This man rollerblades while dancing to music up and down the sidewalk at Pacific Beach.
Nom nom nom--a panda at the San Diego Zoo
Wenches for sale in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disney Land
A pillow at the Disney Land Hotel. Really.
San Diego Zoo
My uncle's lamp collection in the spare bedroom
I returned yesterday from a weeklong visit to San Diego, CA to see my aunt and uncle. We also went to Disney Land and California Adventure, and January must be the time to go. There weren't many crowds, and most of the lines were only five minutes long. My dad and I rode 18 rides, and my mom and my aunt rode 17. (They wouldn't ride California Screamin', the roller coaster that goes upside down.) That's a new personal best for us :) The weather was--for the most part--sunny and perfect, and now I am back to chilly weather and piles of snow. Bookish posts coming soon.
I love this print by Rachel Roellke, which I spotted at funnel cloud, her etsy shop. I've been trying to do as the print says, leaving my curls alone in the morning instead of always reaching for my straightener.
But I shouldn't be talking about hair when I'm supposed to be drafting a paper on who my artistic parents are (think influences from art history or literature, not actual parents) for Senior Thesis for my art major.
Happy Saturday, what's left of it! Also, happy Second Day of Fall! I baked Nutella-swirled sugar cookies and drank pumpkin-spice lattes with a friend yesterday to celebrate the start of my favorite season. What are you most looking forward to this fall?
I'm trying to start and finish a couple paintings before the school year begins, but I feel like I can't move on until I fix this one that I did for a class in June:
It was my last painting for the class, and I finished it just an hour before final critique. Consequently, I didn't get a lot of time to look at it and let it talk to me. I knew it didn't want the top of the figure the way it was, but I didn't have time to figure out what it wanted instead. This painting stumped me all through July and into August, until I remembered a painting I'd seen and photographed at the Art Institute of Chicago in July:
Portrait of Constance Pipelet by Jean-Baptiste-Francois Desoria, 1797, oil on canvas.
I like the figure's pose and attitude, so I decided to appropriate bits of it. I don't know if my figure will hold a book, and I know she won't have the same hair, clothing, etc. (The high heels stay!) But seeing this painting again got me out of my rut. Artists borrow from art history all the time.
In any case, here's a picture (it's a little awkward-looking because I took it with the camera on my laptop, which was not easy) of my progress so far. I accidentally made this great pink color that I added in a few places, started some apples on the right, and sketched some of the figure in with charcoal. (The lines you see now will probably all be rubbed off; they're just placeholders.)
So now I'll keep looking at it, adding lines and pushing and pulling them back. It's like editing a paper. Almost.
I took a little tea cup I found in my mother's dish collection to the studio yesterday because I was thinking I might want a tea cup shape around for inspiration. I didn't do much with it, but it did amuse me. The cup was in the dish cabinet with the back facing front, and I think I know why. It's got one weird picture on the front:
Cat creature blowing out birthday candles?
For what it's worth, the bottom of the cup says "Made in Japan."
And I didn't really use it in the painting. Here's a detail; I might change parts of the whole yet.
And while I'm at it, here's another yet-to-be-titled piece:
I had so much fun in summer painting class in the nicely-lit upstairs studio, but I think I can move back into my basement cave sometime in July. I'm looking forward to it.
Also, Happy (Early) 4th of July! I will be out of town, and there will be no Musical Monday because I will be oohing and ahing at fireworks.
For the summer, anyway. Two of my paintings are in the City Employee Art Show. I ventured to the main library of the system I work for (I work at a branch location) to spy on them last weekend. They are all cozy behind the audio books in a little reading nook:
Snug (with apples) is on the right, and Mutability is on the left. You can see more pics of Mutabilityhere.
The colors are--as always--so much yummier in real life, but these photos aren't bad as photos go. Here's a bit of a close-up on Snug:
Here's my newest painting for my Painting IV class this summer. It's currently untitled, because I'm not yet sure what I mean by it:
I had to drag it outside to get the colors to photograph at least sort-of accurately. I'm so glad my painting prof is accepting 3x3s from me instead of 4x4s like Mutability. (She's always pushing us to paint BIG, because paintings sometimes look smaller once they're on a wall.) I'm 5 feet 3 inches, and carrying a painting that is nearly the same size as me is difficult. I paint on hardboard framed on the side with pine, which is a little heavier than canvas. Also, I can actually get a 3x3 in my car.
