Portraits...

Delores in Fendi   watercolor   11 x 8.25

are an amazing opportunity to commune with another individual in a very personal way....an intimacy beyond measure.  A silent wordless relationship.  For me, a portrait painted in love is the only way to travel.  I am inspired by real people with real humanity and a real soulfulness.  When presented with whiny uninspiring models or those in costume, I am at a bit of a loss, as a boundary has been laid which I am unable or unwilling to penetrate.  Portrait painting for me is so undeniably connected to my brain.  Painting Delores was such a work of love.  She is a perpetual student who is 86 years young.  We have been painting together for many years.  The muse seems to guide me in these joyful endeavors.  The work was started from a classroom situation where she was painting someone else, so the simple shapes changed a bit from time to time as her head rotated both from up to down and from left to right as she dipped into paint.  Once the groundwork was laid I was committed and finished as best I could.

A tribute to my friend and colleague Delores.  I am pleased.

Painting Companions...

Delores in Fendi   watercolor   11 x 8.25

Everyone needs a friend or two.  Painting companions are friends, indeed, but there are a few characteristics of such a friendship that make this relationship unique.  Painting friends base their relationship on the common love of art, of painting....and so they understand completely the goal of "getting into the zone", of being timeless and of staying on target.  We don't chat.  We don't do lunch.  Of course, there are some pleasantries when we begin, and a bit of conversation at the wrap-up, but we respect each other's needs for creative freedom, which is tough to find and even tougher to perpetuate.  Words come from the left brain and demand our immediate attention.  We wouldn't think of interrupting this process with words.  I have such a friend in Delores.  We have painted together off and on for many years.  She is definitely the most progressive older woman I have ever met(I am blessed each week by at least one of her nuggets of wisdom)....I appreciate her insights, her critiques and her never-failing enthusiasm and questioning.  During one of our recent sessions, she attacked her paper with a feverish ardor....off in completely separate part of the room.  At the end, we emerged fatiqued with work in hands.  She felt that she had never painted better or more loosely.  I agree. "Pot of Flowers" is the result.  We chatted and critiqued for a few minute.  We then went home.  Friends. Beautiful.