Today's painting was inspired by a drawing that Ella made on Friday morning. Often, she'll come into my room when it's time to get up, and come to find me writing at my desk. Then she likes to color a picture with my colored hilighters or my fancy black felt. She made a picture of these cone-like figures with feet and--what are those lines across? Arms? I liked the shape of them and wanted to make a painting that included them.
I've played enough with paints before to know I love working with a few mediums--acrylics, pencil, indian ink, which I purchased a bottle of on a whim sometime last summer. I wanted to do these figures in oil pastels and smudge the edges, but didn't have a chance to make it to the art store this week. Maybe the smudged oil pastels will appear in future paintings, but not today.
What I am really enjoying about this process is working with what I have. As a writer and songwriter, I spend a lot of time thinking about what I DON'T have to work with... I need to learn to craft scenes more clearly, or sew the pieces of an essay together more seamlessly; if only I could play the banjo or find a cheap out-of-tune piano. Blah blah blah.
The detachment that has come with my Painting on Sundays project has given the the "whatever" attitude to get some work done. Maybe this is what Keri Smith means when she says you have to have enought "fuck you". Maybe it's what Julie Doiron meant the other night at the Streaming Cafe when she said that to keep doing music, a part of you has to believe that "you're the shit". (pardon all the profanities!)
Anyway.
It's a relief to be creating from this place, and I am intending to transfer it into other areas of my life.
xox
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