This was painted during Covid19 lockdown. I found it very relaxing to paint with dots of many colors. I hope the peacefulness of it comes through in the painting.
Yes I confess to being a procrastinator. I am among many I know. I don't procrastinate about painting. I like painting but I don't like to do all the activities associated with having an art business such as working on my website, marketing, exhibiting, framing. Sometimes I say to myself that I will not do any painting until I have done this and that. That does not work. This morning I amazed myself by finding the distraction of learning all about Caribou, Maine. Such a cool name. To be able to say "I live in Caribou, Maine". How cool that would be. I learned all about population, job opportunities (not too many), housing (checked out a house for sale, rather nice) and weather ( long periods of freezing weather in winter). I have put Caribou Maine away in my "Well, you never know" box.
One of my very many favorite artists, Joan Eardley (she sadly died of cancer in her early 40's) rented a cottage in Catterline (1952) on the Scottish coast where she could totally devote herself to painting. The cottage was very basic, no running water, and of course no distractions from computer or television and she immersed herself into her surroundings and painted wonderful works of the wild sea coast, the cottages, fishing boats and nets and fields.
Early in her career, when talking about drawing, she wrote " It is a most satisfying joyful thing. The contact which you get because you are still, and quiet in one place; the things that move and carry on their daily happenings because they are unconscious of your existence - little mice and birds, and even the sun and wind too become part of you". (from a book on Joan Eardley put out by the National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh). Just reading that quote makes me want to get back to painting so I must be away to complete the things that have to be done.
Well, I haven't written anything on this blog for a long time. My life has been up and down with this and that and if the truth be told I have avoided writing on the blog for no good reason. One thing has changed, I have abandoned pastels and have started working with acrylics. I love pastels but I don't like the dust (I had to keep my pets out of the studio and my little dog would sit whimpering on the other side of the door) and also pastels have to be framed under glass an undertaking which I found too challenging for me (even after taking a class on framing) and having work framed by a professional does push up the cost. I am getting more comfortable working with acrylics and am enjoying it . I have played with dot paintings because I love aboriginal work and also the polka dot work by the Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama.For some reason I have always wanted to paint cats and dragons so have done six cat and dragon paintings. I have had some of these paintings printed as greeting cards and I think they look pretty good. At the moment I am studying the work of artists I admire and enjoy. Joan Eardley is one and Nicolas de Stael another. Very different styles but I love them both.
I recently looked through some U Tube art instruction videos by Alice Mumford (brought to my attention by Casey Klan on FB and whose work I really like) and there was one ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oebnApMiEcg) where she talks about the difference in the art work produced by artists who live in either North or South Cornwell and that got me thinking about my own environmental influences. I have lived many different places. I lived under the grey skies of northern Europe, and now in the lovely northeast USA with a cold and snowy winter when the colors of the sky are soft and subtle, which follows the explosion of fall color. But my early childhood was spent in Africa (Malawi) with bright colors everywhere, lush green vegetation and red earth. I remember clearly how struck I was by the color of the earth. I wish I could go back there with my camera. And now I am musing about how I may conjure up memories of those colors and somehow bring them into a painting.....so much to do! To go back to Alice Mumford, her art studio is right on the coast and if it were my studio I would probably spend way too much time gazing out the window.
