Category: Art

So That’s That With That

While typing away here, thinking about the Greece vacation, trying to decide how to finish that garden painting, and overall impatience and indecision that is my usual trademark, I found out I had a few orders in my Etsy shop.  When did that happen?
A buyer purchased this set of spa cloths I knit.  They’ve been up on the site for quite a while.  Months ago someone bought a set, but the site’s been sort of dry for some time.  I’m not sure how much I like Etsy for art.  The artists there have been complaining that there’s a lot of mix ups in the search feature.  If a shopper is looking for original art, the search will include a lemon reamer among the paintings.  What’s up with that?  How confusing is that to someone looking for an oil painting or a pencil drawing? 
I have a few small watercolors on Etsy, a couple of small handknit items, and the bead jewelry I’ve become fascinated with lately.  The paintings I’ve been doing this past year haven’t made it to the online shop yet.  I’m ambivalent about putting them up and having them sit there.  But maybe that’s the idea?  I don’t know. 
So I prepared the spa cloth order and sent them out.  Yesterday I noticed I had another order for the same set of cloths.  What a thrill!  I put aside the garden watercolor for now and got busy knitting this order.  And then today I saw that a friend of my mom purchased a couple of small watercolors.  Another thrill!  Things are looking up!
Oh, and by the way, we’ve decided to nix the Greece vacation this year.  There’s too much going on here and there to warrant knocking ourselves out to go.  Better off staying put, taking a short trip to the east end of Long Island, knitting, painting, beading, and waiting for my first grandchild to be born. (Thrill!)
So that’s that with that.

Thought for Thursday

“Whenever we indulge in what might be called ‘paint by numbers’ art, we are engaging in cynicism and skepticism.  We are on a subtle level out to ‘fool’ people.  We are looking down at our audience and saying ‘If I just feed them what they are used to getting, I can fool them.’  Does this mean that we must always and willfully break the mold?  No..we are always engaged in a delicate balancing act. We both know how things ‘are done’ and we must strive to listen accurately to see if that’s how our particular piece of art wants to be done.”

        ~Discovering A Sense Of Authenticity, Walking In This World, Julia Cameron

Friday Photos

Enjoy the weekend and Happy Independence Day to all!

The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America

“When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”  July 4, 1776

                                                                      

Preamble to the Constitution of the United States of America

“ We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”    September 17, 1787

http://www.constitution.org/usdeclar.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Bill_of_Rights

http://www.constitution.org/constit_.htm

Thought for Thursday

“I didn’t have the guts to become an artist, I had the ignorance.” ~Jack Sorenson, Western artist, Cowboy

My thought for today was inspired by a fellow artist/blogger Kathleen Roeth and her blog post on Cowboy Wisdom.  A couple of her quotes had me laughing so hard I almost spit my coffee at the computer monitor!  This one was my favorite:

“After eating an entire bull, a mountain lion felt so good he started roaring. He kept it up until a hunter came along and shot him. The moral: When you’re full of bull, keep your mouth shut.”

Go on and visit Kathleen’s blog for more cowboy inspiration and lovely art.  Thanks Kathleen!

What’s the Rush?

Painting in progress
I must slow down my progress on this garden painting.  I’m trying to figure out why I’m in such a rush while painting.  Where’s the fire, huh?  I don’t take into account that I’m working with a medium that needs to dry somewhat before I keep throwing more paint in an area.  What’s that word?  Impatient?  I feel like I want to see results while I’m  painting, but with these watercolors I’m learning I need to wait just a bit or there’s going to be mud, not color and form.  While I was working on this I had to stop myself from continuing. 
Is it that I’m working from life that gives me a sense of urgency?  The idea that I’m present and ready, let’s get it down before I lose the feeling?  I don’t get that sense when I work from my photos.  No, with photos I get too detail-y.  Maybe it’s the idea in my head that time and light is fleeting?
When I paint from life I forget where I am and it’s a good feeling.  But I push it and keep painting like a mindless robot, just adding color, shadow, lines, water, with out of body movements.  As I wake from my painting stupor, I look at the work I did and think, “Ok, you did it again and messed it up! Idiot.”  Some how I don’t tear up the work and I just leave it tossed aside discarded like the trash, but not in the trash.  Later on while passing by on my way to another room I see it and think “Oh that’s how it looks now?  How come it’s not as bad as I thought?”  Things seem to work.
Funny thing is I always forget that it’s the process not the outcome.  Why is that?  I wish I could figure out how my brain works.  How long does it take to grow up? 

A Day on the North Shore of Long Island

The weather here in New York is hot, hot, hot!  It’s only June.  I’m not complaining about the heat, no way.  I’ll take it hot any day.  You know what kind of winter we get here?  It’s not fun, for me anyway.  I can’t seem to get myself warm enough in the winter.  When the summer rolls around and everyone is dragging and complaining about the heat, I’m all smiles.  Yes to summer weather, every time.
So I won’t be painting in the heat of mid-day.  I’ve been waiting until the sun starts going down in the afternoon.  I wish I could get myself out there in the early morning, but there’s too much to do in the morning around here.  I like how the light looks very early in the day.  Anyway, forget it.  I have to get my things done early, get out and be back by lunch time.  Then the rest of the day is mine.

