16 posts tagged “liza myers”
The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes
but in having new eyes.
- Marcel Proust
I just received a great Youtube connection: inspiration and innocence, set to music, a poem about how important the
arts are to all of us. A sweet, original, validating musical video about art: Tanya Davis' song Art by Andrea Dorfman.
To watch it click here: Enjoy!
A great way to start the day.
It was sent to me by Brian Treece in Portland, Oregon via his Twitter account @PDXCulture.
Good painting is the kind that looks like sculpture.- Michelangelo
Moonlight is sculpture. -Nathanial Hawthorne.
What a thrilling series of quotations!I've been working on a series of small, clay wall sculptures that I'm sure Hawthorne would disapprove of! It was interesting to read of his prolific creativity beginning in early adolescence. His life was one of privilege and opportunity, but he used it well, despite his judgmental, puritanical tones. Interesting that he added the W to Hawthorne to change his name so as to not be associated with a grandfather who was a judge at the Salem Witch trials, but then later expressed such puritanical condemnation in the Scarlet Letter. He later wrote: "I have not lived, but only dreamed about living."
Meanwhile, back in the studio, I've mostly not been in the studio. The past two weeks have been spent teaching, organizing to teach this semester, next semester, summer and fall 2010. I'm pretty booked! But now that is mostly organized and I can get back to work with color, clay and canvas.
I particularly like Hawthorne's quote. It speaks to my most recent clay wall pieces, currently hanging in the show.
The moon is ever present.
”When your work speaks for itself, don't interrupt.”
Henry J. Kaiser
I'm hearing that voice loud and clear. I thought it was finished, but it kept calling to me, telling me that it needed more movement and interest in the lower left. Color differences in the two images are only due to lighting. The colors are pretty much as in the final.
Last week mornings were spent painting with several fine art students. We drew with charcoal and pencil and then painted in acrylic.
Our soggy weather finally gave us a break letting us go out into the Vermont landscape to paint. Acrylic, loaded with a retarding agent, worked perfectly for plein air painting. On our last day we had a model in class for drawing and a small figure study in acrylic.
That was a ton of fun!
Back to the easel!
Ravens awake me here. They nest in the spruce above the house. All day long the young one calls to his parents reminding them he's there and hungry.
Reminding me to be attentive to my work.
Apparently the first bird that Noah released from the ark was a raven, who flew back and forth, drying up the waters with the smooth flapping of strong, dark wings, drying the land so the olive branches emerged for the dove to find.
Haida people believe that Raven discovered the first people hiding in a clam shell, and fed them berries and salmon. I like both myths.
I'm just happy to hear and see them on my last few days in Santa Fe. They're comfortable with me and I with them. For great info on ravens read Berndt Heinrich's Mind of the Raven. They are intelligent, fascinating creatures with a complex social structure.
Hoping to get the two sculptures fired today, though I'm pushing the odds with the second one. "Duet: Raven" is ready for the kiln. "Trio"
would be fine if I were home and firing it myself. Strange to be at the whim of someone else's schedule, although my time at Santa Fe Clay has been productive, pleasant and informative.
Paintings will travel back to Vermont and continue to grow and change.
This has been a great residency time of focus and replenishment.
Have been reading Ghost Ranch by Lesley Poling-Kempes. Fascinating story of the adventurous women (and men, but mostly bold women) who set out to discover the wild west and fell in love with this raw, vivid part of the world.
Reminding me to be attentive to my work.
Apparently the first bird that Noah released from the ark was a raven, who flew back and forth, drying up the waters with the smooth flapping of strong, dark wings, drying the land so the olive branches emerged for the dove to find.
Haida people believe that Raven discovered the first people hiding in a clam shell, and fed them berries and salmon. I like both myths.
I'm just happy to hear and see them on my last few days in Santa Fe. They're comfortable with me and I with them. For great info on ravens read Berndt Heinrich's Mind of the Raven. They are intelligent, fascinating creatures with a complex social structure.
Hoping to get the two sculptures fired today, though I'm pushing the odds with the second one. "Duet: Raven" is ready for the kiln. "Trio"
Paintings will travel back to Vermont and continue to grow and change.
This has been a great residency time of focus and replenishment.
Have been reading Ghost Ranch by Lesley Poling-Kempes. Fascinating story of the adventurous women (and men, but mostly bold women) who set out to discover the wild west and fell in love with this raw, vivid part of the world.
The days you work are the best days.
Georgia O'Keeffe
And working is what I have been doing.
