The Case for Original Art...

Precarious Stack of Vintage Bowls   Watercolor   12.5 x 9

Just last week my son was searching for some white glazed pots for his indoor plants.  His trips to some Mom and Pop plant stores yielded much better results than a trip to Lowe's.  Large discount houses cater to the lowest common denominator with more generic products.  The same with art prints which have been killed with correctness.  Of course, we all need those deep discounts in some arenas of our lives.  But, for me, what we choose to put on our walls defines us personally....our senses of visual aesthetics.  No generic here, please.  Original art is one of a kind.  It has a personality and character all its own.  It speaks of the artist's hand who created it.  Lively.  Nurturing.  Lovely.  The more I am able to celebrate my own uniqueness, my own oneness, the less I am able to tolerate generic artwork.

So, OK.  Buy generic toilet paper....bars of soap in bulk.  But engage in the liveliness of original art and the artists who choose to spend their lives in wonder.  Participate.  Oh, yeah.

White objects + Stacked Objects=Quite a Challenge

Precarious Stack of Vintage Bowls   watercolor   12.5 x 9

I love setting up painting challenges for myself. And I love stacks of things. My husband and I are stackers.....mostly stuff we are studying....books, magazines, reference materials and the like. Simply put, we are "pile people". In fact, when we are having company, we scurry around looking for places to hide our stacks. Stacks are always precarious, moveable, shiftable. And I like white dinnerware.....always have. No fancy patterns for me. I like that clean background look for the palette of food colors. White objects pick up colors from their surrounds that are reflected onto them. Rarely does an object register as pure white.....usually only in a highlight area. So, considering my fondness for stacked things, and white dinnerware, why not combine the two for an ultimate painting challenge? I really like this painting. There is something raw about it. I am usually very disappointed when I go too far with refinement. That is a very very very fine line. The values on the white bowl have been exaggerated a bit. All paintings are autobiographical to some degree, even if we consider just the selection process of the subject matter. "Precarious Stack of Vintage Bowls" is even more so. It has my name written all over it.

Tension

Precarious Stack of Vintage Bowls   watercolor   12.5 x 9

Tension is definitely an emotion we can all relate to. We can identify tension in sounds and visuals. Tension causes us to pause....at least, that is my take on it. Tension in paintings very often relies on diagonal lines.....those that are momentarily suspended between the vertical (active) and the horizontal (passive, restful). My husband loves photographing the tension of broken tree branches in the forest that have become lodged in the crooks of other trees. We all know that eventually they will fall.....but when? Fences and telephone poles are often more interesting when they stray from the vertical. They become more active and break up the status quo. Robert Genn's twice weekly newsletter of today refers to sterility versus fertility and he lists ways to "shake it up", ways to pull oneself out of the familiar. His list mostly involves ways for the artist to change her/his approach. I would like to add "painting stacks of things" to the list. Stacking is always interesting to me....a piling up of varieties into the grand vertical format. "Precarious Stack of Vintage Bowls" was a lesson from my watercolor class. The values of the white bowls have been exaggerated to bring up the drama and to hold up to the strong dark background. What will happen next? I am involved.