New "Recycled" art painting

This painting has been torturing me for an eternity. It refuses to be conquered. I've been hacking away at it for longer than I care to remember. Today's foray into my tiny nemesis consisted of gluing failed fused plastic bags onto the canvas to see if I could destroy it once and for all and throw it in the garbage can without any guilt. My experiment with fusing plastic bags together didn't pan out that great, so I figured it would be perfect on this failed painting. I can become quite obsessive about some things--usually the more insignificant the better--and this painting is one of them.

New abstract painting

8" x 10" acrylic painting on Masonite

After finally getting the art room into decent shape where I can walk around and find things, I'm now trying to finish some unresolved paintings. I've worked and worked this painting (like most every one I have), but--surprise!--suddenly I began to like it today. I put a coat of white gesso over most of it and cut into it with my favorite brushes--which aren't really brushes but vinyl-tipped painting sticks. It started to get away from me again when I started working on the two eye-like spots, but I forced myself to stop. My OCD tendencies aren't easy to control sometimes.

Abstract painting--mixed media, graphite, ink and acrylic paint

Mixed media, "Cat hair on the carpet in the full moon"

Today was beautiful--clear and cool (almost cold!) Finally made my way into the art room to varnish some paintings I had laying around. I'm sure I can do this, I thought. It was kind of fun and I was wondering why I had never bothered to varnish paintings before. It really brings out the color and lends an air of finality to the paintings (perhaps), it's mindless and, therefore, not an anxiety-producing event like painting can sometimes be (I know, I know--I'm nuts!) It led to attempting to finish a sketch/painting I had done a couple of weeks before. I added graphite and some ink to the painting and--be still my beating heart--it's done! Heck, it's only an entry in my sketchbook--can't spend my life on it! :-)

Our neighbor's European art show a success!

Our neighbor, Giuseppe Corazzina, just returned from Italy after being away for several months. While there, he had a very successful showing of his artwork and sold eight paintings. He was kind enough to drop off his gorgeous catalogue from the show and Jerry and I have been admiring his paintings ever since. He works mainly in acrylics in an abstract expressionistic style with strong, saturated colors and a wonderful sense of design, but is so talented and versatile that he also does fresco and murals. Check out his website to be truly inspired.

Beethoven as Muse

We had a nice, relaxing day. We got to the the Y at 11:00 and Jerry did his exercise thing while I did a Power Yoga class and took a steam bath. Finally got out the paints later and fiddled around for a while before we went to St. Luke's for the performance of the UCF Symphony Orchestra. I took along my sketch pad and embellished some of the design I had done earlier while listening to Beethoven's Piano concerto No. 4. The soloist was UCF Prof. Laurent Boukobza, a very talented pianist who played wonderfully. UCF is lucky to have such a fine musician and teacher and I'm proud to say I'm a UCF alumni when I hear this group of musicians. They finished off the performance with Beethoven's 5th Symphony. It was fun just listening to the music and letting my pen go wherever it wanted. I hope I can finish off my sketch tomorrow. I've decided to take an old sketch book and fill it up with drawings, paintings, collages, anything. The pages aren't too big so it shouldn't be too taxing to complete a page and I'm just not going to worry about what I do. Maybe something will materialize that I like enough to put on canvas.

Abstract painting--work in progress

Worked on some painting today even though I didn't feel well. This is starting to shape up (I think), but still not there. I'm sure I can overwork it into something for the trash can :-) On second thought, now that I look at it on the computer, I'm not sure what to think except I'm not liking some of the swirly shapes. Painting abstracts is got to be the hardest thing to do! Maybe I'll just put some gel over it tomorrow to texturize it and see what happens. Overworking, here I come.

Art Group Meeting and New Painting

Woman, guitar and cat, acrylic painting, 11" x 14"

Spent some time today painting before my art group meeting. There were only five people there :-(, but we had a good time anyway showing our art around and talking about art, religion, baboons!, George Bush, etc. I almost finished a painting of a girl with a guitar and bowl of fruit, but I took it in anyway. It somehow appeared to me when I was looking at a bunch of unfinished paintings that Jerry had hung up on the wall in my art room. The canvas was a general mishmash of textures, but somehow the figure emerged and I accentuated it this afternoon. I hope to post it tomorrow (it's in the style of Picasso--one of my favorite artists!)

Hey, Picasso! How much for your soul?

