Odd ball stuff

I have been busy in the garden for a month or so and haven't felt inspired to get into the studio - this is the usual part of my yearly creative cycle. The sun comes out so I go to the garden - the rain comes; so I go to the studio. We've had lots of sun lately, so my creative outlet has been my garden. I have, however, done the odd bit of work, including the monthly drawings I send to my niece. When we were together at Christmas, she suggested that as a way of keeping in touch I could send her a drawing each month of the year. We planned a topic for each month and so, with the list tacked to the cork board in my studio, each month I send her a mailing tube containing a 6" x 24" cartoon styled drawing for her to colour. I think of her when I draw it and she thinks of me when she colours it - not a bad way to stay in touch. My niece lives in the United States and has just learned to ride a bicycle, so this month's image features her riding her bicycle and the 4th of July.

First I have to be able to get into the studio

Oh dear ... my studio is a disaster, as you can see, and I don't even have room to move around in there. I began rearranging and adding a couple of upright cabinets a few weeks ago, then got side tracked painting a few other rooms and stored the artwork in the studio, then was distracted by the weeks in the garden ... and now EEEEEK! I can barely get into the room.



The weeds have been pulled, the rooms are painted, the day is overcast, and I have several hours to dedicate to clearing this room today. Wish me luck!

Spider webs

It's a pretty clear indication that I've spent too much time away from the studio when my face is attacked by a spider web when I enter the space!

It's the fault of this gorgeous weather and the weeds in my garden. Another week or so and I'll get back to work. Uh-oh - I see some buttercups in a corner of the raspberry patch - gotta go!

Reality can be very good

I'm back in the studio and must admit reality has been pretty positive this first week home: Celestial Messenger has been erected outside the offices of A&A Contract Customs Brokers Ltd. at the Pacific Highway Truck Crossing at the border and 176th Street, and while I was away Tree of Life won the top prize (Award of Excellence) at artSpacific 2009.



Today I'm working on Celtic Maiden and am planning to have it finished next week, in time to enter it into the Arts Council of Surrey's 2009 juried exhibition at the Surrey Art Gallery.

Last days before reality

Mazatlan was wonderful, despite the swine flu hoopla - we carried on as usual as you can see in the photo below ...

Actually, there were no reported cases of swine flu in Mazatlan, and the locals had many theories about what was really going on. Some folks talked about conspiracy theories relating to US pressure on Mexico to share its oil - "You won't give us your oil? Let's see what happens to your economy if we shut down tourism for a month. Others believed CNN was having a slow news week, especially as they had already covered Obama's new dog and his purchase of a cheese burger.

I contemplated the meaning of it all from a horizontal position, between margaritas, and couldn't decide anything except that it might be time for a pedicure.

Hasta luego!

Lazy Days and Lazy Nights

Hola from Mexico - yes Mexico, the country best known today as ground zero for the swine flu. No cases to date of the flu affecting anyone in Mazatlan. I've had a nasty non-swinish cough for two weeks, so have spent most of my vacation sprawled on a lounge chair on the balcony reading some very good books (The Cellist of Sarajevo, The Reader, and now The Book of Negroes).

My cough is gradually settling down, so I hope to get out and about a bit before I return home.

Hasta luego!

Jingling all the way

Although I haven't been painting, I did manage to create a few charm bracelet styled jewellery pieces before closing the studio door for the next few weeks:

This one features freshwater pearls and silver-plated starfish and an embellished toggle clasp. (If you click on the image you'll get an enlarged image and will be able to see how lovely these are.)




This one's made from silver findings, glass, fire polished glass, Swarovsky crystals, and vintage Japanese beads.


I'm pleased to report my Tree of Life painting has been juried into Delta's 2009 artSpacific show. The show at the Firehall Centre for the Arts in Delta will run from May 1st - 29th, with the opening reception being held Sunday May 3 from 1 - 4 p.m.

