Paints and brushes

ah, yes. I do remember those early posts where you painted boards that provided backgrounds for your eventual digital fantasy island image. I took your idea into the images I've been making in Procreate. I've tried to take your other way of creating art images, moving your photographs into digital paintings. Some, like the swirling green turmoil going round your manikin figures I can not see the original inspirations at all. I wonder how you got to the end result and can only guess that both may represent calm waters and the final image describes the underlying stresses going on for you. I am amazed at how you transformed the hospital cafeteria flower into a lovely painting by abstracting the negative space around the flower. Finding a bright spot in the bleak atmosphere of the hospital? The other one makes me wonder if it reflects how you might feel split across several roles.

Then there is your art journal. Black paper?!?! I haven't tried that and you make it look like the perfect ground for all your bright colors. I like your description of how you approach painting in this journal. While abstract paintings can very much be about releasing the inner stuff, you describe a freedom from all that in just playing around with the colors, markers, and "meaningless" shapes on the page. I like when that happens and I am experiencing some restriction when I layer photo images in my digital paintings that are recognizable objects. I get stuck on what they are...until I completely obliterate their original form.

I like that you took the parking garage floor image and turned into a power background for your self-portrait. Tell me more about that class. What have you learned from it about creating self portraits and about you? Any new and startling insights? I was so glad to see a full-on selfie of you; but, I also like how you placed yourself in a small mirror, behind your camera, in the store photo. You've seen some of my selfie images used in various venues where I also hide behind my camera or a painted mask. I do like those the best...for projecting 'me'. I also like the distorted self portrait paintings I've shown you when we shared our art work via email.

No images to post today. Maybe this weekend. Oh, one more thing. Thanks for the photos of your renovation and studio-in-the-making. Mine is only about 10' by 10' - not all that big. You can see how much I get into that small space. With the right surfaces, wheels on things, and fold-up stuff, you can get a lot out of a small space. It also helps in my studio that we turned a closet into a set of cabinets where I store a lot you can't see in the photos. My other studio didn't have cabinets or storage. The walls are also covered by material that can take constant pinning. The covering is a thick, dense, composite of wood pulp we call Homosote in the US. It emits a terrible off gas smell when the air is humid. We can't get rid of it. But, I like what it gives me for opportunities to hang my work to study and scheme with before finishing it up. By the way, how can you not have an idea about what your space will look like? Didn't you design it before the builders came in? It is your space, right?

Eileen