The trouble with January is.... January Blues. It is not only blue Monday but a turnabout in mood throughout the month. The sad thing is February deems not much better. Here in the Northern Hemisphere lies a lack of sun. Every year older this lack of solar power settles in with a vengeance.
Beauty is hard to find these days. The skills I have acquired in the past years don't seem to make much of a difference in the motivation of moving forward. The start is always exciting. It is a matter of continuing the excitement to finish. To be satisfied with a painting when it is finished. To sit in the illuminated sphere of contemplation and face the reality of a path once taken brings back memories of a life that is worthwhile.

The memory comes flooding back. Have I achieved the right lighting? Can I smell the dryness of the grass? Is there enough beauty in the drab scene to bring me back home? Back to another path that brings back more memories. Enough to continue on. ​​

Or to return to another painting. To adjust and reflect. What can I change? Where can I go from here?
I returned to a painting finished a few years back. I felt I needed to resolve a bit of the path I was on. Subtle change but change non the less. Just one step closer to happiness. 
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I sit and contemplate landscapes from old photos. I need to carve out little thumbnail drawings. I need to satisfy a means. To control the composition. I need to enter the picture plane. The contour of the path. Move me along into the scene. Take me over the edge. Does it always have to be the same? Working out these compositions in small studies brings a smile to my face. Some feel so good. The memory, movement, feel of the thing, brings me home. Such a great start to a painting. Now stick to the path. Keep it real. Keep the beauty of the piece in its creation. Keep the memory alive.

The painting is as much about memory as it is about place. The trails are a place that pull me. A wanting for the ability to travel the paths again. Physical capability to scale the hills of Summers' past. The dead of winter brings hope for the Spring meanderings.

Well, it is January. Last post was July. Well!! 
Here's to New Years Resolutions. Or perhaps,... no promises this year.
The Roaring 20's  start out with a purr.
It is a time of getting back to a routine. Finding my will to add to my journey through these colored pages.
Perhaps?
The year that was...not productive. Sure it trudged along with a hobble, no skipping or jumping, the two things I love to do (because skipping and jumping are all a part of running). This is a new year. I am working on the hop. I see progress. My progress, so far, sees some kind of light at the end of the tunnel. I see trail running by Spring, in my future.  The depths of darkness and finding my new normal was not as exciting as one would expect when dealing with a curve in the road. The broken leg did something to my psyche. Confidence in who I was, what I could contribute, wavered. My body let me down. I could not trust it any longer. A new discipline of courage and mindset emerges. 
I've become a couch potato athlete/artist. Reading about others triumphs, overcoming obstacles, anyone can "do it" attitude. It is always easy to begin tomorrow. Start when the weather is beautiful, when conditions are just right. But when the pain sets in and the comfort goes away, the mind takes over. It tells you it is impossible. It tells you "what is the point"? It tells you to be thankful for your comfort. But there is something that tells you there is more to life than being a couch potato and you deserve to take it easy.
Resolve. There is no feeling good about yourself when you have no resolve. No reasoning behind why you exist on this earth. It is easier to wrap yourself up and read about others journeys and wish you had the resolve to follow your own.
I have lost my discipline over the past year. My hope is to get it back. Regain the trust in myself once again. Find a mindset that slowly brings me back to where I want to be once again.  It is not easy. Life is not easy, but it really should be enjoyable. There has to be some balance between enjoyment and pain. Small steps lead to enormous gains. I have done it before. I know how much work it takes. But in the long run it is so much more enjoyable than sitting on the couch, stewing in the negativity that permeates the mind. 
So cheers to the roaring 20's. May it be filled with triumphs, breakthroughs, and the comfort of knowing you can get through the pain of physical and mental downturns. Get to the other side of trust. Being confident in one's own being.

Well we seem to have flew through almost two seasons. Change can throw a wrench in plans, motivation and inspiration. January and February started out with good intentions. Working in a larger format. A start on a series.

Then in March the wrench.
​ I slipped on some black ice and broken my ankle in 5 places. A weekend stay in the hospital and surgery consisting of plates and screws to put me back together again. Now, I am not one to sit around and now I am forced to "sit" around. This puts a real damper on the creative juices. It somehow changed me. I am still trying to figure out how or why. I am putting the pieces back together. 
After two months I needed to get something ready for a group show at the Nature's Center. So I managed these:
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The larger piece is 24x24 inches. The small magpies are individually 4x6 inches.

