Its Been Too Long

Clearly I am not a professional blogger.  It has been over a year since my last post.  Much has changed in that year that has kept me away from my own art-making and blogging, but many good changes.

In March 2012, I took on a full time position as Exhibits & Marketing Manager for Tubac Center of the Arts.  Moving from part time to full time has been a huge commitment of my time but I am learning so much and am creating wonderful exhibits and working with so many great artists.

In December 2012, I purchased a home in Rio Rico, AZ and have since spent time moving and working on projects at the new house.  I gave up a large 800 sqft studio space to make this move and now, temporarily, have just a small space off of my kitchen to paint in.

My new commitment to myself and anyone reading this, is to create the time and space in my life to blog and paint again.

A Place to Paint

Who's Your Mentor?

As artists we are often isolated, working alone in our studios, creating the next great masterpiece, at least, that's what we think. Its important to get feedback and critique in order to know you are not just living in your head and also to be able to grow as an artist. In the past I had joined groups and taken classes and workshops to keep me connected and learning. But there was always still something more that I needed that I wasn't getting that I knew would help me expand and move into the next level with my work.

After taking two wonderful abstract painting classes at The Drawing Studio in Tucson which really helped me get out of a rut, moving from 6+ years of almost exclusively painting with encaustic, to painting large abstract paintings on cavas with acrylic, I discovered an artist's website whose work I very much admired. I was very excited to read on her website that she offered mentoring. Ding! This is just what I needed. I happened to be heading back to WA, where she lived to visit my sons and we arranged to meet. For the next 3 months we had weekly skype meetings where she encouraged and critiqued my work. I felt motivated to meet her weekly challenges and produced more work over the last few months with what I feel to be HUGE breakthroughs with my work than in the many years past.

Jeane Myers is a contemporary abstract mixed media artist and a fabulous mentor/art coach. If you need a kick in the pants and some encouraging words along the way, Jeane can take you there.

Artistic Integrity

For the last week I have been working on an ecaustic painting that includes a photograph of my son and daughter in law for their upcoming wedding gift. For the last 3 days I added, then scraped, walked away, went back, changed palette, added some more, added some more, and kept finding it was never right and probably would never be right by the time I had to pack it into my suitcase and head for Seattle. In fact, I don't even like the painting because it is so not me - I don't do hearts or cutesy, but that's what it ended up being.

detail of encaustic painting

If I don't like the painting, am I compromising my artistic integrity by then accepting it as is and giving as a gift?

I decided that they would like it, or at least appreciate the thought/effort as opposed to a purchase from the Target gift list, which I just couldn't bring myself to do seeing that I was "the artist" .

I also decided that I liked parts of the painting, the way the copper colored oil pastel melted over the wax, the way the titanium white oil paint breaks with direct heat from the heat gun, and so I learned something in the process - what I liked and what I didn't like, what works and what doesn't - for me at least. And I learned that I need to make my art based on what I like, letting a true creative process come from me and not compromise myself for what others may want or what I think they may want. Be true to oneself.