...tonight I worked on the pieces for the Art Nouveau show that is fast approaching. I feel like I have got a good start but still a long way to go. I have little wooden plaques, some 8x10 canvases...all with some scrap of paint on them, even if it just the background color. Hey....gotta start somewhere, right? Still working with the Hedwig/owl inspiration…really having some fun with this theme… About an hour or so into painting I picked up one of the plaques that I had painted with a coat of blue and quickly painted the simplified owl shape...but then quickly put down my brush to pick up a pencil….seemed only fitting that I elaborate on the branch…before I knew it, one of my trees had creeped into this small work…and then I started to think, yeah, that makes sense. Owls live in trees…yep. So I unwrapped my new blank canvas and just started sketching…owl shape, check. Crazy, curvilinear lines…check. After going over the pencil lines quickly with black paint…ready. This will be the canvas that I paint at the live-art event. So that is where I am as of this evening. Several plaques and small canvases in progress…three trays of ornaments not even opened and two packs of square canvases that need to be addressed.
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I finally got around to photographing the trees... here they are! …the sigh isn’t because I am dreading going back to work, I actually have a pretty good gig…they pay me to teach art. Awesome. But I will miss the freedom to do things on my own schedule, which for the most part has been great about this summer. This has definitely been a productive summer for me…I feel like I have gotten some work done, not that I attained some sort of enlightenment or anything…I just put these hands to work. As the school year looms ahead, I know that I will just have to manage my time. (IMS kids, if you are reading my blog- help keep me inspired and motivated to work on my own art! Ask me what I am working on!) Completely achievable. Rambling on… I will be photographing and posting the trees later this week. I had planned to do this earlier today but that didn’t happen. I got lazy after lunch, and the stormy weather sure didn’t help. I did, however, manage to take some group shots of the drawings before lunch, thanks to my husband. (See photo above) Last night I had was trying to think of a place that would be big enough, and have enough light, to photograph the group as a whole, before I nodded off to sleep I thought of the mall. There are a ton of open courtyard areas with skylights, and it was pretty empty except for the mall-walkers. I have already sold one of the trees, and will be posting others on Etsy later, so I may not have all of my trees later…but they are documented. Now time to move on. I have two projects that I need to work on now; first priority is my entry for the ECU School of Art and Design Alumni Show. That is due this month. Also, I am creating a piece based on the film ‘Firestarter’ by Stephen King for a show down in Fort Lauderdale. (Right) In typical fashion, I started that latter first even though it has a later due date. Go figure. …like climbing a metaphorical Mount Everest. Yep. Finishing the thirtieth tree felt…like a chore, like a relief, like an epiphany. In many ways I felt enslaved by my own intentions, my own preset goals to draw thirty trees…by setting boundaries/goals for myself I contained myself…but now I am done. I hung up trees 1, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25 around me as I worked on this final tree…hoping to inspire myself…to find some sense of purpose…that blank piece of paper can be so intimidating. But then…I just worked…and organically tree number thirty appeared.
Now, the next obvious question is…what is next? What is next is that I have some square canvases waiting for paint. What is next is another thirty page 18x24 sketch pad. What is next is my entry for the ECU alumni show. What is next is my entry is my entry for the Bear and Bird show…what is next is the delicate balance of figuring out how to be an artist and a teacher, and a coach for that matter…what is next is life getting in the way of my art, me falling in and out of inspiration and dealing with it, creating despite what life throws at me. John’s friend said he wanted to virtually stab my blog (I love you, by the way, Ryan) ; I want to virtually kick my own butt to stay motivated to make this art that I know needs to be made. Here is to Amy, to Lucy, to Oacie, to Dillon, to my grandmother, who is still alive but unable to create with her hands and robbed of her memory. I am here to create. For all of you. Three thirty, that is just the stepping stone in the portal of my inspiration. Let’s go. A week off….kind of. I need to find a way to balance my time. I started back coaching this week, and I am excited to have my own team to coach this year. I have been crafting it up, making all kinds of fun cheer stuff but the trees remained unresolved. I need to go ahead and find a way to manage my time now, before the school year starts and I have even more obligations pulling me away from my art. But I did do some creative things, and I worked on my Etsy site, so all is not lost. Per usual, I digress. Back to the latest trees….Tonight, I saw my large sketchbook with those three remaining pages and I knew- time to get back on it. So I started tree number twenty-eight. Rather that reference a previous tree, I tried to start fresh and just sit down and draw…surely by tree twenty-eight I should be able to do this. So I did. I did just few pre-drawing lines and then…just went with it. I seemed to focus on the text for this tree. My focus? The word love. Over and over again, the word love. I think I am drawn to this particular word for numerous reasons, and the fact that Love is my maiden name is actually not one of them. When I was little, my mom had a picture of a tree and it had the word love over and over again hidden in the branches. I remember looking at it as a child and trying to find every single one. I think I became aesthetically aware because of this tree painting. Looking back on it, I know it was probably some very seventies-looking piece, with lots of brown and orange and a dark wood frame, but that picture fascinated me. Now, there are other connections to the word LOVE, but this particular image is clear to me right now. Anyways, still figuring things out. One my friends from college commented that she had been following the trees…what were they about? The word that came to mind is vehicle. These trees are a vehicle to get me working. These trees are a vehicle to hold trees, figurative work, curvilinear line, patterns…the trees are a vehicle to move me from inactivity as an artist and a creative soul to a person of action, making art and not just talking about it. So…may I present…tree number twenty-eight. (Left) Tree twenty-eight. (Right) Close up.
