Sour and Sweet

-A few weeks ago, I started this still life at a workshop given here by Bruce Williamson, a visiting artist/teacher from Texas. Unlike the other members of our class who used oils, I was working in acrylics.

Bruce would begin each class with a demonstration ( think of it as You Tube LIVE ).

As a visual learner, and aren’t most artists, I gained so much by watching him begin to fill in spaces. And hear his mental process, not because we were psychics but because Bruce, while working, was telling us how he translates what he sees into what he applies.

-By the time his demo was over, it was midday and the sun was directly on top of us which gave our still life set-up the very sharp shadows as you can see in the photo.

It also very nicely baked my paints into a abstract form on my palette, much faster than I could paint. That’s the Sour in the title.

But I liked the beginnings. It taught me to work fast and not over think each stroke. I took it home and worked on it in the studio, using the photo as a reference ( what did we do before digital cameras??).

How we look at shadows- they’re not one color. There are at least 6 colors in each object and its’ shadow. The true color, the mid-tones of the true ( or local ) color, the shadow of the object, the shadow of the object reflected on the surface, and finally the best part- the little highlight on the true color that gives the object its’ “ping “.

Who could have known you’d need an abacus to tally the contents of your work while you’re having at it!!

Art is math. Art is science. And some darn fine teaching too.

This is what I finished in the studio.

-I’m very happy with the lemon. I adjusted the pear to be more grounded into its’ axis- it wasn’t leaning authentically. The apple, well, I’m learning to compensate for how acrylics dry darker than you think they will but I’m not into overworking this piece anymore.

What I did get out of it was a sense of having fun while doing it. I haven’t done a still life in a very long time.

How pedestrian, to be living in the Caribbean and presenting you with a trio of fruit you could find in a convenience store on the interstate! But mango season is coming right up and hopefully may compensate your disappointed eyes.

They Took a Village

We have a community here on St. Croix that reaches deeply- into their pockets, into their hearts, and into their consciences to help a good cause. There’s no shortage of those, certainly not here on our own island.

This past Friday night I went to an art show fund raiser that was unlike any other I had ever been to. One of our local galleries - Maufe` by name, hosted at its’ own expense, a show dedicated to a newly formed, St. Croix based non profit organization known as Haiti Community Support. Please don’t stop reading now. There is a very important story to be told here.

Headed by Bruce and Mathilde Wilson, they have devoted their lifes’ work to changing a pocket of humanity, one cinderblock, one child, one bag of rice at a time. Mathilde has lived on St, Croix for many years but was born in Au Centre, a poor among the poorest village in the mountains of Haiti.

They have made numerous trips back to her village where not one child had ever been to a school or had even seen a school. Through the setting up of their 501 (c )3 organization, they have raised some of the funds necessary to build a school and hire two teachers to make sure that the next generations have an opportunity to improve their lives.

I’d like to offer some quoted text from Mathildes’ Spring 2008 newsletter as no one can put this into words better than she can-

HCS Newsletter Spring/Summer 2008

“For each of my 41 years on this earth, my country, Haiti, has been a place of terrible suffering and despair. I’ve wondered all my life how this holocaust could be allowed to continue, year after year, with no meaningful intervention from the developed world.

Recent press stories about mud cookies and deforestation, food rotting in the ports, and hunger riots in the cities are shocking and discouraging. But Haiti has been this way on and off since my earliest memories. I’m worried that if that’s all people hear about Haiti, maybe they’ll just completely give up on us.

Sensational stories hide the greater truth: That Haiti’s survivors are eager to rebuild their ravaged country – if given even minimal help. Deep in the mountains, in the poorest and most forgotten of mountain villages, our school kids and their parents are today making great progress; planting a community garden, running the school lunch program, and learning new skills. Men and women who have survived the odds already just by staying alive, defy the odds again, to build a school and a medical clinic.

Making progress in Haiti is difficult and exciting work. You’ve been a part of our success. We’re a young organization, and early supporters like you are especially important to the future of an effort like this.

