ARCHIVES: November 2010

trainscape
Trying to capture what we see

Trenton. It doesn't get more exotic than that. Maybe because it's where we went for our fifth grade class trip. Mmmm, state capital. Many years later, a different we, a much smaller group of we, traveled to Trenton for Thanksgiving, or as our good friend Simon says; "Saint Macy's Day", at least when he's referring to the parade. But that name kind of fits the whole weekend in this foolish era.

We had a good time. It was a good day. Even the train trip up was fun. The three of us found an empty three-seater behind some very curious kids who decided we were interesting, and we then decided that was interesting and the situation kept us entertained for awhile.

I sat by the window, camera at the ready, planning to take photos of factories for painting backgrounds. I don't have the best camera, it really wasn't the ideal vantage point, the lighting was questionable and taking photos though a dirty window from a moving train... well, I've done it before because that's the circumstances I had. Sometimes you do what you gotta do. And it's just for reference, so really, it's all okay. This photo to the right is one of my favorites. It even has a face!

posted November 28, 2010

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yes, they keep on coming
Yet another late November

I'm finishing up my first representational painting in over a year. It's got stems. The one I hope to begin in the next week or so will have a face. I'm also back with the abstracted landscapes, working with those Valley Forge photos I took recently. One is mostly in blues, because that's what I had leftover on my palette. Sometimes it happens like that. And I'm beginning to paint on hot-press watercolor paper, partially so I can experiment some more, and partially so I can have some lower-cost work to sell, as long as I sell them unframed.

And then there's the writing; here and on Daily Kos. A few of us are starting up a weekly community poetry diary in the new year. It's in the planning stages now. This is getting me to write poems and lyrics again, which is a very good thing. I've been skimming through older poetry files and found a whole bunch of poems and notes that involve my earliest years of being a visual artist. Some will get posted here from time to time.

I wrote the poem below a few weeks after I turned twenty. I was in my third semester at Mass Art, doing terribly as a student probably, but becoming a painter nonetheless. There doesn't seem to be a title anymore.

After midnight
December now
words flow
rain comes down
flows down the hill to the tracks
dirty hair clings to my back
words flow from the plains
to late night tired subway trains
I believe it now

Car doors
and high heels
clicking on the street
tonight I’ll freeze
tomorrow I will be tired
I’ll paint in my sleep
with the hands of a woman twice my age
alert and dreamy cat eyes looking from my face
oh, I believe it now

There’s a rush on time
creativity
motivation
a slow cautious leak
motors for the month of December already
take a deep breath, somewhere I’m ready
there’s no solution
for two decade confusion
I believe it now

Stories up in boxes
abstraction
fantasy
and depression
I want no analysts - I’m all rebellion
mistrustful of what they’ll sell someone
water - my comfort - my birth
comes down to lick the earth
no deceiving now

posted November 23, 2010

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bigger than a pochade box
The world’s tiniest studio

I have the world’s tiniest studio. It's half a room. I am grateful I have a studio at all. Let’s get that out of the way first. But things are getting very, very squished. And I really need to stretch out and paint bigger than fourteen inches in any one dimension. With rare exception, it’s been a very long time.

You can see for youself how tiny it is. I've got three paintings going right now, all 9x12". It's like painting in a kayak. It's a painting booth. I ought to show you how it looks under the table; supplies and tools and paintings and supports relatively well-organized and all in their place, as long as I do not add so much as one more roll of masking tape or a new tube of paint.

There is the option to join up next to my boyfriend’s studio space in his building, but it’s neither climate nor squirrel controlled. I like some warmth in winter and I need my cool in summer, and so therefore here I am. I like my basic creature comforts. Plus, I am sure I would paint less, what with the commute time and all. I like having a home studio. I get more done, and at any hour, although there are the space limitations.

That which doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. That which doesn’t squish us makes us expand in other ways. How to create whole worlds on a two-dimensional 6x8” plane... I am becoming quite good at this. But just the same, I really need to spread these wings of mine.

posted November 11, 2010

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creative fun from almost nothing
States of being - Confidence

Confidence is not cockiness, but comes from a realistic assessment of your own personal power and abilities. When you are confident, you know for a fact that you are just fine with the issue at hand. You are secure enough in this knowledge that you do not need to put anyone else down in the process. With a sense of confidence you are strong, sure and steady. Like the mountain that sits in place, the running river and the blowing wind, you are doing what you were born to do without question or doubt.

As an artist, it would be wonderful to have complete confidence in your creative and technical abilities. In order to get there, you need to have enough confidence in yourself to make mistakes, and to not always be brilliant. Being confident is not the same as being perfect. The goal of perfection can paralyze you with the fear of failure. Fear is anathema to confidence.

I remember one teacher from Mass Art that made a great impression on me. This was a beginning painting class. He wanted us to have the freedom to make mistakes. He wanted us to make “big, bold, beautiful mistakes” so that we could learn from them. Hopefully, we would not repeat those mistakes, but instead find new glorious mistakes to make and learn from. This is how we built confidence in our abilities, and at the same time we learned to love the act of painting.

With experience, you will become more confident. By taking chances with your art, whatever those aesthetic risks may be, your work will eventually grow stronger. Push yourself beyond your own boundaries, and although you may create some strange things along the way, you will eventually discover that you have abilities you never thought possible. When you realize that you can achieve new things through your own power and determination, you will become confident, and so will your artwork.

Portraying Confidence exercises and guidelines:

• Regular portrait:
The person is shown upright, front and center, and looking straight at the viewer. Use at least two primary colors somewhere in the painting, either as part of the figure or in the background.

• Challenge portrait:
Place the person being portrayed in the bottom third of the painting, or so far over to the side that at least one third of the figure is off of the picture plane.

• Regular abstract:
Use only black, white and a maximum of four primary or secondary colors (red, blue, yellow, green, orange, purple). Have the main activity of the abstract be centered, either horizontally and vertically.

• Challenge abstract:
Have 80% of the activity way off to the bottom or over to one side. Have some element of something that is mostly hidden, or describe a general sense of important things being hidden.

• Sculpture or craftwork:
Choose one strong bold color, with or without slight variations on that color. Have that color be at least 75% of the piece. Combine three strong forms or shapes as the predominant feature of the piece.

Every month a new creativity lesson is posted. See the archives for the full series. See September and October 2009 for further explanation on how to use the exercises.

Creatively Unblocking Creative Blocks
Author: Alexandria Levin
ISBN: 0-9743267-1-2
Published by Painted Jay Publishing
www.paintedjay.com

posted November 4, 2010

 

All images and content ©2009-2010 Alexandria Levin