Rockamelon....summer delight

Rockamelon   oil on canvas   8 x 16 x 1.5

Summer's lease hath all too short a date.

                                                                                             William Shakespeare

  
Aficionados of August revel in relinquishment.  When it's one hundred degrees in the shade, it's too hot to be anything but receptive and reflective.  Let a seasonally sanctioned sojourn of slow joys refill the authentic reservoir of creative energy.  This month on the Simple Abundance path we commit to discovering, acknowledging, appreciating, owning, and honoring our authentic gifts, transforming no only our own lives, but the lives of those we love.

                                                                                                        Sara Ban Breathnach

                                                                                                        Simple Abundance

Watermelons are fun.  They have fun colors, fun textures and funny shapes.  Biting into an ice cold slice is definitely one of my summer pleasures.  "Rockamelon" is my tribute to this simple, yet luxurious, fruit.

Sara Ban Breathnach's Simple Abundance A Daybook of Comfort and Joy is a constant source of reference for me.  It's simple message of spirituality has gotten me through the worst of times.  And it's always there on the shelf during the best of times.

Fright Night...

Shocking   Mixed/Paper   34.5 x 22

I am a mystery-lover.  After all, isn't making a painting somewhat like solving a giant mystery?  Each October, I have a bit of a film festival for myself....mysteries, thrillers, haunted houses and the like.  Things that go bump in the night.  Things that jar us away from the day-to-day, the status quo that can become ever-so-monotonous.  When I hoisted the work "Shocking" onto its notch on the wall recently, I was reminded of how much fun it was to create this work.  I assembled photos of shocked and surprised friends and family:  my friend Concepcion, friend Brian and his two sons Oscar and Casper, son Seth and friend Cheryl who for many years, ran the now-defunct Brimfield Post Office.  Cut linoleum blocks printed onto the paper's surface provided the "look" of a film strip.  (which has indeed become an antiquity) The work continued by arranging faces and drawing with pastels in my favorite spooky colors.  I tried to keep a vague darkness going on....as if these were faces in a darkened movie theater.  My friends had fun posing for this work, I think.  And I had a great deal of fun making it.  "Shocking" is the title.  I am slightly hidden in the upper right hand corner.