Illustration Friday "Fail"

Sometimes things just don't work out. Like this illustration, for example. It's a digital piece I did to accompany an article on Adult ADHD. The story describes a typical workday of a mom with ADHD where she moves through a number of tasks – reading email, answering a phone call, getting a file for a coworker and making coffee – without actually completing any of them. There was also a cute reference to multiple bottles of glue misplaced around the house so I threw that in there.

Conceptually, I think that covers one aspect of this week's Illustration Friday theme "fail" pretty well: Failure to follow through. And here's another one: For whatever reason, the illustration was not acceptable for the publication. It failed to meet expectations. There was a time when I would have been upset about it but I've managed to detach myself pretty well. Perhaps that's why I failed to get it right in the first place. Who knows. But now that I've written about it I can move on with my life in peace.

The Art of Bossy

Photography is one of the few art forms that has not tempted me into obsession. I love looking at other people's photos but when it comes to taking my own I have a difficult time summarizing a moment in time into a two dimensional snippet. There are just so many things, seen and unseen, pulling at my attention.

What does this have to do with Bossy, you ask? Firstly, if you don't know, Bossy is a very funny blogger who is in the midst of blogging her way around the continental United States AND she visited me at my home just last night. Secondly, I took lots of pictures of Bossy and a group of new friends during a wonderful evening and they came out like this


and this


and even this


I'm very sorry about that. This is, after all an art blog. So where is the real art for this post? I mean, the good stuff?

I suppose it will have to be in the telling. The experience is the art. And the seeing is within each one of us. We are all part of it. This excellent road trip that Bossy created has brought together so many personalities and viewpoints and the effect radiates inward and outward in so many directions.

The picture that forms is in motion. It is of a woman who carries a spark to every person who wants to take it. It is a beautiful picture of confidence, elegance and poise. It is a picture that speaks of letting go of whatever is holding us back. The I'll nevers and the I can'ts are painted over with the I wills and the we ares. Okay, we ares is weird. But you get the idea. We are connecting in so many ways in this wild web and I am grateful to have Bossy holding the thread as she passes by. She is a pioneer that cuts the path so we can all see each other more clearly for who we really are. Wondrous creatures.

So go forth and read iambossy.com. And read her comments and her commenter's comments and they will each show you another unique piece of the picture.

Thank you to everyone who shared this excellent experience with me during Bossy's stop in Tallahassee. Ruth, Deb, Blog Starr, Inga and Julie. You are all fabulous. And thank you Bossy for being you.

Happy Hunting

Instead of hunting for eggs we hunt for liquor.
A friend of mine brought this Easter activity over from the west coast a few years back. It involves lots and lots of miniature bottles of liquor, acrylic paint and a bunch of fun loving adults.

The rules:
1. The more variety of liquor/liqueur the better.
2. Labels must be completely concealed.
3. If you find a bottle, you MUST drink the contents on the spot before you can look for another bottle.

But really, only the hard core follow rule #3. I helped paint the bottles so I had a very good idea which ones contained the gin, which I did NOT want, and which ones contained the bailey's, which I totally wanted but did not happen to find. I never really was sure what was in the two bottles I did find. One was kind of a vanilla flavor and the other was something fruity. They both went down rather nicely with coke. Thank you Easter bunny.

Find your inner Pollock

Have fun, go wild and be the free-wheeling drunken artist you've always wanted to be without the booze or the mess. Or at least without the mess. You can paint just like Jackson Pollock right on your computer. Experience the madness. You'll never be the same. Click here.

Sum Song

More Cassini Lines music on myspace. We've posted a moody winter song called Sum that I wrote when my daughter was 9 and she desperately wanted to see snow for the first time. Me, well, I'm quite smitten with hot summer sunshine and snow does not impress me. Much. On a particularly hot, melty day, she announced to me that she was beginning to prefer winter over summer. It struck me that she was truly beginning to develop her own sense of self separate from me. I knew it had to happen sometime but what I wondered was how far she would go before she found herself. And how long it would take me to catch up.

