Gaining Traction

Yesterday the schedule went up for the next Art and Soul Retreat to be held in Portland in October. Hop on over there and drool over the class listings; lots of fun is in store for us this year. Glenny and her crew keep coming up with great new ideas for after hours fun too - something about a fashion show where the contestants design skirts with lots of pockets. We can never have too many pockets!

For one of my class samples I used a watercolored drawing instead of collage. I always encourage people to use their own drawings if they like to draw; collage or photographs if they just want to play and design. I haven't worked in watercolor for awhile and I've been feeling the urge to illustrate along with my grungy paint. It's an uneasy mix but I feel like I'm going through another change in my work so I surrendered to the muse.

I cut her wee self out. The first drawings I ever did were paper dolls and I'm still not tired of them. Expect more.

In the raking light you can see the texture of the wood as well as the watercolor paper. All this will get covered with wax and resin.

This is the underpainting for the next image I'm going to share. A nice stacked cake shape with a ladder or something. I like to set up a difficult problem and then try to solve it.

Like a delicate watercolor set into a textural ground. Here I've copied my own work from the 80's.

This is what I ended up with. A bit of split personality but that's okay. Fortunately I'm not a brain surgeon. ha ha. Just tell yourself that if you're in doubt about your painting.

This past week I spent a day with a woman I think of as pure goodness. We shopped Anthropologie and then went for a fine lunch of Salad Nicoise. Several hours with this friend turned my cranky mood upside down. I'm learning that the dumps = visit a friend. Especially if that visit includes food in a cozy cafe, steaming hot beverages and great conversation. Do what gives you joy. Now if I can just remember that. :-)