(c)2010 Dora Sislian Themelis

The Mr. was home on Sunday, rather than fishing out east.  He suggested visiting a custom car show that a friend mentioned, nearby in Glen Cove .  That’s the other mania: cars.  Drag racing is in the blood.  The Mr. and the Sons watch it on TV, talk about it, go to sanctioned events, and had/have cars they’re developing.  Car people just want to look at and talk about cars, a very benign bunch.  All cars, all the time.  Ok, so I don’t mind it either.  Unless my guys want to spend money on car parts, then I get crabby.
(c)2010 Dora Sislian Themelis
(c)2010 Dora Sislian Themelis

The car show was at a lovely shore-side park called Morgan Park, on the north shore of Long Island, so the setting was lovely.  A band was playing, food and cold drinks were available, some vendors selling car stuff, and cars.  Parked all over the private park were all kinds of cars as far as the eye could see.  Old cars and new cars of every model, shape, size you could think of.  Over the sea of shiny waxed, colorful cars and chrome, was the blue of Long Island Sound.  Boats bobbed in the calm water.  The sky was clear with puffy clouds and the water sparkled.  Great!  I love being near water so I could ignore the cars.  (Except for the 1963 Buick Riviera I saw, one of my pop’s favorites.  Hi Pop!)

(c)2010 Dora Sislian Themelis
(c)2010 Dora Sislian Themelis

The park was very pretty and had walking paths along the shore with this lovely, stone pergola at the end where people were fishing.  Another park and museum near this one is Garvie’s Point which houses Native American artifacts and such.  The area is a great place to draw or paint.  Seeing the signs on the road pointing to Garvie’s Point I thought I’m going to have to visit alone one day this summer and make it an Artist’s Date. 

Good idea.

Thought for Thursday

“I don’t believe in total freedom for the artist. Left on his own, free to do anything he likes, the artist ends up doing nothing at all. If there’s one thing that’s dangerous for an artist, it’s precisely this question of total freedom, waiting for inspiration and all the rest of it.”  ~Federico Fellini, Italian movie director (1920 – 1993)

Tuesday No-Show at the Easel

Daylilies and Hydrangea in the garden at 7AM this morning

Sorry I was a no-show yesterday.  I had one of those days that would not stop for anything.  My morning started at the farmer’s market.  I was disappointed with the produce as the veggie guy didn’t have much with him.  Maybe he was having a bad growing week.  Then the fruit guy was out of fruit, so I visited the cheese guy and bought cheese.  Okay.  Cheese is not fruit, but I decided to splurge.  I love cheese.

When I returned home I had phone calls to make that I have been putting off.  House stuff, laundry (people need clean clothes you know), oh and a library stop to pick up books I ordered.  Tried to cross things off the to-do list and not making much of a dent.

After lunch I was meeting a good friend for Starbucks coffee and to dish the dirt!  We don’t get too many chances to get together often so it was a real treat.  That took up three, nice long hours, but worth every minute!  She’s an art lover and is encouraging me to set up some sort of gallery show somewhere.  I’d like to do that, but I’m afraid I may not have enough work.  I have to think about it.

Later I had to plan our dinner, prepare the dinner, serve the dinner, clean up after dinner and finally sit down in front of the TV to just veg. 

Painting? Nope.  Thinking about painting?  Yup.  Planning the next painting already even though the current one isn’t finished at all? Uh huh!  What’s interesting is that I’m not in resistance mode, just moving along.

I’ll try again today.

Thinking of Painting and Don’t Ask About Dinner

Back to Monday, my favorite day of the week.  I apologize to those of you who hate Mondays, but I need Mondays like you need that first taste of coffee in the morning.  It’s like that.  Okay, I won’t bore you with the “gory” details of Monday morning, I know I’ve been there before and dragged you along.  Yeah, I know, you know, we all know!  Like Jerry Seinfeld used to say, “Yadda yadda.”  But I like to say BlahBlahBlah.

So, anyway, a nice quiet weekend at home was spent.  My family came for dinner, we ate, we laughed, we talked.  Was just lovely.  Calm and quiet morning, the Mr. took a ride on his bicycle, Son #2 in LaLaLand sleeping the morning away, and I had coffee and the Morning Pages on my lounge chair in the garden.

The Mr. raises birds.  Canaries, finches, other kinds I can’t remember, and hangs them outside our patio room and in the tree where they chirp and sing.  For a while it’s nice to hear the birds in the morning.  It feels like a far away forest escape until a few hours go by and the chirping/tweeting doesn’t stop from the five or six birds hanging out there and my head feels like it’s going to explode if those darn birds don’t shut up already! Ugh.

Ahem.  Sorry I almost lost it there.  Anyway.. After a long while they do calm down and so do I.  You know, chirping birds can get just as annoying as kids who don’t just play and talk but scream and run around in circles.  Cute and nice at first, bloody murder afterward.

No, I didn’t paint this weekend.  That’s why I like Monday.  Monday I get back to work too, except I’m already at the job site and everyone else leaves.  On the weekend too many people are around.  I don’t mind people looking over my shoulder as I work.  On the contrary, it’s nice and social.  But the family has demands.  They need things only I can do.  Yes, only me.  And if I’m painting, it seems to them I’m not really doing anything.  So they talk to me, ask me questions about other things, like what’s for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and where’s their socks.  Yes, a lovely conversation.  Uh, nope.

Back in the garden.  When my son and now daughter-in-law were planning their wedding, she wanted white hydrangea for her bridal bouquet.  I started looking at this flower differently after that.  I never really liked the bloom heads, all droopy and huge.  After the wedding I found these white hydrangea on sale, barely alive, and practically dried up at the local Home Depot.  I was compelled to rescue it.  Now two years later they are growing and blooming beautifully.  It’s called Blushing Bride and bloom all summer long.  Lucky me!

When I look at these flowers I think of my gorgeous daughter-in-law and it makes me so happy.  All weekend I spied this hydrangea thinking of how to paint it.  That’s how I spent my time in the garden with no one around.  Observing, thinking, planning, daydreaming, making mental notes.  It’s a lot of work, but looks like I’m idle and inactive.  With iced coffee in hand, lounging in the chair in the midst of the blooms I’m painting, but no one is the wiser.