Underwater Band

So, this group of people here is the band I'm in, Cassini Lines. That is my porch with the mini Japanese lanterns that I love and that is me, second from the left, making an awful face. Well... we've been taking our time making some music and having a pretty good go at it. But so far, only a handful of people have actually heard what we sound like. But now I am pleased to announce we have un-officially released our first official demo recording. The song is called Underwater and you can listen to it on our myspace page if you can handle the trip. I know it's a long way away and gas ain't cheap but getting there is half the fun and the other half is getting to be one of the first people ever to hear our song. I would post it here but myspace is the best way I know to keep it secure. Don't be hatin'.

Helping Hands

This is an illustration and layout I did for the Nov/Dec issue of Emerald Coast Magazine for an article on volunteerism. The medium is soft pastels with some digital tweaking. I drew the original on 8.5x11 paper and then scanned it at 11x17 so that it could fit over a two page spread.

The original colors were too bright and I wanted a softer, more soothing, more tranquil feel to the piece. So I did some color adjustments in photoshop using hue/saturation and layer blending modes and maybe some other stuff and... I don't really remember what all I did. Maybe next time I'll do screen shots and take notes. But this time I was in a big hurry to get the job done - from concept to print ready - in 8 hours. Before this version there was the original scan that I touched up a bit. It can be difficult to be precise with pastels especially when working on a small scale so after I scanned in the original, I cleaned up some fuzzy lines on the woman and the girl and around some of the hands before I adjusted the color. But I didn't save a copy of the untidy version for comparison. It wasn't *that* messy though. I promise.

Illustration Friday "Open"

Life is a balancing act between earth and sky, day and night, light and dark. With one eye open and one eye closed we grow our minds and sooth our souls. Acrylic paint on canvas.

Fun with pastels

This is a pastel drawing that I did for the Tallahassee Business Journal cover. I've been so involved with music that I had forgotten how much fun illustrating can be. Six hours go by quick when I'm focused on something I enjoy.

Cassini Lines at the May Day Picnic

Here we are at our debut performance. Cassini Lines rocked the park. It was a small neighborhood affair so we didn't make a big announcement about it but we do want to have a show where we can invite everyone – hopefully soon. If you want an invite, let me know.

The audience was mostly preoccupied with picnic activities – grilling, eating, maypoll dancing, more eating, sliding, swinging, wreath making, talking – but I noticed a lot of toe tapping going on. In one of the photos Mike and I are reacting to delayed but heartfelt (and loud) hooting and hollering somewhere off in the distance. Mike said "They liked that one". After the next song there was more hooting and hollering off in the distance and Mike said "They liked that one, too." From the response I got after the show, I would have to agree, they liked it. I had a great time and I can't wait for the next show.

Honestly

So I went ahead and did it. I entered the American Idol songwriting competition. When I first heard about it back in January I got started writing a new song. The contest was officially announced a couple weeks ago and I had really wanted to record it with my band but time was too short so I bought garageband and threw it together myself. Although it may not be quite the tone they were looking for, I am happy with it. I think it could be sung with a combination of humility and sass. My favorite part is the backing vocals on the chorus.

Click here to listen to Honestly.

Peace

Peace Offering - Acrylic on canvas

This year I am feeling especially peaceful and it's not just in my imagination.

I love to paint and I love to sing. These things have always been my preferred method of escapism, with the end result being some kind of art that usually appears as peaceful tranquility. But there has always been some degree of separation between my mind's eye and the rest of my worldy existence. It has been a slow transformation but my butterfly wings are beginning to unfold into the outward world. I am resting my skeptical, critical mind and exercising my faith and inner wisdom. I am following my bliss.

I feel like I am finally beginning to understand the creative process. It doesn't all happen at once and I don't have to have it all figured out ahead of time. I just have to begin. One little bit of action and a little flame of passion is all it takes to get started. This works for any aspect of life, not just a so called work of art. Life is a work of art. And I am thankful for every delicious moment.