Painting in acrylic and watercolor, ink drawings, charcoal, and clay sculpture. Also a little plein air and cloudscape. How can you not respond to this astonishing landscape, so overwhelming and immense, continually changing.
There is a constant sense of wonder.
I have been painting indoors and out, working on 3 large canvases at once, after stretching 5 canvases the same size. The idea I had planned on has, of course, completely changed since my arrival. But that's fine.
I hope to have finished 2 small clay sculptures. One is done, but has yet to pass trial by fire. The other is nearly done. My days alternate between my home studio (painting) and Santa Fe Clay, where I've rented studio space. That has worked out quite well, although there's never enough time to get it all done.
I had one night of camping on my land near Taos. My car, an Element named Georgia (for guess-who, who used to paint in her car) was very happy to be there in the quiet, serene sagebrush across the Rio Grande Gorge from Taos.
Never enough time!
Back to work now.
I hope to have finished 2 small clay sculptures. One is done, but has yet to pass trial by fire. The other is nearly done. My days alternate between my home studio (painting) and Santa Fe Clay, where I've rented studio space. That has worked out quite well, although there's never enough time to get it all done.
I had one night of camping on my land near Taos. My car, an Element named Georgia (for guess-who, who used to paint in her car) was very happy to be there in the quiet, serene sagebrush across the Rio Grande Gorge from Taos.
Never enough time!
Back to work now.
So very much has been consuming my energies for the last few weeks I have been sadly neglectful of this blog. A wonderful Kidz Aartz group spent a week with me making clay wind chimes & pins and acrylic paintings.
I've been working on the new website, which is COMING ALONG FABULOUSLY.
Writing a few proposals;
dealing with finishing up a round of commissions etc. etc.etc.
Finally have been able to allow myself a respite of color and canvas.
The Aegean Moon image is a long overdue project, that I'm very happy with. The creative process has allowed me to delve into memories of a fabulous experience in Greece a few years ago.
The painting is still unfinished, but most compositional aspects have been dealt with. The moon is now about a third of it's size in this painting, and I'm working on light and shadow...the drama of it all. the beach pebbles are much more colorful and ocean foam more believable. Celestial stage lighting.
Clay is about texture.
Have been watching my clay texture scraps while working on the sculpture commissions. They are all slightly different in expression and gesture. The feet are fun to do too. There is always a new quality to enjoy. Trying to look at things differently and see a new solution or harmony is always the challenge. Looking at it out of the corner of my eye gives a new perspective.
I started thinking about combining the scraps with quality beads and silver, after painting them in interestingly layered acrylic color. I'm having some fun and interesting results.
But now it's time to get back to sculpture.
Several commissions that need finishing, both 2 and 3 dimensional.
Gotta get to work.
Decided that I should add the acrylic commission that I'm working on too. It's getting closer. I've posted progress previously.It is a triptych.
I have been working SO INTENSELY on this project... An elaborate grant proposal that I almost got. I was one of three finalists in the state, but not the final one. Darn!
What I pitched was an installation of tile, each one created from casts of the hands of townspeople.
The resulting tiles would then have been incorporated into a monument. The tiles that have words on them have phrases direct from the minds of the townspeople. Memories and images that evoke the values of the town. Perhaps I'll mount these on the side of our gallery. That would be kind of cool.
The monument I designed had a sort of Stonehenge look to it. It would have created a gathering place for sharing and contemplation.
What I pitched was an installation of tile, each one created from casts of the hands of townspeople.
The resulting tiles would then have been incorporated into a monument. The tiles that have words on them have phrases direct from the minds of the townspeople. Memories and images that evoke the values of the town. Perhaps I'll mount these on the side of our gallery. That would be kind of cool.
The monument I designed had a sort of Stonehenge look to it. It would have created a gathering place for sharing and contemplation.
It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.
-Charles Darwin.
The planet spins, wheels turn on the highway and the calendar page flutters, hovering on the brink a new year.
Change is constant, change is imminent. The challenge is to choose change. Determine the most useful and constructive change, then enact that choice.
Since the opening at Gallery•in•the•Field on December 6, I have been immersed in the season. Friends & family; wrapping up classes at CSC and CCV; mailing boxes hither and yon across the country, etc. etc.
Now a wintry sun is about to set on my first quiet day at home in ages. In the past week and a half, our houseful of family has been inundated with swift and drifting snow, deluged with unseasonal, warm rain, beset with strong winds... The creek is brimming, perhaps about to flood, but with tonight's bone chilling cold that becomes less likely, and all visitors are home safely.