The Thistle miniatures are each 2"x 3" and framed in old fence board frames. 
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I managed to make it to the drop in Figure Drawing group before letting out for the Summer. I only missed two sessions in which I am happy to have had help to get out of the house, so I could get to them. I was extremely happy with the final day before our break until the fall session begins again.
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I am trying to catch up on some more painting, Finding inspiration and a place to settle. There have been a few plein air days, unworthy of any inspired works. Lots of starts and dead end finishes. I hope the breakthrough comes. The struggle and frustration with something " just not quite right" continues to elude me. Who knows what's to come? 
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In making the most of 2018, a radical departure from my pastel practicing journey. A group show with our local drawing club took the challenge of Figure in Relationship as far as I wanted to go with my own internal interpretation of the subject. Two pieces shown here are done in acrylic and are 4'x5' canvas paintings along with the artist statement for each piece.

​The Empty Nest- Finding a new Relationship with Self
 
Who this female artist is.
A self that changes direction to a different path in life.
Social norms expect that growing up as a woman, getting married, having children---expectations envelop this artist’s life. Expectations and fulfillment!?
The female artist, without a family, creates to fulfill her desire for creation.
The Painting
The young widow makes a nest, a home, a safe place to fall.
Age has changed the potential for new life, the nest will be forever empty.
The nest was built from loss of relationships.
The Crow, the trickster---the promises not kept---waiting for a change that never happens.
Fly away, Trickster, Fly away, Crow.
Her promise of a family of her very own is stolen.
Passing on namesakes and strong family roots.
The relationship of family history is forever broken by the departure of all
And the birth of none.
 
“The Empty Nest” is a painting ripe with symbolism of a woman following an inner guidance of what seemed to be expected of her. It is about the end of the first chapter of her life and the relationships that have been severed forever.
This nest was built from the loss of relationships.
The nest will be filled with renewed expectations. A new relationship with self. An Intuitive self.
 
 

The Struggle is Real
 
There is a vulnerability on both parts of the relationship between the artist and the model.
There is a seeking, a searching in the relationship of artist to their art.
This is an integrity in the relationship of artist to authenticity.
There is frustration and a grappling in the relationship of artist to self-reflection.
All of these statements reveal that “The Struggle IS Real”.
The relationship with the figure is like dancing with shadows. It is hard to grasp, sometime. There is a relationship of trust between the artist and model, and a relationship of trust, within the artist, to believe in the vision.
The artist portrays the relationship between Classical figure drawing and the painting of Mickey Mouse. The Vitruvian Mickey Mouse (taken from an image by Dan Whiston, Disney artist), portrays the struggle the artist feels in exacting realism in her subject, only to come up with a cartoon character extruded from her model.   The agony and the defeat of a purposeful movement within the artists’ mind.
This is not a hobby. This is not easy. This is not a walk in the proverbial park. Like all things grand, the work it takes to get to where you are, is real. The struggle and frustration getting you there, is real. The results are what proves your purpose.
 
Some of my favorite quotes form Mickey Mouse.
“If you can dream it, you can do it”
“Smile, Breathe, and Believe in magic”
“All your dreams can come true if you have the courage to pursue them”
 
And my favorite:
“It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.”
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Some quotes I had written down. Thought I would share them as it meant something as I work in the landscape.
The hand is the tool of tools (Aristotle)

When we speak of the perfection of art, we must recollect what the materials are with which a painter contends with in nature. For the light of the sun he has but patent yellow and white lead---for the darkest shade, umber or soot (John Constable).
The sky is the light source of Nature and it governs everything (John Constable).

Painting is a science and should be pursued as an inquiry into the laws of nature. Why, then, may not a landscape be considered as a branch of natural philosophy, of which pictures are but experiments? (John Constable).
We see nothing until we understand it. (John Constable)
Every Master knows that the material teaches the artist (Ilya Ehrenberg).

