Commission painting
mixed media on 9 x 12 inch canvas
A friend of mine has this wonderful and faded photo from 1926 of her grandparents and her grandmother's two sisters jumping rope in the middle of a field in Kansas. She asked me to paint them in my style and this is how it turned out. She loved it, which is always a relief!
Bedroom in Gold and Sky Blue
mixed media on wood block 4 x 6 inch
Last week seven of my tiny paintings (4 x 6 to 6 x 8 inch sizes) sold from Tessera Gallery, so I painted several more to fill the empty spots. I really enjoyed doing the interior paintings that were inspired by some old decorating books I bought from a used bookstore last year.
Dining with Cobalt and Paisley
mixed media on wood block 4 x 6 inch
And of course my favorite subject...figures. These are all imagined or from my "sketchbook sweetie" sketchbooks.
Peggy and Patty in Pigtails
mixeed media on wood block
4 x 6 inch
Grace With a Good Luck Cat
mixed media on panel 5 x 7 inch
Liliana and the Sleepy Cat
mixed media on panel 5 x 7 inch
Bike Ride in Spring
mixed media on panel 5 x 7 inch
(SOLD)
And look what I found! A red flannel shirt for my next Finding Faith project. It cost $3.49, so does that make my project low budget? :) I am happy to tell you that things are well on the way and we are excited about how the video and photos have turned out. Time for the painting! Wish me luck!
A million thanks for all your amazing and uplifting comments on this project. I was truly overwhelmed with all the kind comments, sweet emails, and encouragement to keep at it. Faith loved reading all the comments too, and that's important because without her, there would be no Finding Faith. :)
Over a month in the making, and my "Finding Faith" project is finally finished! I named it Faith is Waiting For Spring and it is a three part art project using painting, video and photography to tell a simple story. I have always loved to dabble in photography and with my new-found love for videography, I had the idea to connect them with my painting and this is what materialized.
I really hope you enjoy the video and photos and especially the surprise ending in the painting! :)
FULL details on the making of this project are below for those of you who want to know more. I know who you are and it was written for you.
As you know, if you follow my art, I am a figurative and narrative painter and often paint intuitively (where the story unfolds by itself as I paint) or by creating scenes using vintage photos. However, I had a new idea for my approach and that was to create the story with the use of video and photography, and then attempt to paint it. In all honesty, this whole concept started with finding the 8 mm app for my iPhone. It is the same app I have been using to make my "Studio Clips" videos, and it has me hooked on video making. It's kind of funny to me how such a big idea can come from such a small thing like finding an app, but that is what happened. Plus I have always loved taking pictures, so this project provided a way I could sort of tie these arts together with my love of painting.
The video and photographs took only 1 1/2 hours to shoot, but took over 10 hours to edit because I was very picky and kept changing my mind about the clips of video I wanted to use. Plus, selecting the music took a while. I needed something slow since the whole theme was about Faith waiting for "Spring" to arrive. It is amazing how music can make or break the mood!
My beautiful niece, Faith was my gracious and willing muse and we did the shoot in an open field in the middle of Benton, Kansas. I found her dress and the small props at a thrift shop, borrowed the table and chairs, and I made the flower crown myself. I was pretty excited the day of shooting because everything turned out exactly as I had envisioned and the weather was perfect!
My friend and gallery owner Teressa Sliger helped me locate the property after I sent a text to her one day to ask if she knew of any "Andrew Wyeth-looking places" out in the country where she lives. (My all time favorite painting is Christina's World, and the Kansas landscape looks exactly like that painting). So Teressa took me driving around one day trying to locate the perfect spot for my project and I ended up selecting the first one we saw. I have to point out here what a great friend and support Teressa was to do this for me...indulging with me on my what had to seem like such a crazy creative whim. She questioned me very little and just rolled with it. Had she not done this, I might have just chucked the whole thing aside labeling it as a dumb idea, but her interest and enthusiasm helped push me forward. Also, the property we chose was private property and we were not sure who owned it, so she offered to meet us out there on shooting day to keep watch for anyone that might question what we were up to. We had to lug the table and chairs a long ways off the road to the tree that provided the main part of our stage and Faith and I were a bit nervous about trespassing. I imagined poor Faith being hauled off to jail in her pretty dress and flower crown, and me having to explain to her mother what had happened. But having Teressa there helped us relax as we worked. She assured us it was not a big deal to be out there and it wasn't. We never saw a soul for the entire hour and half we were there.