I and my husband have been working in Haiti for the love and exhilaration of success. What has kept us going has been your support and encouragements, and especially the hard work and dedication of our village leaders in Haiti.

I hope you enjoy reading some good news out of Haiti. Feel proud! It’s news you are helping to make happen! “

Thanks,

Mathilde Aurelien-Wilson
Director HC

The gallery event Friday night was something that made every resident here feel proud of our community. Up for auction were paintings by Haitian artists, some of our local artists, and in the best tradition of total involvement, paintings by young local art students, some of whom never painted before.

This was coordinated by the supreme efforts of Monica Marin, the art teacher of Country Day School here. What this group accomplished was not only raising over $10,000, just last night, but to instill in children here that what they do can make a difference.

If all we do is focus on what’s wrong with our society and our politics and policies, we will become beaten down and deadened. There is so much to be done, and thankfully, there are people like Bruce and Mathilde who risk so much and try so hard and in the end, refer to themselves as a ” lucky crew”. How can we not help them? With last Friday nights’ collection they will be able to expand the school and add another 50 children from neighboring villages.

There is no doubt that unlike any other agency you may give to during the year, there need be no question as to where every penny goes. It ALL goes to the children and families of Au Centre.

Please have a long, deep look at the photos.

I’d like to ask you all to visit their website here to see what the best of humanity is capable of and click on their automatic payment button to make a real difference in the lives of people who have never known running water, electricity, a meal before bed and still, only want an education.

Thanks to all my readers and friends for indulging me in something I feel so very strongly about and just know that whatever you can do- will truly make a difference. Let’s all take a village.

Peace and love now more than ever.

I’m no Plein Jane

Just ended a weeks’ workshop given by Bruce Williamson, an artist and teacher living in Texas who flew here to St. Croix to hold a plein air workshop with the idea of turning us into ” Painters of Light”. He refers to The Yin/Yang of Painting by Hongnian Zhang and Lois Woolley.

Some rapt students at the waters’ edge watching a landscape take shape.

Bruce is a wonderful painter and generous teacher. I wondered what the challenges would be in painting with acrylics while everyone else painted with oils.

I soon found out.

I likened it  to wanting to dance with the corps, but while they were in ballet slippers, I was in tap shoes! Did I enjoy it? Yes! Did I learn? Yes! Was I able to apply the same techniques and get the same results? A very frustrated no!

Our repertoire consisted of still life and landscape with the components of composition ( light and dark ), light source ( warm light, cool shadows ), focal point, and value based on grey scale ( Frank Gardner has a great post on this ) being consistent in whatever we painted. Varying directions of brush strokes for interest, giving the focal point sharper definition than background elements. He also included an exercise in painting with a limited palette ( two primaries ) to create harmony of color and deliberate thought of mixing to achieve a result that doesn’t rely on a quick grab of a tube.

I gained lots of insight into these important tenets of a good painting. Bruce starts a blank canvas by visually selecting his subject with a view catcher, then gives himself points on his canvas as reference.

He then loosely draws basic placements of his objects with a sienna wash. At this point, he blocks in his darks. So up to this point I was nodding eagerly ( I can do this, I get this …). Add some lights for a visually arresting composition. Still with ya’ Bruce.

Then the scientific adage of oil and water………

Even with a Sta- Wet Palette, my paint puddles dried before I could dip into them again. Every color had to be re-mixed over and over which creates two problems- a painting that takes forever, and colors that are always off.

Landscapes were impossible for me. I was cautioned by Nancy Moskovitz, well, she actually wished me ” Good Luck ” and said to work fast. Fast and good are not always best friends.

What do I do? I did quick studies of fruit, using the one stroke at a time method that he showed us to really ” see ” the warm and cool, light and shade.

I love the way oils look when working with them- the subtleties of color range and staying power of pools you can keep referring to. But how do I negate drawers full of acrylics. re-tool in oils and all their sidekicks, and justify it? The smell of turp, the safe disposal of toxic liquids on this little island?

I humbly bow deeply and respectfully to plein air painters while I ponder where to go with all this.