Stones, pigment, graphite, charcoal, and pastel dust...may seem like dust, with little value. In the hands of an artist, however, they can become something transcendent, priceless, rendering the feelings of the maker and transmitting to us feelings and sympathies that we could not ourselves name. (Peggy Hadden).
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In the past few years I have been practicing my craft. Drawing and pastel painting.
Apart from making pretty pictures and learning an application process, it does feel empty for me. I keep coming back to the question of What kind of artist am I?
In search for meaning of my life or my role as an Artist in it, I thought I would come up with  answers by now. The struggle of freeing my mind from all the reasons why or why not? Self righteous indignation creeps upon me at the best of times and I forget to set free those limiting beliefs so I can bathe in the Freedom my life has given me. The words of Brian Thompson says it better than I ever could. He writes about the idea of Freedom with such grace,
I must post his blog below as a reminder of how we should all live our lives.
​Thank you Brian 
 
 Blog written by Brian Thompson 
​September 21, 2015The Cry for Freedom (from self-obsession)Brian ThompsonWORDS & PHOTO BY BRIAN THOMPSON.
We cry for the freedom of choice, for the freedom of speech, for the freedom of belief, for the freedom from being oppressed, freedom of equality, for the freedom from being annoyed, for the freedom for everything to be perfect... and for the freedom from this, that, or whatever other thing we can possibly conceive.
We've become so consumed by our self-righteous indignation that we fail to realize that the very liberation we seek is already within us, waiting to be realized. In the process, our freedom is held captive by nothing more than our limiting beliefs. This is our prison.
Your falsities befuddle you.
We’re so busy playing the blame game that we’re unable to see the truth of our very own being. We’ve become hypnotized into believing that someone other than our self is responsible for our peace and happiness. We blame our parents, our bosses, our jilted lovers, our ex-friends, the banks, the media, the government, the “system”, the “man” — we blame everyone and everything, except for our very own misguided perceptions of this whole, entire thing — reality itself.
It’s all a very convincing dream, but nonetheless, it all remains false and unreal.
The truth is, nothing really matters much, except for where we place our attention. Wherever our attention goes, so too does the rest of our mind. So if you focus on fear and dwell on feelings of lack, then fearful and lacking you become!We continually cry for freedom because the one thing we fear most is its opposite, imprisonment and isolation. But as long as we fail to see the true interconnected and indivisible nature of reality, then we will continue to be mentally handcuffed by the limits of our cultural conditioning.
However, freedom is our true nature. Our awareness can never be shackled, and underneath all of our conceptual thoughts, that’s who we truly are — Awareness. It’s within us, here and now, underneath the many layers of delusion and personal identity we’ve piled on top of it. Underneath all of our so-called knowledge, this freedom of our true self awaits — pure Awareness — untouched by opinion, judgement, fear, anxiety or any other belief. This is our true Self, infinite in nature — free.
The truth is, we only oppress ourselves.We are not victim to anyone or anything other than our own sense of self. We need to realize that our personal identity is not real, it is only a sense. It’s a misguided perception — you are not who you think you are.
We make everything in the world to be all about us, which is why we take everything so personally. Believe it or not, the world does not revolve around us. We get furious over every little thing imaginable, including bad traffic, a flight delay, our dog that just pooped on the rug, or even a long wait in a coffee shop. We believe that everything within our experience is either being done directly to us, or directly against us. How could they do this to us!
The government is trying to screw us, the cops are trying to control us, our boss is trying to take advantage of us, our friends are alienating us, our lover doesn’t trust us, our parents don’t love us, the sales person cheated us, and society just doesn't think we fit in. We’re too fat, too thin, or too poor; we’re winners, losers, failures, our clothes are out of style, oh... and our car is too old and needs to be replaced too.
Narcissistic thoughts — all of them. Every single self-obssessed, self-possessed thought enslaves you further into a false world of your own imagining, further distracting you from the truth that sits right before you, and yet you continue to play right along.
“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” —Shakespeare
We simply just need to get out of our heads.
We wrap ourselves in all of these false thoughts, and then we wonder why we feel so trapped and entangled all the time. We’ve tied ourselves into a conceptual knot that we just can’t seem to get out of.
The only way out from our predicament is to cut straight through all of our false thoughts and shake them off completely. We need to simply un-know what is untrue.Begin by distrusting any thoughts you have of personal identity. All of them. Anything that includes I, Me, My or Mine — get rid of them. Don’t believe any opinion you have of yourself. As they arise, drop them, one by one. They are creations of ego and habits of mind only, they are not real. As you begin withholding the attention these thoughts crave, their hold on you will begin to disappear. Your spirit will become lighter and you will feel less weighed down by the burden of your false beliefs.
After all, it’s hard to hang onto that which isn’t real. Illusions are slippery, so they require you to cling to them tightly, which is of course why you always feel so tense.
Live and die in the present — every single moment is a new beginning. All that is, is whatever is, right now. There is nothing more, nothing less. Take things as they come and deal with whatever needs to be dealt with as it arrives. Go with the flow and surf the ever-present Now.
Quit resisting and struggling so much and you’ll find that the troubled waters of your mind will soon settle, allowing your true freedom to finally become visible. When all of your kicking, thrashing and flailing subsides, you'll find that there’s no one holding you down — it was all a dream.
Your self perception is a mirror in which all of your projections are reflected, so when you no longer project any thoughts of ego or duality, then your true Self — pure Awareness — will appear as it truly is, happy, calm and serene.When we live effortlessly in pure Awareness, untouched by any obsessions of personal identity, the spirit of our true Self thrives — freedom.

