Keep Those Hands Busy!

 

I am a fidgeter...real and imagined slight discomforts arise when I try to sit still for longer than, let's say, 10 minutes.  So, drawing while listening provides that needed nervous release during the long evenings of critique.  And, I must say, that doodling also allows for a more intense listening.  My mind doesn't have the opportunity to meander, as both brain parts are functioning.  These small portraits of artist friends were sketched this past week.  Oh so many good paintings were displayed!  So many ideas and so much beauty!  My favorites this time around were three powerful works that shared the element of simple shapes:  the wondrous dark 6 am clouds of Judith Carducci done in a narrow horizontal format (one of my favorites); an early morning patchwork Irish landscape by Ann Emmitt (small but packing a large punch); and the almost-abstract work of three warehouse garage doors by Dan Lindner, the color being pushed to the max.  Perhaps my adoration of these works arises from the fact that these were so very different than my own paintings.  Perhaps I just like them.  But what they all shared was a powerful simplicity.  And our critique leader Jack Lieberman peppered the evening with so much knowledge....knowledge that has accumulated from a lifetime of work and study.  We are a lucky bunch....support and constructive comments.  A perfect evening, methinks.