I took a day off to deal with, well, life. Nothing too crazy, just some organizing and then tonight I made the time to sit and work on one of my trees, number twenty-six to be exact. For this tree my time frame was a little over an hour. I love having my little computer right by my side to listen to music and to post updates, but it sure can be distracting. I kind of started, then stopped, and after about twenty minutes finally got in the zone again.
For this tree I referenced tree number nine for the overall shape of the tree and treatment of the background. In tree nine, I got a little playful, using a heart motif throughout the work, from the interior of the tree to the shape of the ‘sun’ shape just behind the tree. I kept these motifs in tree twenty-six while adding my own face (yep, me again) from two angles, then used the hair as a unifying element. I am still hiding words in my work, it’s almost like I am meditating on a particular word or feeling while I am working and it shows up in my line work. All positive thoughts, sending love as my subliminal message if anything. About fifteen minutes ago I put my pen down. Tree twenty-five, done. I feel like this one went a little faster, I started it around noon, worked for about twenty minutes before going to lunch and such. I guess I ended up putting almost an additional two hours into the drawing. It is not that I am keeping time, just making the observation to myself that since I hit drawing twenty the work is taking a little longer, getting more involved. I referenced tree six for this drawing, sticking basically to the exterior shape of the earlier tree and the horizontal line work in the background. For the most part I kept the same patterns and the same pattern placement, again trying to ‘marry’ the pattern and figurative elements. Another change for this drawing, instead of looking at my magazine ‘picture file’ I actually used some pictures I had taken of my own face a while back from a variety of angles. So if the gal looks familiar (and hopefully she does at least a little) then that means I did okay rendering my own face. Side note, I do like the sharp black edges from the pen work, but I am itching to do some ‘detail drawing’, really explore value and realism…another direction for me to explore. Now I have five more drawings to go if I stick to the ‘new’ goal of thirty. However, I feel like I am just getting warmed up –just a little closer to resolving the drawings now that I am twenty drawings into it. Also, thirty was really an arbitrary number, I chose thirty because there are thirty pages in my 18x24 pad of paper, not because thirty is a special number to me, or because it represents the number that will yield to some greater understanding…that’s just how much paper I had. With this in mind, per the title of this blog, ‘Tree Twenty-five...the end (and beginning) are in sight...’ To me this means that, yes, I could be almost to my goal, but it also means that after getting this close to that goal I think I have more questions than answers, each drawing has spawned other ideas, and I really do think that after I complete that ‘last’ drawing it will be just the beginning. I did go and buy some canvases, so I will be taking a little break from the drawing table in favor of standing at the easel and painting. And I do have intentions of bringing my embellished fiber collage technique to this body of work, so all of these things will really be a continuation of what I started out with; just a gal in awe of Klimt and Mucha trying to push past creating just piece of work as a ‘solution’. …just finished tree number twenty four. While working on this one I tried to take pictures periodically to document the tree as it ‘spread’ across the paper…kind of like watching it grow from a thought to my drawing on paper. I kept hearing the Avett Bros. song, ‘And it Spread’ in my mind as I was drawing. (…and I admit, I did play it on my Ipod once I finished the drawing)
I digress, per usual…So for this drawing I looked back at tree number five as a reference point. I used the same basic shape for the tree, give or take a few curves. In tree five, I guess I started to become interested in the background. I remember thinking about rays of the sun and what the wind would look like if I could trace it- and trying to mimic this in my line. I brought this to tree twenty-four, kept working with my figurative elements, and tried to make more of an effort to allow the patterns and motifs to transition into the ‘macaroni’ hair, usually by using thin curvilinear lines to move from one area of the tree to another, and to provide boundaries as needed. I am still hiding words in the image, which I don’t think I have mentioned yet. (So…ummm, yeah, I have been hiding text in the trees…) I guess this tree took about three hours. I am getting lost in these trees, lost