When I look at the calendar, I see that I have not posted anything here for a couple of weeks. Have to admit I've really been enjoying some time away from blogging. In fact, I really had to talk myself into sitting in front of the computer today. My
body balks at sitting and my
mind demands that I go outside and enjoy the beautiful weather.
But here I am ... because my
heart tells me I must maintain my connection with all you wonderful people. Right now,
YOU are what I miss about blogging. I hope you are all well.
First, let me say to Photo Art Resource Cache subscribers that the full subscription of textures is up and waiting for you to download. If some of you had trouble with the downloads recently, the problem has been fixed. The site will close on May 15th, so grab your textures while you can and enjoy!
A couple of you asked for a peek at my work (paintings) and my studio - so here goes ...
Now don't get too excited ... My studio is a just a portion of our large, finished and well-lit garage and my adventures in painting are definitely more therapeutic than artistic ...
Here is where I play with paints, brushes and spatulas. I love texture (you already know that!) and find using spatulas (more than brushes) suits what I like to do (and am capable of doing).
This is the same collage as above, but with some text added to it. The
canvas in the upper left of this collage is now a painting hanging in a stairwell in our home. The painting of
two women was framed given to my eldest daughter for her birthday. The two
red pieces have evolved since this photo was taken and are waiting to be framed and hung. The
empty blue canvas laying on the table has been finished and is waiting for my son to pick it up.
(You might be better able to read some of the words in the collage if you click on the image to enlarge it.)
Not the best photograph, but it gives you a bit of an idea of what became of the canvas in the upper left of the previous collage ... I intended for the edges to look scuffed and textured. Really ... I did! This painting is really much brighter and more dynamic than this photo shows. Really ... it is!
Canvases in various states of completion. The blue one is one requested by my son - 'wide, narrow and full of blues' were his words.
Here's a clipped view of the finished Pollock-esque piece for my son.
The black figure on a red background above is a study of a famous painting by
Matisse and I am calling it, '
Etude Matisse'. The one with a similar figure to the left of it has been claimed by my middle daughter and her partner and is now set off in a great gold frame with white matte.
Do you see the remnants of wool Berber rugs on my studio floor? My husband installed them so that my feet would not get cold. The garage is heated and rugs are totally impractical, but I don't complain when he is so thoughtful! :)
Here is the painting for my middle daughter, sitting on a table in poor lighting in the studio, waiting for her to pick it up. I saw a little something in it I wanted to adjust, so she could not take it home when she first saw it.
So ... as you see I just try my hand at different styles of painting and see what happens. And, yes, because I am a neophyte painter and have not yet discovered my own style, I sometimes copy master works to try and get a feel for their style. That is a common technique of art teachers, btw. (It can be a very demoralizing exercise, however!)
Right now I am trying my hand at some
Rothko-style pieces. It looked like it would be really easy, but as with many things, appearances can be deceiving. I am finding it to be much more of a challenge than I anticipated. You can see examples of
Rothko's paintings
here.
If I can paint,
anyone can and I highly recommend giving it a try both as a creative and a therapeutic endeavor. If you love the form, color, texture and self-expression of photography and digital photo-art why not dip your toe in the waters (colors)? Be warned, however, there are no '
Undo' buttons!
:)
Here's a free texture for you. It does great things to skies, hence its name 'Sky Love'. The download button will be removed in a couple of weeks so download it while you can.