After the photos and video were complete I busied myself in the studio attempting to capture the scene in the painting. Since I do not paint realistically, this was a challenge for me. I had to keep reminding myself that my job was to capture the essence, not every single detail. Also, I knew from the start that I could not make Faith look like Faith. I had already tried painting her face over and over again in my sketchbooks. I decided that if I could at least capture the scene with just a likeness of her I would be happy. I worked in oil because it is easier for me to make adjustments.
Being outside, collaborating with people, taking photos, shooting video...it was such a fulfilling way to work in art! Plus working with all the images from the photos and video, and physically having been in that location provided a lot more information for me to work with, which for some reason seemed to make the painting process flow more easily. However, I can't always work this way because it is so involved. From time to time though, it will be fun and I love the challenge.
Didn't Faith do an incredible job? She is a natural beauty and she just knew exactly what I was wanting for the video and photos. She was such an easy model to work with and I could NOT have done this without her! We had so much fun that day and I am happy to say we are already scheming for the next project. I just need to find a red flannel shirt somewhere. :)
The Week before last I was in the mood for blue, so I painted another series of blue pieces of clothing. They are all done in oil on 4 x 6 inch heavy watercolor paper and I used a palette knife and very small brushes.
I think it's easier to make things look more painterly and loose in oil paint vs acrylics, at least for me it is. I tend to tighten things up when I paint with acrylics.
I tried to work quickly on these and not get too caught up in details...not worrying about perfect sleeves or perfect flowers. I see things I might have changed had I slowed down a bit, but if I had slowed down I know things would have tightened up.
Painting these pieces of clothing got me thinking how much fun fashion designers must have at work every day. And imagine how excited they get when they see someone walking down the street wearing clothing they dreamt up one day while having morning coffee.
I am still working on my Finding Faith project and I cannot wait to show it to you. It is tempting to give you what I have so far, but I think you will enjoy the whole kit and caboodle all at once instead of in parts.
But here's another trickle of evidence that I am working.
Props for the Finding Faith project
I am anxious to progress more on it this week and it's getting closer! Thank you so much for all the visits and comments and for following. Happy week to you! See you soon!
I made another studio clips video and in this one you will see a commission piece I have been working on for a friend. She has this wonderful, very faded photo of her grandfather, grandmother, and her grandmother's two sisters jumping rope and I had fun trying to capture them. I will post the painting later on after she has seen it.
I hope you like the video. This is truly becoming another art form for me.
In an earlier post I mentioned painting faces for a particular project I am working on. These are some of the attempts. Upper left is done with acrylic and the others are in oil. I have been calling it my "finding faith" project which will all make sense later on.
Stay tuned and thank you all for the great feedback on my last video. I am so happy you enjoyed it.
I was on Instagram one day and saw a lovely video of Kate Hudson playing in the snow. It looked like an old reel-to-reel movie and it had music. For some reason it set my creative mind on fire and I just had to figure out how to make such an old-looking video. After some hunting, I found an app called 8 mm for the iPhone, and boy has it been fun.
I know many of us love seeing videos of artists doing their thing and in their spaces, so
I thought I would start making short videos of life in my art studio to share with you once in a while. It has provided another creative outlet for me and another way to sort of shake things up. If you know me, you know how I like change. That's why I switch from oil, to acrylic, to mixed media from painting to painting just about. Keeps me from getting bored. My mother used to tell me when I was young, "bored is your middle name," and I think she was right.