I'm still alive

It's been a long time since I've posted anything as I haven't spent much time in the studio lately. We've had a few small renovations since my last post, so I suppose, aside from relocating furniture and boxing decorative items and books, I must have spent more time than I realized peering over Don's shoulder as he worked (Don did an amazing job installing and finishing the hardwood floor and rebuilding and tiling our stairs). And then there were those sunny days when my garden called to me ...

Now I'll be out of touch again for a while as I'll be sprawled on a poolside lounger with a Margarita in my hand.

Hasta luego!

There's lots of elbow room in the studio now

Now that the eagle is out of my studio I have an extra 7 feet of horizontal space to work in and I've already filled it up with a variety of sketches and works in progress. After a long stall, I've decided to make Celtic Maiden into a mixed media work by adding 2-d and 3-d collage elements. I was inspired to take a new tack with this piece after reading Robert Genn's Painters Keys - I realized I was having a difficult time moving forward with this painting because it had become too "precious" to me, a struggle I spoke of in an post earlier this year when I was working on Tree of Life. I'm letting go of that preciousness and am adding textures and 3-d elements to the piece and am once again excited to work on it.

I'm also working on a piece inspired by a difficult few months my family went through half a dozen or so years ago - I was at my wit's end trying to communicate the love and support I had to give to one who was near and dear to me and who just wouldn't/couldn't hear it; words were not enough. It'll be an assemblage of sorts and my amazing Uncle and Aunt, who can create just about anything from a mere stick of wood (this time a 2x4), have created the substrate for me in the form of a shallow box containing a gridwork of compartments. Stay tuned ...

Flown the coop

Ready to go ...

Rick and his co-worker from BC Lions Society arrived at 10:30 this morning.

and out the door it went...

into natural daylight

rolling along

and into the truck



secured in the truck, along with prolific muralist Elizabeth Hollick's eagle

Bye-bye birdie.

Celestial Messenger is completed

Art Garage Sale Update

Thanks to all who have taken a look at the works included in my art garage sale. Since posting the sale I've sold 3 of the listed works and 4 unlisted works - you never know where a little shameless self-promotion may lead.

Art Garage Sale

I'm clearing out my art storage room to make room for guests arriving from Europe in late Spring. I've sorted through all the paintings hanging and leaning against the walls in the room and have organized an on-line garage sale (thanks for the idea Andrea). Here's a link to the garage sale. No reasonable offer refused!

It's all in the name

The back side of the eagle is all but completed - I'm making arrangements for a couple of strong folks to help flip it over tonight so I can finish the front by the end of the week. I've been contemplating a title for the piece for weeks and finally this morning at my physio therapy appointment, the moment I relaxed as I lay on a table having electric pulses encourage blood circulation into my neck and shoulders, a name popped into my head - Celestial Messenger - right out of the blue (forgive the pun). This seems to be the likeliest choice as it conveys the essence of the meaning behind the imagery. I checked online and discovered there were several sites that included the name 'Celestial Messenger', including one featuring a statue located at Holy Family Parish in the Philippines; an angel therapy practitioner; an Oregon artist; and many others - the majority were positive with the exception of the character mentioned in this one.

I still like the name and think I'll keep it.

Portrait of an alter ego

After last night's snowfall and freeze, my car is covered in snow and icicles and I'm unable to open the car door - as a result I had to cancel this morning's appointment. Being the sideways and upside down thinker I am, I took this to be a clear sign from the heavens above that I am meant to take this time to update my blog ...

I've been intending to create a series of portraits for a number of years, but was keenly aware that my usual painting style simplifies everything down to the basic elements to the point of faces being homogeneous - definitely not what's required for recognizable portraits. After finishing Tree of Life, I decided to continue in that style and start on the first portrait, in between working on the eagle.


The model is a budding novelist with a penchant for unicorns and all things Irish. When I began washing in the first layers of colour, the young lady asked me to keep the hair blonde (although she is not), because she visualizes the heroine in her stories as a blonde version of herself.


A portrait of an alter ego - a delightful and interesting idea that opens up all sorts of fantastical possibilities.


With glee, I changed my original concept and have begun including objects to reflect the interests and personality of the model's alter ego. The fun has just begun!

