feel like I'm tightening up, I probably will do several rounds of 10 minute paintings.