I am also working on another idea for the use of this app, but I will share more about that later.
Caterpillar
mixed media on cradled wood
4 x 6 inch
(sold)
This has been a blazing and creative week. I worked on a small commission piece for a friend and painted small works to take to the gallery for Final Friday tonight. Caterpillar and Ladybug are two of those small works.
Ladybug
mixed media on cradled wood
4 x 6 inch
(sold)
Creme Shirts One, Two, Three
and Four
(sold)
I worked a lot in my sketchbooks last week and several of my pages were simply clothing. I loved painting them so much, I decided to do a small series of shirts, which also went to the gallery. You will likely see more of these.
my space at Tessera Fine Art Gallery
Tonight is Final Friday here in Wichita and this is what my space looks like as I type this. Readings atthe Dusty Bookshelf (upper right and photo below) has a new frame. It was in a black frame, but I like this one better.
Readings at the Dusty Bookshelf in a new frame.
I painted Readings...nearly three years ago, but it stayed in our home for quite some time before I first showed it anywhere. It was inspired by a really atmospheric bookstore called The Dusty Bookshelf in Manhattan, Kansas. My only regret about this painting is that I didn't paint the store cat that lives there. Truth be told, I never even thought of it. Atmosphere was my ultimate focus at the time I painted it.
detail
I am still on a mission painting faces. I have a new project in mind which I will share more with you as things unfold. This was what actually took most of my time this week! Let's just say the words technical difficulties and leave it at that for now. :)
Happy weekend to you all and thank you tons for all your comments on Between Green Thread and Broccoli in the last post. Your positive feedback made me so happy.
Between Green Thread and Broccoli
mixed media on cradled board
16 x 20 inch
A while back I was visiting Sharmon Davidson's blog where she had posted one of her wonderful collage works, and with it there was a poem by Tony Hoagland called The Word. I was immediately drawn to the poem and looked up Tony Hoagland to read more of his work. There is a style to his writing that resonates with me and I found myself returning to read The Word a few more times which led to an idea for a painting. I jotted down a sketch and some thoughts to go with it then set it aside, not feeling sure if it was something I truly wanted to paint. But the idea and the poem stayed with me.
Below are some closeups and the words of the entire poem. You can see bits and pieces in my painting that derived from the poetry, and there were so many other elements I wanted to add. However, I worried it would be too busy and decided to keep the composition simple.
detail
detail
detail
The Word
by Tony Hoagland
Down near the bottom
of the crossed-out list
of things you have to do today,
between "green thread"
and "broccoli," you find
that you have penciled "sunlight."
Resting on the page, the word
is beautiful. It touches you
as if you had a friend
and sunlight were a present
he had sent from someplace distant
as this morning—to cheer you up,
and to remind you that,
among your duties, pleasure
is a thing
that also needs accomplishing.
Do you remember?
that time and light are kinds
of love, and love
is no less practical
than a coffee grinder
or a safe spare tire?
Tomorrow you may be utterly
without a clue,
but today you get a telegram
from the heart in exile,
proclaiming that the kingdom
still exists,
the king and queen alive,
still speaking to their children,
—to any one among them
who can find the time
to sit out in the sun and listen.
_____________________________________________
I hope you enjoy the painting and especially the beautiful words of Mr. Hoagland. I don't know about you, but it inspires me to remember not to get so busy that I forget to enjoy all the pleasures that are so easy to take for granted...like sunlight.
I want to thank you all for your wonderful comments on Tahmoor's Table in the last post. I read every word and really appreciate the comments particularly about the changed face. I am trying to push myself a bit artistically without completely changing the way I normally paint things. I have had my sleeves rolled up these last two weeks painting in sketchbooks...everything from faces to clothing to table settings...and enjoying the sunshine. See you soon.
♥ Lisa