Don't touch the face!

OK, so right after I completed my last post, I went into the studio to turn the canvas against the wall for a week ... but something caught my eye that needed to be fixed (AGAIN!) so ... some time later, after restructuring her cheek bones, subtly adjusting the shape of the upper lip and right eye ... I will now promise (cross my heart and swear to die, etc.) that I shall not touch the face again - unless I absolutely have to ...

I'll let the piece sit over the weekend while I contemplate whether or not to continue with my ideas for the background around the head, or to leave it as is.

Have a lovely weekend!

Tree of Life

I'm having ambivalent feelings towards this piece - I usually work on a painting steadily over several days or a couple of weeks from start to finish. This piece has dragged on for months for a variety of reasons, mostly beyond my control, but one of the reasons is that I've allowed the image to become overly precious to me and I've fussed and redone parts of it repeatedly, trying to perfect it. This is a problem I was warned about early on during my art training. My instructors in college helped students overcome this by having us quickly create a work in clay (for sculpture class and ceramics), then destroy it, make another, destroy it, make another, destroy it, etc. Through this process we could see that no matter how fond we were of the original piece, subsequent pieces usually improved upon the original and the final piece was significantly better than the first. No amount of fussing with the original would yield as good a result as starting over, more than once or twice if necessary.

As for the painting - I've changed various parts of the face repeatedly, especially the eyes and skin tone, and recently had the thought that what I was feeling was probably similar to what Michael Jackson was feeling when he realized that rather than enhancing his appearance, all those plastic surgeries were destroying his looks to the point of him becoming irreversibly freakish.

I'm setting the work aside for a few weeks and will re-evaluate then. In the meantime, I'll hoist a fresh canvas onto the easel and see where that leads me.

Recovering from dermabrasion

Here she is after her dermabrasion treatment, enjoying a nice gesso facial mask. Even though she's been neglected lately due to my working on the eagle, she's continued to smile subtly at me every time I see her - not pouting in the least. Strong well-centered women are great that way.

Back to the Tree of Life

I'm having a problem with my right arm so decided to take the Tree of Life into my kitchen where I could lie the work down on the table and try a different painting position (usually I stand in front of the easel with the painting resting in a near vertical position). This didn't work very well for my aching arm, however it did wonders for my inspection of the painting. Seeing the piece in natural daylight, away from the bright halogen lights in my studio, I was able to see ridges and bumps on the work that weren't evident in the studio - textural flaws that detracted from the imagery. The lighting in my studio was such that it flattened these flaws to the point where I couldn't see them, even with my reading glasses on. I toted the painting back to the studio and attacked it with fine sandpaper - the result is that I shall have to repaint the face, except for the eyes and lips.

This is a source of great frustration for me because I had just completed the face to my satisfaction, after a several weeks of much pondering and making slight alterations in shapes of features and colouration. The positive side is this will save me no small amount of embarrassment should the painting be juried into a show and put on exhibition in lighting that reveals the flaws.

Here's the work as it appeared before my lady had her extreme dermabrasion treatment:


She's not feeling or looking very well just now. Perhaps she let me post her picture after she's recovered.

Ciao.

With Sturdy Shoes: Community Volunteer updated

This painting, begun in 2006, has lain first in my studio and then in my daughter's bedroom for about two and a half years. My daughter claimed it as her own (as she often likes to do or attempt to do with various of my works) and said she loved it just the way it was - unfinished. Ever since I've been cringing every time I see it and muttering that when I have some extra time I really should finish it.



Motivated by the fact my daughter is in the process of moving away from home and plans to take the painting to her new home this week, I secretly hauled the painting into the studio and up onto my easel on the weekend while she was many times over loading boxes of her many many possessions into her car and delivering them to the new place (think books, books, books, purses, purses, purses, and shoes, shoes, shoes - I must admit she's something of a "chip off the old block", except for her penchant for collecting teeny-weeny cutesy objects).

I just couldn't let Community Volunteer go out into the world in its piteous (to me) unfinished state. So I set aside the eagle and Tree of Life to get to work on completing this painting.