The forecast is snow and cold through New Years Eve, then sun on the first day of 2009.
My muse is shivering. She is in the process of re-grouping, re-vitalizing projects left bobbing in the wake of the show, preparing for the next semester, which will have a much better schedule than last. Very promising.
Time now for a cup of tea, and cozy retreat with the cats and my new book: Enclosure, by Goldsworthy. Yay!
“I long, as does every human being,
to be at home wherever I find myself.”
to be at home wherever I find myself.”
Maya Angelou
Perhaps that's why entering the warm and intimate space of the BigTown Gallery in Rochester, Vermont felt so much like coming home. There was art everywhere that touched some sort of primordial connection within me. Stimulating, thought provoking imagery.
Gallery Director Annie MacKay is currently presenting an exhibition of work by world renowned photographer/collage artist Rosamond Purcell. The drive over the mountain from Brandon was well worth it. Purcell is an articulate, deeply philosophical artist. She spoke of her artistic and scientific fascination with transition from the natural, to man-made and, through the process of decay, back to natural. She also addressed an artist's need to constantly self-challenge and grow.
Her compositions are richly textured, complex and fascinating. Museums and zoology labs around the globe have invited her to photograph their collections. Some of the photo-collages in this show were composed with diverse artifacts from World War I: medals, photographs, newspapers and books, treasures unearthed in a Maine landfill, which she writes about in Owls Head, On the Nature of Lost Things.
Texture, patina, detail, color and challenging questions.
Purcell composes and photographs these elements, or shoots them as-is. Technical photographic expertise serves as her palette, with the occasional assistance of termites (no, I'm not kidding) and time.
Another component of the show was a series of photographs from museums and laboratories throughout the world: museum specimens of all sorts.
I was particularly amazed by a photograph of a calcified passerine nest. Through a millenia-long, slow-drip of calcium-rich water it has turned to stone.
The nest itself is as-found in the depths of a French cave. In the background, pale, fragile tissue creates a ghostly, other-worldly negative space, perfectly complementing the form of the nest. Having spent time climbing in caves immersed in paleolithic art in France, this link with truly ancient past resonates. Beyond any conceivable framework of time as we simple humans understand it, tiny hearts once pulsed within these eggshells. The ephemeral fragility of tissue could not be more opposite.
I had just purchased Purcell's most recent book Egg and Nest, having found it on Carel Brest Van Kempen's terrific blog, Rigor Vitae. (go there to watch time lapse photography of his amazingly detailed wildlife paintings and feast on his writings!)
I arrived at the opening with Purcell's latest publication firmly in hand in hopes of having her sign the book, which I'm glad to say, she did!
Copies of the book, and other writings by Rosamond Purcell are available at the gallery. Be sure to check out the website of Bigtown Gallery to read about Anni MacKay's wearable art, and their yummy selection of yarns.
Gallery Director Annie MacKay is currently presenting an exhibition of work by world renowned photographer/collage artist Rosamond Purcell. The drive over the mountain from Brandon was well worth it. Purcell is an articulate, deeply philosophical artist. She spoke of her artistic and scientific fascination with transition from the natural, to man-made and, through the process of decay, back to natural. She also addressed an artist's need to constantly self-challenge and grow.
Her compositions are richly textured, complex and fascinating. Museums and zoology labs around the globe have invited her to photograph their collections. Some of the photo-collages in this show were composed with diverse artifacts from World War I: medals, photographs, newspapers and books, treasures unearthed in a Maine landfill, which she writes about in Owls Head, On the Nature of Lost Things.
Texture, patina, detail, color and challenging questions.
Purcell composes and photographs these elements, or shoots them as-is. Technical photographic expertise serves as her palette, with the occasional assistance of termites (no, I'm not kidding) and time.
Another component of the show was a series of photographs from museums and laboratories throughout the world: museum specimens of all sorts.
I was particularly amazed by a photograph of a calcified passerine nest. Through a millenia-long, slow-drip of calcium-rich water it has turned to stone.
I had just purchased Purcell's most recent book Egg and Nest, having found it on Carel Brest Van Kempen's terrific blog, Rigor Vitae. (go there to watch time lapse photography of his amazingly detailed wildlife paintings and feast on his writings!)
I arrived at the opening with Purcell's latest publication firmly in hand in hopes of having her sign the book, which I'm glad to say, she did!
Copies of the book, and other writings by Rosamond Purcell are available at the gallery. Be sure to check out the website of Bigtown Gallery to read about Anni MacKay's wearable art, and their yummy selection of yarns.
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