Oh No! I’ve Hit a Wall!

When your current medium of choice becomes a QUART of Gesso, and your favorite brush width is a 4″ housepainters’ special, you, fellow artists can surmise that I’ve hit the old 2000 mile long Great Wall of Nothingness!

Since my last two shows, I apparently used up whatever I had and have gone blank, should be relegated to drawing stick figures like the old hangman game ( remember that one? ), and haven’t been able to paint another canvas since.

I can further punish myself by looking, no, fawning over everyone else’s blog whose work knocks me out and imagine that they’ve never known moments like these because their work is endlessly luminous, prolific and they confess to loving every minute they’re in the studio. Not painting but looking at other art blogs is akin to buying the exercise clothes, paying for membership and NOT GOING to the gym.

Arghhh!

This frustrating condition led me to a very interesting blog by Robert Genn covering a topic called painters remorse ( hmmm, I thought- there are others …). His writings are just the thing I needed to read as well as those of other artists expressing their points of view about the same dilemma.

One of my favorite artists Carol Marine- a great painter of still lifes so alive and frisky, you’d be hard pressed to pick a favorite, also posted a comment on his blog about this very frustrating perception.

Stop whining, I said to myself. Start painting or something, said my husband ( and cheerleader ).

What is that something! I’m ruining every canvas, hating everything, what do I do? This self-flagellation is sublimely easy when you work alone without other artists to commiserate with or learn from.

I began to sketch and do quick studies just for the practice of re-introducing my hand to my eyes again.

Pencil in a moleskine book and a loose watercolor ( my first, really ) doodle just to break this streak.

In the form of confessional here and as a way of segue-ing into a workshop next week, you my loyal, kind, admiring readers get to view these.

I’ve signed up for a 5 day workshop here next week given by Bruce Williamson ( more details next week…..). This will be my first official painting/drawing class in decades. Although he works in oils and I use acrylics, I’m going to take the classes anyway to be in the much needed company of other artists and a teacher. It’s 5 full days, 8 hours a day.

That ought to slap the whining out of my psyche and get me back in the mode or mood.

Wife Imitates Art

In one of my previous posts, I presented this painting called CaptuRED. I had no idea it would be as popular as it was, and on a greater level, never suspected it would become a totem of fertility to a woman who was told she would not be able to conceive. The woman I’m referring to, had seen this painting on the web and went mad for it. She told the man in her life and he contacted me about purchasing it as a surprise for her for Christmas. ( What a good guy! ) I shipped it to him in California and the night it arrived he presented it to her. I imagine there was that particular way in which a woman can express her absolute joy at getting such a surprise and guess what?? That very night, she conceived and is now 5 months away from the birth of a baby she was told she would never have! Women have a way of knowing almost to the second with accuracy envied by the NASA space team, when they conceived. She said she knew that very night.

There ARE of course other methods to determine when is the best time, like the lunar cycle.

You can move to a part of the world where fertility rates are the highest, like Africa.

There are ancient totems of fecundity that have been known to increase the potential for fertility like the Venus de Willendorf

But what would YOU rather have hanging in your bedroom?

This same couple was also here on St. Croix last month and she attended my art show at the Atrium Gallery, glowing, slightly rounded, and brought the painting back here with her from California in order to hang it in my show to entertain the many who attended with the magic of this great story. What’s next? One of her next year substituting the baby for the rooster!

I can see another commission coming……….

The Pressure of Commissions, The Pleasure of Recognition

Ahhh, the pressure of a commission painting!

Will they like it? Will I like doing it? Will I regret the minute I said ” OK, I’ll do it? ” Maybe all of these things are present when the process starts. One way to minimize surprises is to have a preemptive understanding that you do not wish to reproduce, as if by photography, every eyelash, mole or freckle. That this is an artists’ perception of the ” capture ” of some essence that will at least make the painting recognizable as a portrait.

I was graced with a free rein of interpretation when a very close friend commissioned me to do a painting of herself and her first child- a 6 month old daughter , as a surprise for her husband for Christmas.

