A Day Off

The paintings are hung at GPC (Georgia Perimeter College, Clarkston Campus, Fine Arts Gallery) with the expert assistance of gallery director, Don Dougan. I was so glad to move the 37 paintings out of my studio. Once they are out no more changes to be made. Thank goodness. I think I begin to question each image if I look at them too long and this series of paintings was accomplished during a five month period remarkable to me since there were side trips taken during this time as well, paintings that were entirely unrelated. That was in fact good because any break gave me a chance to come back to the series and work with renewed energy and a slightly different eye so neccesary for remaining fresh. I always learn something from an unrelated image whether it be a drawing, print or painting of mine or sometimes even an artwork that is accomplished by one of my students.

Today is a day off. I have such a hard time taking time off from the studio, call me obsessive, type A...both apply I am sure and I consider it a plus except when I need to stop, renew. It's hard to know at first when it's time but yesterday told me stop! I was barely able to converse, to think clearly...The good stress had the upperhand. True of any creative you must leave time for the gestation of new images. It will take a day or two before I am truly able to relax.

So here is the painting that is my focus right now while I relax. I will not visualize it directly but let it simmer beneath the surface. When I return to the studio in a few days I will begin to draw again on my new big white wall and begin to comb through the photographs that have been awaiting my attention, no expectations just draw and look and luxuriate in the power of images.,

My favorite quote for the day

Vladimir Nabokov wrote that the purpose of storytelling is "to portray ordinary objects as they will be reflected in the kindly mirror of future times; to find in the objects around us the fragrant tenderness that only posterity will discern and appreciate in far-off times when every trifle of our plain everyday life will become exquisite and festive in its own right; the times when man who might put on the most ordinary jacket of today will be dressed up for an elegant masquerade."

She Always Walked That Way

And there, hanging my the one hair left to her, she heard a song.
Bent backward and all around she dreamed of inventing the sea.
She tried to understand why she was so solid and not there.
But was geometrically opposed.

She had many eyes at the tips of her fingers but could feel nothing.
Did she need arms to go behind her looking for the answer.
She always walked that way.
Staying connected or wishing for no silence, whichever came first
Part of her stood waiting for the many faces left in her brain.

Her dress was dark and stormy
And her eyes had two lenses.
It was funny the appendages she grew while waiting to divide.
Living up in a row, she saw no one.
Uncontrolled hands were never there.
Was her father the fly on the wall?

Her senses tried to find calm.
She saw a mechanical leg---then she wept.
Her ears grew longer and she felt an eye.
She stood on the stand half thin,
But her eyes were wings, green.
She grew pregnant and heard voices.
Hooks and hangers stabbed below her heart then came a hot whistle.
Her neck stretched to a long finger and she wept again.

Small and black and finely grained
Her legs were shorter than she was.
There was a big line that threw itself about her.
She was only three.