in just making marks on paper and I love that feeling. Anyway, I will take a photo of it tomorrow when I have daylight. For now I am just going to post the in progress pics, get some sleep and then see what I can create tomorrow. I am posting tree twenty-one not only because I just finished it, but just in case that is it for the drawing tonight. Not sure. Do I have nine more drawings in me? Yes. Can I finish them by tomorrow? Possibly. One thing that I have noticed is that these last few have taken more time, so it has been a little slower going than the first fifteen or so. Then again, I am doing more pre-drawing and the figurative elements take more time. Also slowing me down a bit- I am going back to the first five drawings and referencing the shape of the tree, patterns/motifs used, etc. in attempt to relate the last ten works in the series to the first drawings. Again, posting this one just in case I don’t get anything else done tonight but you never know…
Above (Left) Scooter has found a new napping spot. (Right) Tree Twenty-one, pleased to meet ya! So after a pretty productive day/night of drawing, I am taking some time today to look for more images/organize and to write a little about my process. On ORGANIZATION….I have created a visual filing process, which helps me when I am trying to draw my figurative elements and also gives me inspiration. When I am reading magazines and I am always looking for faces and bodies. I never really have anything in mind, just whatever catches my attention. Sometimes it is a particular pose, sometimes the angle of the head of the gaze of the eyes. I rip the images sorting them according to face vs. full body. Then I sub categorize the images into full-on view, three-quarter view, profile, looking up vs. looking down, seated figures, etc. I even have another category for patterns, which I sometimes find in textiles, jewelry design and other fashion-based sources. I have another category for hair, when I pictures that showcase hair, usually really wavy or wind-swept. (LEFT: just some pics of the mess I created this morning as I was pulling and sorting images. Notice I do have a studio assistant, he isn't very helpful though) Funny thing is, no tree pictures on file. Just thought of that. I guess I am not as concerned with the tree; it is more of a vessel for the figure and patterns. Side note… I have had formal training in drawing from life. Did the whole standing for three hours, looking at the nude figure and trying to recreate it in conte crayon or charcoal. Loved it. I have done self portraits, set up mirrors in different settings to learn my own face and how to articulate it in paint and other media. I love drawing from life. But sometimes you want to start and stop a drawing, or you can’t get the model to stand still so my go-to source for ‘models’ for my work is the images I see in magazines. So for the tree series I am working mostly from photos, however that could be a whole other series…something to keep in mind. That would definitely be more gestural drawing, perhaps with charcoal or India ink and a long handled brush… Now on to PROCESS….When it’s time to draw, at least for this series, I have started one of three ways. The first way of working on this series is to start with the tree outline first, then fill the shape with pattern and figurative work if it ‘fits’ with the image. Sometimes I will draw the face(s) first and then add the tree later; there really is no set formula I just decide when I sit down. I sometimes start by tracing a large circle on the page in pencil; I like the idea of the circle as a metaphor for showing something that is sacred…mandalas, halos, Byzantine iconography… the circle is just something that is aesthetically appealing to me. In the first half of the series I sat down and just started to draw with a Sharpie. No pre-drawing. Somewhere around tree fifteen…I started doing more pre-drawing in pencil and not just sitting down and going straight for the pen, which allows me to make changes as I draw. For the most part each drawing have been completed in one sitting (the 18x24 drawings); time spent on each drawing ranges from twenty minutes to two hours. And I am not sure how other artists feel on this, but I just about always listen to music when I work. So that is how I organize and my explanation of my process for this specific series. After finishing the twentieth drawing last night, working on the slide show and then organizing some of my images this morning I just felt like taking a minute to record and to reflect. That is really the whole reason I started this blog, to write what I am doing, how, why… and to really keep myself motivated to keep working. Now, back to work! Gotta try to finish these trees so I can treat myself to some canvases tomorrow! |
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