Abstract Landscape, acrylic paint, pastel and graphite

I found a California artist while surfing, John Robertson, who has raised some uneasy questions about what it means to be an artist today. I really like his assemblages and Van Gogh-type pieces, and he does some nice, large portraits. He went on television recently promoting his willingness to sell his bohemian or artistic lifestyle for $250,000. I realize it's probably a stunt, or a performance piece, to get publicity for his art, but it brings up questions about what exactly an artist will do in order to make a buck. Can the soul, the artistic soul, be sold for so much cash? If it can be sold, then doesn't that make the artist soulless and, therefore, not an artist. Isn't art a measure of soul? I suppose each painting contains the artist's soul and each time we offer something up for sale, the question becomes "how much will we sell that piece of soul for?" It's something I've been vaguely wondering about as I labor over blogs, websites, Etsy sites, all kinds of sites in order to make a name, make a buck, no matter how small, no matter how elusive. And I can see it's a very competitive, dog eat dog, web world out there which doesn't seem particularly conducive to someone trying to develop their art. It's hard to focus with so many questions and fruitless mind exercises. And along with that, another fruitless painting (something about that shape in the middle is bugging me and I have to do something about it--but what?) I've got a number of semi-completed paintings which are going nowhere fast. I guess they must be a true reflection of this artist!

Dog days of summer!

Blazing Florida Landscape (God, I wish it was October so I could go outside!), 15" x 30" acrylic painting on gallery wrap canvas

I was so thankful I didn't have to go outside today in the 108 degree temp (at least it seemed that way) and pull weeds, or work on rentals, or mow the lawn, or whatever. It was totally miserable, and other than going out for a quick squirt of some wilting plants, I stayed blissfully indoors and caught up on some of my favorite blogs, e-mail and painting. I had a jar of Golden Acrylic Clear Tar Gel laying around that I had bought a while ago and decided to experiment. It didn't quite do what I had expected when I tried to drip it from the brush, so I put it into a bottle with a small nozzle and squeezed it out onto this painting I had in process. I think I'll study up on the process from Golden's website and see if I can improve my technique tomorrow. Their website does offer a lot of worthwhile ideas on using their products and which might prove inspirational for a painting. (I hope I don't sound like I'm advertising, but I do kind of like their paint.)

Played around with a painting I wasn't so happy with in Photoshop and I'm kind of liking it, but have no idea how to duplicate it in paint. It would require some kind of unifying coat of paint with texture, although how to get the right texture is a puzzle. This will require some thinking. Speaking of which, is there anyone in Washington doing anything remotely like that? The latest bombshell about the Bush administration comes from Pulitzer Prize-winner Ron Suskind's new book "The Way of the World." In it he reports that he has recorded on the record statements from two CIA officials that the CIA was ordered by the Bush administration to forge a letter linking Saddam Hussein to Al-Qaeda to justify the invasion of Iraq. Surely even Nancy Pelosi must wake up sometime to the incessant facts that, just possibly, this administration committed criminal acts and should be investigated. Oh, I forgot, the rules are different in Washington and what might be a criminal act on Main Street America is business as usual in Washington. No wonder Congress has an approval rating of 9%, way below even George W. Bush's. Now that's an accomplishment Ms. Pelosi can be proud of! The Democrats may not be such a shoo-in to the White House if they don't stop conducting themselves like accomplices in these crimes. I wonder if Obama is going to sweep this under the rug too?

Seamus, 16" x 12", acrylic on gallery-wrap canvas

Finished the portrait of Seamus. I can't say that I'm 100% satisfied with it, but I wanted to take something into the art meet-up tonight, so this was the closest I could get to a finished piece. I obsessed over it to a ridiculous degree. I might work on the face some more later, though--it seems to be going flat all the time. Perhaps some gel medium might give me some of the texture I'm looking for. Well, anyway, I like the background. We had a pretty good crowd at the meet-up and a lot of people showed their work--everything from abstract to super realistic. They seem to be a nice bunch of people and we had some good discussions about art happenings, techniques and how to actually sell some of our stuff. Bob Boynton is apparently making it and can hardly keep up with the demand for his paintings. It must be nice! He highly recommends ArtistsRegistry.com and YourArt.com for exposure. Next month's assignment is to do a piece on something laying around the house. Hmmmm! That could be anything from my dog to a spatula. I'll have to start focusing.