I feel much better letting the work out of my sight now and hope my daughter likes it as much or more than before!

Tree of Life

Here's how the piece is coming along so far. I started work on it today to take a break from the eagle and recover from the loss of my favourite liner brush.

Requiem for a paint brush

Yesterday, while working on the eagle, I became distracted and set down a brush loaded with paint onto my wet palette and left the room to talk to my daughter, then took a phone call, left the house on a quick errand that turned into a 4 hour absence, returned home just in time to prepare dinner, have a glass of wine, watch a little television, settle into a hot lavender-scented bath, climbed into bed ... this afternoon I returned to the studio - uh-oh, the brush. I'm hard on my brushes, usually replacing several every couple of years. But this one was different. It was a favourite, inherited from an artist who willed his art supplies to my uncle who then passed this brush and others along to me - it must have been 25 or 30 years old when I received it, and I've been using it for about 12 years. A lovely thin sable liner brush, made in England, the perfect brush for incredibly thin lines that flowed off it's tip with amazing grace ... used so often and so intently the paint has worn off the handle.

I picked up the brush, aghast - the entire length of it's once supple hairs had hardened to the point where it could now be used as a toothpick. I rinsed it in tepid water, tried peeling the acrylic off with my finger nails - oops, a few hairs came off on my first attempt ... I tried rinsing the bristles in warm and then hot water (not too close to the ferrule, though, as I didn't want to melt the glue holding the bristles together - an artist only makes that mistake once!) and rubbed a little soap onto it, worked off the acrylic as best I could, losing a few more hairs along the way ... unable to get all the dried paint off near the ferrule ... oh dear, it's not the same brush anymore - won't hold nearly as much paint as it did, doesn't let the paint flow off the tip in lovely straight flowing lines of seemingly endless lengths ...

I've attempted to prepare for this situation for some time, knowing that with the loss of a hair here and there over the years this favoured brush would one day need to be replaced. Whenever I'm in an art supply store I look through the liner brushes, but can't find anything close to it - I suspect the decades of use enhanced the brush's extremely subtle graduated taper-point.

Boo-hoo.

I have several seldom used liner brushes, and now I shall begin using them to facilitate their 30 year evolution to becoming THE perfect liner - I'll be 80 years old by then, probably just hitting my prime as a painter. Then watch out!

Progress

New work on the easel

I'm taking a break from my week working on the eagle and started work on a new piece I began in November. Here's a detail shot of a work inspired in part by the romantic pre-Rafaelite paintings. Quite a departure for me, but I'm injecting my own style and symbology into the work, as you can see.

I'm determined to improve on my organizational talents and submit to a few more juried exhibitions this year than I did last year. I have several sketches and ideas on the back burner and intend to finish this one in time for the Arts Council of Surrey's Arts 2009 deadline of May 15th for their show at the prestigious Surrey Art Gallery.

Back to the studio today

It's been a few months since I've picked up a paint brush, however, today was the day to get back in the saddle and get painting. I've the eagle to complete over the next few months, and I've begun a new series of paintings I'm excited about. Once I make some decent progress I'll post an image.

Cheerio!

Home again, home again; shovellin' ain't done!

Here's what we arrived home to - actually we couldn't see the car at all when we arrived home; this photo was taken this morning after an evening of rain greatly reduced the snow mass!

I don't mind my car being stuck today as the situation has encouraged me to get back in the studio right away to complete a few big projects. I was brought up with the paradigms of positive situations are "meant to be" and disappointments were the result of "it just wasn't meant to be" and I also heard a lot of "the Lord works in mysterious ways". So for those of you inconvenienced by the huge snowfall, I must apologize because apparently it was created by either fate, kismet, or the Lord to help me get back to work!

P.S. Here's a link to a visual dictionary I found on my friend Andrea's blog - enjoy!

Mexican Sunset

What can I say...? A picture paints a thousand words.

Must learn Spanish!

Life is good in Mazatlan.