We both agreed ahead of time that whatever style suited me would be fine with her. I think she knew I wouldn’t translate my vision into something reminiscent of Picasso’s Les Demoisselles d’Avignon.

There were no live sittings- I live here on an island in the Caribbean, and she on another- in Manhattan. She emailed me lots of photos, and I studied the one I thought best summed up her love for this little girl.

We were both very happy with the results.

The hardest thing for her to do was to keep it hidden for a month before surprising her husband. The hardest thing for me to do was to get over the doubts I’d had about keeping it soft, real, and not obsessing over exact likeness. We both managed to succeed, I think.

I bet Paya the elephant didn’t obsess for one minute as she picked up HER brush. I may have to travel to Chaing Mai and study with her!

A long overdue mention here- I had never thought of setting up a blog, I just enjoyed reading everyone elses’. Had it not been for my friend Mary Schwalm, a most talented photographer who visited here in the fall, I never would have set this thing up. It’s Mary’s wonderful photo of St Croix on the heading of my banner. After morning coffee one day she pronounced: you are going to have a blog! And I’m going to set it up for you! Who could deny such a luxurious offer? So now I recognize, officially, the great lens and funny caption maker, Mary.

She shoots for Associated Press and her own pleasures which include animals, sports, and the oddball. She’s on my blogroll under Is Today A Zoo Day
See some of her wonderful work below:

The Business of Show and Sell

This past Friday night was my second art show of the very limited season we have here on St. Croix. Unlike stateside locales, we have a minor window of opportunity to show our work to an appreciative audience here on this island- our season is essentially over in a few weeks. In addition to the truncated season, we have lost valuable galleries due to the same myriad explanations that plague the overall economic climate everywhere in the states.

But, wait- don’t bemoan or pity the poor artist! We’re creative! If you provide people with an interesting evening out, in a beautiful setting and do the appropriate outreach in forms of advertising, you can get around those details. This show was made into a very elegant, exhibition that brought in what looked like a few hundred people and within the first half hour, 4 of the 7 paintings I had on display, were sold!

Thanks to the very enterprising efforts of Kathy Bennett, the owner and creative engine behind Undercover Books and Gifts, here on St. Croix, she transformed an underutilized atrium, normally used as a breezeway, into a stunning, gallery like space, sent out hundreds of invitations, radio blitzes, and posters, and made this a first rate show.

I mention this as a sharing of ideas to other artists out there who have found disappointments in galleries closing after bodies of work were produced, leaving the artist with the equivalent of a punch in the gut. My friend and oh so wise and talented artist, Sue Smith of Ancient Artist fame, has experienced this more than once. If she has, so have others. Just as artists are looking for venues, art patrons are looking for places to view. Let’s inspire our creative brains to find alternate options other than the standard gallery and/or the web. No web page ever did justice to Gauguin’s colors- there’s nothing like seeing works in person.

Read some of the many other suggestions on Creating Artists Space to learn what alternate paths are available. Just as you can’t stop learning new computer programs and re-programming another phone, sitting back and thinking the same old way will get you exactly that.

As happy as I was to have sold what I did, I hate to see them go.

Posting here for the first time is the finished painting that I had put here a few months ago in sketch form called ” Salsa “. This was the image used in all the promotional material for the show and as is often the case, the one that gets sold immediately. No exception here. It was a thrilling night for me. Now I have several uninterrupted months to create a new series for next season and be mopey that my living room walls are bare except for some lonely, unoccupied hooks waiting to serve their purpose.

The Days’ Offerings

The title of a new painting and some smatterings of unrelated things of interest. First, about the painting called ” The Days’ Offerings ” in acrylic at 11″X14″ , and how it came to be. I was given this great photo ( I’m always on the lookout for period photos from the Caribbean and West Indies, and friends know to save them for me ) and knew it was something I wanted to paint.