I am trying to get into a groove of painting. Cleaned up a lot of studio papers etc. and found a small start on 4x4 pastel. I had no image to work from but only the Notan of a scene with dark and light shapes. I thought I would post a progressive process of the work in process just to let you have an idea of what colors lie beneath a finished painting. This is a quick work up of a painting. I thought I would reserve the right to quit before I overworked the piece.

The following excerpts are taken from Eric Roads thoughts on plein air painting. While reading his blog, his thoughts are my thoughts about sitting in nature and just observing. Even if one does not paint a pretty picture. The time just observing is worth its weight in gold.
Eric writes,
In fact, my friend the great Russian painter Nikolai Dubovik taught me that he, and many others in his country, use painting as an act of meditation and prayer. I find that when I paint, I’m having a continual dialogue with God. I find myself in a meditative state, lost in the rich greens, the crashing ocean waves, or the distant mountains. It simply doesn’t get much better.
One of my dear readers in England, Kate Edge, wrote me this week to say this:

"By far the hardest thing to be today is to be at peace, to be centered in the place of stillness where the Spirit of God resides as it clearly does in Creation. The miraculous sunset which you witnessed is without limit, it is just simply a total flow of joyfulness in the creation of colour which all of us register with our retinas too."


She goes on to write,

"Painting is a response to the pure beauty we are blessed to witness and which we honour by the desire to wish to capture, which is also the desire to remember that moment when we were present in mind with the eternal. When you let go of all techniques and must try to do this or that, there is another, deeper painter within which does not have an agenda. It flows its wisdom over the canvas, and if it is  given the space before the busy mind engages what it wants to do in the extraction process from nature, into a rectangle, someone else flows through the heart and mind, and it registers a different feel
altogether in the brush, and the result.
The painting done outdoors is about losing yourself, and touching base with Creation that makes the experience so important. 
​Eric goes on to write:
Remarkably, it’s rare to meet an outdoor painter who is angry, unhappy, or carrying an ego the size of Texas, and I think it’s because they are in nature, still, looking at one spot, and taking it in. It’s the stillness that makes this special and gives them peace.
because I believe painting outdoors opens hearts and calms us inwardly.
We’re all living very busy lives. We’re not communicating with our families when we’re all on our phones around the dinner table. We’re in a world of constant stimulation, feeling the need to not let a second pass us by without a new e-mail or social media post. Though it's a wonderful time to be alive and to gather information, it’s also a dangerous time of addiction when our phones and social media posts become more important than love, human interaction, and communication with our Creator, however you define that.
our families need leadership away from their addictions, so they can realize what else is out there — so they don’t grow up and only visit places on their phones or in virtual reality. We need experiences in nature, and we all need, somehow, to plant ourselves in one place to take it in. That’s why I find painting so appealing; it satisfies my busy mind’s need to be doing something, yet it offers me peace and meditation.
If there is time, give yourself this gift of one spot, breathing the air, smelling the scent of pines, and staring into the rich colors of nature. It will feed your soul.
I couldn't have said it better myself. Thank you Eric Roads.

The beginning of this blog story starts August 10. Please refer back to Aug 10 for context.