I'm hoping to finish a second painting tonight. How are your summer projects going?
I first heard of Thao and Mirah on NPR.org's First Listen, where I listened to their collaborative album that was released this spring. (You can't listen to it there anymore, though . . .) I recognized Thao from her song "Violet," which was stuck in my head for about a month after I featured it on a Musical Monday. (This song also inspired part of a workshop on incorporating text in artwork in my drawing class. I may turn parts of the workshop into a painting.)
A workshop in charcoal and white acrylic paint on a large piece of crappy paper. The bits of text are from Thao's "Violet" and the poem, "Winter: My Secret" by Christina Rossetti.
Anyway. "How Dare You" is on Thao and Mirah's self-titled album, which I have enjoyed listening to both in the studio and at my laptop.
One of the assignments for my Intro to Sculpture class was to go outside and make a sculpture. We had Good Friday off last week, so my friend/classmate, Carrie, and I went to a park and went scouting along the bike trails until we found the perfect spot.
A tiny ravine + curving vines? Check yes!
We envisioned a little arched pathway into . . . well, where it might lead is for the viewer to explore or imagine. We began by untwisting loose vines from tree branches and adding them to our portion of bushes to make the faint arch that was already there stronger.
There's not much to see yet, but the vines we moved are there...
Next came adding dead long grass, which was abundant along the trails.
Grass.
More grass.
Red seeds for a little color on gray day.
Really. This was the view directly behind us. It was supposed to rain all afternoon, but we were lucky; no rain fell while we worked.
The sun even came out when we were about done.
But of course the clouds came back. Here's the finished product; you can kind see a glimpse of the river through the arch.
We called it quits at this point because we liked how our project looked, and the wind was also picking up and turning our arch into a furry wild thing. Curling pieces of grass began to fall gently to the ground, and I wish I'd been able to get a picture, because the piece only looked more beautiful as it began to fall apart. (And part of the project was letting our creation go back to nature.)
A few joggers and people out walking their dogs passed us as we worked, but only one person stopped to ask what we were doing. I was curious what joggers saw when they went past the arch, so I took a tiny run and then filmed it with my camera. I forgot that I can't rotate a movie halfway through, though, so you'll have to turn your head about halfway through:
I enjoy how the arch directs one's gaze straight through to the river. And that's another project done!
Carrie and Me: happy faces!
Much mud was stuck to the bottom of our boots. I recommend going outside and getting some stuck to yours, too. I felt like a kid playing outside again.
...was last week. The show was a group exhibition of works from collaboration projects between visual artists and writers in the fall.
Me and my painting, Mutability. (The color is slightly off in this photo, but that's life...and cameras.)
If you think the patch of blue on the lower right looks like water, you're not wrong. The writer I was paired with decided to write about self-image, and water seemed to correspond with his concept. One can see one's reflection in water--contemplate oneself--but water, and the images reflected on it, move constantly. And the way we think about ourselves shifts constantly, too. This painting turned out more nonobjective than I thought it would, but it works for the project. And I like it.
I know you want to see it from another angle.
I also really like being in a show with a reception and nibbly-dibblies and everything. (There was really good banana bread with chocolate chips.) As a double major, I had writing in the show, too. It was in a booklet hanging at a reading station with all the other essays, including the one by the writer I collaborated with--but most people, including me, were more absorbed by the visual art. Probably because you can't eat reception goodies and hold a booklet open at the same time.
2. Uploading a couple of pictures from my phone is quicker than choosing a song, and I am rather busy this week. One of the things that is keeping me busy is the copy of an Old Master painting due in Drawing this week. I chose Diego Velazaquez's The Spinners, and while I love the composition, I'm beginning to think it was too ambitious a choice. Here's the lower left corner of my copy on last Wednesday:
I love this part-finished/part sketched out stage of drawing.