Drawing to loosen your hand is a good way to unfreeze the mornings’ claw that you hope will produce something you’ll like looking at. So I thought to sketch the ladies on paper first instead of going right to drawing with willow on canvas. One of my favorite blogs by Debby Kasperi - Drawing the Mot Mot and yes, I’ll mention her again because her paintings and drawings are gorgeous, she shares lots of information and is very funny. Should call her the Wit-Wit. Anyway, she says she draws to warm up her hand for the day and draws what she calls Bananadoodles. Curious? You want to look at her site.

Drawing the same thing repeatedly gives me a familiarity with the subject. Then I wanted to see where lights and darks would go. That’s the quick sketch with colored pencils. By this time I was getting a sense of where I wanted these women to be standing in relation to each other.

I picked somewhat brighter colors for this piece than I usually do since this time frame is more recent than the early to mid 1900’s era which is what I often paint. Clothing then was overbleached from the sun and salt with extended time spent outside. These clothes had to be brighter but still be faded from wear. The environment plays a rough game with you and your belongings here. I’m presenting this piece as well as several others in a fine art exhibit here on St. Croix on March 7, 2008 at Undercover Atrium in Gallows Bay;

What the heck draws me to this subject matter is curious to me. I see the strength of my grandmothers’ generation. I miss the foods my grandmothers both used to make every Sunday when we came for the day. Egg noodle dough spread on the kitchen table, sliced free hand down its’ length, dried on her chenille bedspread and later that afternoon plunked into boiling water. Everything tasted real. Food was honest and simple and generational. So when I go to a farmers’ market or road stand and see a jar of homemade guava spread, or gooseberry preserve, or chutney, I know I’m looking at more than a condiment. I’m looking at a quickly fading heritage and soon to be lost custom because no one has the time to do this anymore. I’m so glad some people still do.

This is what I’m talking about.

Let me amble on to another blog that I can’t keep away from. This is not an official tag. Mainly because this artist/writer/mother/animal lover could not possibly have one nano second extra in her life that isn’t accounted for in order to respond to another person. Maggie of Greywarenart writes hysterically funny chronicles of motherhood, animals, serious goal keeping and marketing and paints as well she writes. Seems not fair to the rest of us. Don’t hold out too long and when you have a look, bring your pajamas- you could be reading her posts all night. You’ll learn a lot too.

HOUSE STRUCK BY RAINBOW!!!

Caught this during a 100 second storm over Cane Bay that came in dramatically and then was gone.

The Calypso Dancer Begins to Emerge!

– Meet The Calypso Dancer, “16X20 ” Acrylic.

She’s the beneficiary of two new discoveries that have gotten her to this point so far. I’m still in the progression stages with her but she’s got enough presence to introduce on this site until I complete her, hopefully after this weekend’s Good Hope Art Show here on St. Croix, which I’m exhibiting in.

First, I sketched her, not on the canvas as I usually do, but in a sketchbook that I’ve promised myself I would use more often than I have.
Doing that first, gives me a sense of the planes of a face, lights, darks, shadows.
I like the process.
But here’s the big discovery. The thing that I absolutely LOVE and can’t believe I just found.
First, though, I must confess to having oil paint envy!
I’ve mentioned here on these pages that I don’t work with oils because of the humidity factor of living on St. Croix. Then there’s the fumes of turp and spirits that linger in a non air-conditioned environment.
Add to that, my mail order arsenal of accumulated Acrylic paints which I can’t replace without spending even more than I already have on supplies.
I love Dick Blick for mail order- they’re fast, professional, ship to the US Virgin Islands at low cost, and have a great catalogue and website.
But acrylics dry too fast. And if you choose to work with many layers of colors in sheer coats, your paints dry in seconds.
Here is my big discovery.
It’s called ” Sta-Wet Palette ” made by Masterson. It allows your acrylic paints to stay wet for days-even a week. Now I can treat my palette to the same range of paint subtleties and nuances that oils allow you to do. And you don’t waste paint.
I can’t say enough about this product or you’ll all zone out from reading this entry.
But have a look.
It’s a 13 “X 17” plastic box with a snap tight lid ( think of Tupperwares’ seal ).

The bottom is lined with a spongy yellow pad that gets soaked and squeezed.