When you spend some time in Writing On Stone you come to realize the Spirituality of the place. Many of the hidden rock art pictographs will reveal itself during certain lighting conditions. Raking light is useful in some instances, and ambient, cloudy days are great for viewing other panels of rock art as well.
When outdoor painters paint their canvases, lighting conditions are the most challenging to work with. What reveals beauty one minute, hides it the next. The same would go for this project of camouflage.
The best way I could come up with getting a solution for "fooling the eye", in all conditions, was to find the right value identity. Then worry about color. This proves to work for Sandstone painting as well. Just getting that value right on a porous surface was a struggle at best, and very time consuming.
I liken the process of value adjustments to sitting in traffic. I paint an area and wait for the light to turn green. Meaning the pigment goes on wet, waiting for it to dry to give me the signal. if I have succeeded in the right value and color match or not.  More often than not, I was stuck in a long line of traffic. The light was red for a lot longer than it appeared green.
As an artist you know how important lighting conditions are. In the studio you can control the direction of light and type of light to work to your benefit. Even if you are outdoors you can position your easel to achieve the benefits of greater control over what you are about to paint. This project has none of those conditions to manipulate. Red Light Green Light. 
Panels worked on (or not worked on) were entirely based on the movement of the sun. If at all possible, the value matching had to be done on panels that were in shade. This way you could better evaluate a local value/color. If you could match the value in the shade, it will match in the sun as well. I found it easier on the eyes to work on shaded panels whenever possible. I value my eyesight and prolonged staring at a strongly lit panel would do considerable harm to those valuable retinal receptors. As outdoor painters will contest. Starting on a white canvas/paper for this initial start is hard on the eyes. Working in direct sun is very detrimental to visual acuity.
Stepping up to the challenge of this project was met with many disappointments. Many of which come from working with Mother Nature and getting your ego pummeled. The challenge to think you can come up with a better solution. The challenge to communicate with the rock.
  In the end, after so many trials and a lot of prayer (remember "a spiritual place") there was some success (at least temporarily). There was much elation as well. When a challenge is accepted, and actually succeeds, there is a great sense of elation.  
I learn a lot from Mother Nature. Working alone with her along the trails and sandstone cliff walls. b There are whispers heard when you really listen. Working in early mornings to beat the excessive heat of the day, brought a new kind of sense of calm to the soul. Mother Nature was awakening. I could hear the deer munching on the grasses. Footsteps through the grass echos through the valley. Life as it meets the rest of the day. As the earth warms, the insects come alive. Buzzing at the foot of the cliff walls. When you are alone in a place you begin to hear life all around you. The buzz of the wings echo against the sandstone. So much so, you begin to realize they are communicating. It almost sounds like a group of people talking and I begin to listen closely to make out the words.Or I look over my shoulder to see if there are people drifting down the river. But no, it was just Nature doing its thing. When you have the time to stop, look, and listen you will find a joy in this "Spiritual" place. The joy that Nature expresses, if you only take the time to listen and as artists...to see. 

I came into this project, with a designated title of "Artist".  The title may be of little significance. How hard can it be? Using your talents to match color to camouflage a surface area. But it was much more involved that just matching a man made color to a man made surface, as modern day image makers do today. Or perhaps even easier yet, to have a computer do it for you. Complications evolve when you include Mother Nature in the plans.

Conservation-restoration of cultural heritage, protection and restoration of cultural heritage, including works of art and architecture, as well as archaeological and historical artifacts.

In conservation practice, their are efforts taken to "know your materials",
 What color? What pigment? What surface? What binder? What texture?
What can you do with the materials to manipulate a surface to obey your commands. In other words to be in control of your materials. There had to be some kind of systematic way to organize and test the pigments found in the rock.  
I started pounding found colored rock. Seeing what pigment I can "squeeze" out of each type of colored sandstone and yellow ochers. Getting a feel for the rock before starting pigment trials. I felt the most confident in experimenting with local material. Trying to come up with a solution using local materials, rather than adding something foreign to the sandstone. I spent many hours grinding rocks into powders and mixing and matching ratios of different rocks to come up with a value and color solution. Sun and weather conditions may prove to disprove my trials to pigment matching, yet in the short term, camouflage was successful using all natural material from the area.
At this point I would need some help from conservationist/scientists  to come up with a conservation material that will hold up to the weather conditions. Since pigments and paintings in museum settings are all under such controlled conditions, how can one expect longevity of pigments in an open air setting?  Much more research would have to be done to come up with a solution for longevity.
 As an artist on a conservation project, I needed to be comfortable in knowing all material added, could be reversed. To do no further harm to the rock face. The pigments used are natural pigments.   From pigments to binders, all natural rocks and soil were from the area.
Every effort was made to keep the material used natural and local. Clay makes a good binder.  Bentonite clay is natural in the area. The soil is also clay in nature. Both were considered. Clay earth was found in the banks of the Milk River, and Bentonite Clay was purchased for use on this project.  In the park, the Bentonite Clay mounds are considered "Spirit Mounds". The Bentonite clay was not retrieved from these mounds but purchased in store for use as a binder. 

Red Light Green Light
You might think this is about sitting in traffic. But for my next installment I will talk of trials of lighting conditions when working in the great outdoors. Outdoor painters will know exactly what I'm talking about when it comes to the color of light.
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