Next post - January 2009

I'm off for a few weeks of inspiration in sunny climes. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, and Happy New Year!

Cohen-inspired again

I'm feeling inspired by Leonard Cohen, and not for the first time, as you will recall from a previous post.

Last night I was at the Canvas Lounge on Powell Street for a showing of prints by Leonard Cohen - this is the third showing of his works, previously in Manchester and Toronto. The trendy nightclub was closed to the public and open only to invited guests (I was the accidental recipient of an e-mail invitation and though we were not actually on the guest list, Garth and I managed to talk our way in.

Cohen's charming son Adam spoke at the event, in a deep voice tightly resembling his father's. He was rather witty and managed to convey the deep respect he has for his father and not only made the crowd laugh, but also to cheer!

Oh to have such an opening for my own work!!! There was well over a hundred attendees, all fashionably dressed, apparantly upwardly mobile (or had already achieved a spot at the top), and noticeable amidst the dark clothing was the sparkle of "bling". Bar tenders on all three levels were serving martinis and wine at a swift pace and about a dozen volunteers culled from the art department of a local college stood at regular intervals between large framed limited edition prints of Cohen's line drawings. These volunteers were there to point the way to the bars and washrooms and to explain a little about the works and the process for purchase (envelopes attached to the wall beside each print held cards with the print name and number, so that more than one person could purchase the same image but with a different print number; i.e. 20/150 and 24/150). The prints were priced between the mid-$2,000 and high $9,000 range - a little steep for my wallet, but clearly not a deterrent for other attendees. The works were enlivened with sometimes witty and sometimes poignant text, bright colours, and Cohen's logo-like double flipped heart (forming a star of David) and what appeared to be his personal chop in brilliant red. As Garth commented, the drawings were somewhat Picasso-esque in their simplicity.

If you'd like to have a look at Cohen's works yourself, by Saturday they will be available for viewing and purchase from Linda Lando's gallery in Kerrisdale.

Winged Mother of Two

I'm very nearly finished the piece and am pleased with it - it's been a while since I've painted a winged mother. The painting is on a wooden cradle panel and as you can see, the edges are a part of the painting.

Inspiration out of chaos

Isn't it funny how when we're at our busiest we somehow manage to make ourselves even busier? At least this is true for me. I'm one of those people who works well under pressure (well, am I working well or working like a crazy person on 10 cups of coffee, I must ask myself). With my studio show quickly approaching and in the midst of rearranging furniture, framing prints and small paintings and hanging them and larger works all over the house, and finishing, pricing, and tagging jewellery pieces, I suddenly became inspired to start a new painting. As you can see, it's in it's beginning stages, however, I'm sure it'll be finished in time for my show next week.

Getting ready for my Open Studio show

I've been busy for the past couple of weeks making new jewellery works and shall continue for another two weeks in preparation for my Open Studio in mid-November. - I love arranging bits from my vast collection of beads and silver to make unique one of a kind jewellery pieces - it's an alternative way to play with colour and texture.

Feathers

Here's a peek at what I've been working on in the studio - eagle feathers (sounds like an expletive, doesn't it!), using a very fine liner brush while in a meditative state.

Back from the deep South

Earlier this week, kayaking on the Chattahoochee River, checking out the beaver dams, basking turtles and herons.

After 2 weeks away from the studio, I'm enthused to get back in there and let the creative juices flow and grow. I find no matter how focused on a goal I may be, some time away (physically and mentally) is the surest way to reengage energy and mindfulness to allow for a better outcome.

Watch out studio, here I come!

New website

I've been working on a website and, although it's still a work in progress, it's ready for you to view: www.BarbaraRoden.ca

I'd appreciate your feedback.

A change of scene

I'm having a lovely visit with my brother and his family in sunny Atlanta, Georgia (well actually, today it's raining, so I'll have to give up my usual afternoon poolside read until tomorrow or the next day).

I'm planning to visit some of the wonderful art galleries here - they always inspire me to get busy in the studio. There's nothing more motivating than seeing the work of accomplished and innovative artists.