The special acrylic sheet that also gets pre-soaked and placed on top of the sponge.
That’s it! Paint stays wet just like happy, non-envious blobs of oils!
Painting The Calypso Dancer is actually fun for me now.

Speaking of fun, notice how much fun that coconut is having, tormenting Aberra at La Reine farmers market. Aberra grows and nurtures exotic fruits at his orchard on St Croix. Coconuts, cherimoya, wax jambu, egg fruit, Black Sapote, mango, and Shaddock ( sounds like a fish, looks like a grapefruit !). He will be at Ag Fair this weekend and so will I.

Tagged Under the Palm Tree

– Until I established this blog, admittedly later than many but earlier than Grandma Moses, I had no idea what it’s content should be, or it’s slant, or even WHY I should do it.

Then I started to view some fine examples of what this medium is so good at representing and providing. I’d go back to see what made them stand out and make me want to bookmark them for fear of losing them in the Bermuda Triangle of ” oh no, where did that go and how will I ever find it again?!”.

They had to, of course, be visually stimulating, which for me is often an eclectic selection. I knew I didn’t want my blog to be about my every thought, how I like my coffee or a journal of self promoting blather. I wanted to find models of intelligence, generosity of information, wit and kick butt inspiration.

There are hundreds, probably thousands of blog sites belonging to incredibly talented artists, so for now and until someone takes the Gregorian Calendar and adds 2 private months to it that no one knows about but me, I want to acknowledge with a loud tip of the brush, the artists here, whose sites are wonderful and whose insights are just as grand.

The deliciously expressive and masterfully hued figuratives and landscapes of Brad Bisbey . He’s shared so much information about color mixing and technique with me. Most of all, he’s reminded me to listen to my own voice.

Karin Jurick- a favorite on so many blog lists and I share those opinions. Her small jewels of paintings within paintings and everyday subjects are rendered with dazzling beauty.

The beautiful portraiture, and light filled landscapes of Nancy Moskovitz whose succinct and snappy writing exemplifies what I’ve been writing about here.

Drawing the MotMot- wouldn’t that turn your beak if you loved birds?
Debby Kaspari is the impressive artist of birds, and so much more. She writes with great humor and devotion to her art and love of the natural world.I was drawn in by the title of her blog and have stayed ever since.

Ancient Artist- Developing an Art Career after 50- the wisdom and creativity of Sue Smith. Sue has taken this model and shown us so many templates for pursuing with smarts, talent and vigor, the business of our craft.

A bit of an iconoclast, I thought rules were only suggestions but I like the rules of tagging here.

Not on my profile but should you want to know more, ( even though it does contradict rule #4….) here they are:

Things you didn’t know about me.

1. Since moving to St. Croix, my tolerance level for insects has grown proportionately to the length of time I’ve been here.
When I first arrived, a fruit fly in my nightstand water glass received a nocturnal heave-ho down the drain and the glass’s contents immediately replaced. ( Even the glass was rinsed out with soap )
Now, if I can’t feel it on my lips, down it goes.
Guess I’ve been here long enough.

2. So far as I know, I’ve coined the phrase, “ Outside Begins With OW”. Living in this environment, danger lurks everywhere, band-aids are the new fashion accessory and scars are the new liposuction.

3. The first chapter in the book of the above named coined phrase, will be “ I Used to Have a Concierge, But Now I Have a Machete “. Not a term often used in New York City. I may or may not get to the book, if I keep at this blog and squeeze in an occasional painting.

4. As I’ve reached a certain age, I prefer to listen more than I prefer to talk about myself. It’s become the foundation of some great friendships.

5. Someone recognized me three years ago from 2nd grade! Said he’d recognize me anywhere, and that I hadn’t changed! ( That was 47 years ago ).
Perhaps HIS eyeglass prescription hadn’t changed either!

6. I disbelieve most everything I read in the newspaper, or hear on the evening news -especially when it’s reported by spineless anchors with plastic grins.

7. I teeter on the fine fencepost of live for today and plan for tomorrow. How’s everyone else doing with that equation?

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