Hands & Pants collab : Many ideas, one outcome

My friend John Casey has been doing a specific collaboration with artists from all over for years that he calls "Hands & Pants" because that's what you get when you participate: a hand and a pair of pants. The rest is up to you. I had the opportunity to do this last April when I received a 8.5" x 11" pen and ink drawing of a hand and pants. With the composition and size, I was sketching, sketching SO many ideas. I went to the several boxes filled with collage pieces and thought, "Oh this would be fun" since I hadn't done a collage piece in a while. Well, the piece I chose, the flower headdress, extended far beyond the paper's edge. After hemming and hawing for a while, dabbling with a few other ideas, I made the (in the back of my mind, a possibly regrettable) decision to cut the being out and adhere it to a watercolor piece that I had been working on around the same time. I think it turned out nicely.

Thank you to John for the experience. The next Hands & Pants show will be in the Fall 2019 at Faultline Studios.

Inktober 2018 - 28/31

 

 I endeavored to do my best with Inktober this year. I missed 3 days in total, so not too bad. There are a few of these I really like, some are concepts that I'm now turning into actual pieces (like the mermaid), and some are...eh (my Idi Amin Crododile didn't turn out so great). Will attempt for all 31 days next year!

Old Small Jewel

  "Quiet" done in watercolor and ink crowquill is a work I finished a few days ago - after this piece sat langishing in various stacks of half started pieces for a number of years.
  I love it's vibrant misty silence. I can hear a hush of water and a rustle of leaves. I think I kept it unfinished for so long because of how much I enjoy this small jewel.

Spirit Flowers

These are small - 5.5"x 5.5" - pen, watercolor, and colored pencil spirit flowers. I do these sort of mindlessly, working out different color pallets/combinations, designs, and just general warming up. I did these at work where I don't have a compass so I used a paperclip and a pushpin.

Bubble Theory - unconscious action within the sphere

Bubble Theory is a way for me to engage my unconscious creative side while warming up before I get into more involved drawing or creation. It is much like unconscious writing or drawing techniques, the difference, I guess, is that this one is confined to a circle - a bubble. I wanted to draw the free nature of the swirls of rainbows upon the surface of a bubble and out of that came a lot of emotional stuff, much of which is good. Sometimes, like today, it took on an aspect that I guess was bothering me and actually has bothered me for a while. 

This is not to say that doing this brings up bad things each time I dive in, but this is one of several I've done and thought, well, since no one reads this, then there's no problem in me putting it here. 

So, here's the first of many bubble pages from my meditative process.

Sometimes you wish me to be more like you, to reflect your emotions and perspectives; to have a mirror-mind. I have compassion where you demand condemnation or agreement because my own perspective is in opposition to what you want to hear. I must assuage you because my ability to see from a different position of understanding or perspective is not what you want. What is required of me is to say "yes, you're correct," or nothing at all, lest I be accused of being bad, not taking your side, or simply not listening. It becomes too difficult to talk with you because there's no room for anyone else's view point, least of all my own. It makes me feel like a trash can that you can dump all your emotional wreckage in. Everything that I am is disregarded in the face of great emotional turmoil or pain. What I say, the wisdom that I can impart, is nothing. It is crushing, deflating, demoralizing. 
 It's in these portions of time that I loathe loving anyone because it makes me hate myself for all that I'm not and for everything I will not be.

Mardi Gras Mask-Making: Dark Water Sorceress

In October of last year, a friend of mine asked if I had ever been in New Orleans for Mardi Gras and when I revealed that I had never even been to Louisiana, it was decided that we were going to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. With a group of people that I had never met before. And we all were to dress in a theme.

Challenge accepted.

After ideas were tossed around, we settled on a water/underwater theme. (It was so much fun and I highly recommend doing it) I didn't want to be a mermaid because that's just too obvious and since I hadn't created a mask in over a yea, I would make the mask the focus - have it do the work of the costume without digging myself in too much of a time/money suck. I created a dark water sorceress' mask from a blank and glued sea snail, oyster, and muscle shells as well as feathers and a few crab carapaces and appendages.* Oh, and "some" glitter. Never forget the sparkles, my friends.
 *all shells were organically harvested from various beaches after each creature's demise;)

Nearly completed mask

Thoth's Cookin' parade day w/ Mr. Mermaid Lounge Singer.

 

Ready to snatch dem beads with these fun ladies

Nailed

Another heart. I think about this piece now, months' after its completion, and I see the representation of a "total feeling," a complex physical, psychological, and emotional reaction. This was especially agonizing but even from the sketch it felt good to do. In a lot of ways, art works are some sort of picture diary. I'm letting you read pages  fom mine.
In life, we take the hammering because it is unavoidable, and after a certain amount of time one tends to acquire an extensive collection of nails.

Sometimes I feel more of the nails than others. Being sensitive will do that. Also, I find with huge failures, all of those plans, those beautiful dreams, the peaks and valleys, so much energy and work, all became nails driving into one spot, knocking the wind right out of me. And the big ones take longer to hammer in so it's a protracted and shocking process.

Now that I'm an adult, a good portion of the time I'm doing the nailing. Whether it's about perception, expectations, rules (including moral and ethical code), or personal character traits, I'm making most of the decisions. You hold the hammer, life just provides the nails.

Or maybe it's  just me? Wouldn't be the first time that's happened.

Nailed: DeScaibled: 2016

Mixed media gouache, ink, and colored pencil on prepped chip board.

Birthday Creation - The Gatekeeper

After what I have termed my "Wayward Girl" summer, I finally got things squared away and with that, a glorious shot of creativity. And the first thing I wanted to do was something special for my very inspiring, generous, wonderful friend. Happiest of birthday, Dwawn!

This is a 9"x 12" mixed media painting entitled, "The Gatekeeper."

Skull Still Life

Found this still life I took several years ago while clearing out some old photos. I took this on a Huawei Mate. It's a top view of a deer skull underneath what I believe is elk antlers over top.

Ink: Forgotten Shaman

This is a surreal ink splatter piece made from two separate pieces and merged digitally.

Honeycomb Heart

Mixed media watercolor, ink, and colored pencil on bristol paper.

The Power of Surrealism: Laundry Clairvoyant

This piece was created from two very different times with no thought of them ever being one project, one piece.
The canvas surface was one I had used in school, most likely for an oil paining still-life study or some sort(I can't remember now), which I had gessoed and then affixed old black lace. I gessoed it again and then put acrylic paint on top. Once it was dry, I placed  it in a dark place and didn't think about it for at least a year, if mot more. Much later, I was tearing through an old Nat Geo mag and there was a photo of a village that did laundry. I tore one page and the rip was awkward, not straight along the binding. I looked at it then I stuck it on my wall and continued harvesting.
I saw a face in the laundry. A stoic, sad profile.
And the two separate pieces finally came together. Quite remarkable when you witness that.

 Laundry Clairvoyant

Mixed media collage and paint

9"x12"

Boxing inspired art

I have a piece in the Compound Gallery's boxing themed show entitled "Knockout." It is a great privilege to be chosen and also a relief, since this piece was created because of the gallery's open call. Here is the post card for the event and my piece, "Right in the Kisser." This is a mixed media acrylic paint and collage piece, with the mouth guard being created from an electron microscopic view of a diatom (dead algae). The photo is when it was drying in my studio space (centered).

Pink Week..."Ouch"

 

This is a post card sized piece of artwork for Sacramento's "Pink Week" where artist send in art where the dominate color is, of course, pink. This is entitled "Ouch" and was done in watercolor, ink, gouache.