Seven or eight months ago I picked up my dusty guitar that I barely knew how to play. I had taken it out of it's case a few months earlier and set it up on a stand in the living room. I walked by that guitar every day without thinking much about it. But then I started hearing it call to me. It was very quiet at first but every day the call grew louder until I just couldn't ignore it anymore. I bumbled around on it without much thought and then put it back on its stand. The next day I picked it up again and it felt a little more comfortable in my hands. I pulled out an old instruction book and looked up some chords and played them. When my fingers started to hurt I put it down on its stand again. Every day my urge to play grew stronger and every day I played a little bit longer and a little bit better. It felt great.

About two months later I was out with a friend of mine. This was a friend that I had known for many many years and I had always envied her a bit because she was in a band and I had always wanted to be. In fact, when she first started learning to play bass guitar we had talked about being in a band together with me singing but she didn't feel ready yet. Not too long after that I dropped out of music school where I was a voice major and started pursuing visual art. I had lost my confidence as a singer and decided to focus my creativity as a hermit. Anyway, it turned out that this friend of mine was now looking to put together a side project and asked if I wanted to sing with her and some other people. I was still unsure of myself but the idea excited me so I said yes.

I had no idea what to expect because I had never done anything like that before but when we got together for the first time everything went really well. Before that first meeting I had written a simple song on guitar that I stumbled through and then everyone joined in. This was my first truly collaborative creative experience and it was wonderful, not perfect, but wonderful. Over the next couple of weeks we wrote a couple more songs together and after that I was fully engaged. I spent every minute of my spare time practicing guitar and writing songs. The other people in the band, who have all been in other bands, were extremely patient and encouraging with me and that allowed me the freedom and confidence to be increasingly more creative. It has been incredibly satisfying to bring the framework of a song to the group and watch as it evolves into something so beautiful that I could never have created on my own.

It has been a lesson for me on allowing other people into my sacred space, my fantasy life of imagination. And this allowing has spread into all areas of my life. I am grateful and I am peaceful in this place of right here, right now.

One of the songs I wrote is called "Ask". When I get a good recording of it I will post it, but for now here are the lyrics...

If I got what I asked for, immediately
would I be able to move beneath the weight
If I got what I asked for, suddenly
would I keep it all or give some away
Would it make me happy, would it make me kind
Would it give me more important things to say
if I got what I asked for
if I got what I asked for
today

If I got what I asked for, would I see
maybe I was asking for the wrong things
Would I want what I asked for, seriously
like when I asked the world to go away
Did I know what I was thinking
Did I know what I needed
Well I'm glad I had the time to understand
to figure out what to ask for
to figure out who I really am

Can I have a warm house that stays clean
handmade ceramic dishes and a washing machine
Can I have work that I adore
Can I have peace and love and joy and a strong body
Can I travel the world and explore
the beauty that I know is there
and can I learn to share
it all

Illustration Friday "Mask"

Night Mask
The sun tries on the starry night and smiles with the moon.
Acrylic on canvas.

Our Deepest Fear

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant,
gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously
give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
our presence automatically liberates others."

a return to love - marianne williamson

I heard this quote in the movie "Akeelah and the Bee" and found it profoundly meaningful.

Illustration Friday "Safe"

Angel Baby
I started this illustration for last week's IF theme but didn't get it done in time to post it on the IF website. Oh well. This is what I think of when I think of feeling safe - being gently and lovingly held in the arms of a peaceful, serene angel with all of life's worries far, far away.

This is a digital image rendered in Photoshop.

Illustration Friday "Play"

A quiet moment after a long day of play at the beach...

This is a commissioned soft pastel piece that I finished last week. It is quite large for me - 17x23 inches - and took about 30 hours of work done in less than a week.

I hope you can excuse the infrequent postings while I recuperate from that exhaustive effort as well as continue work on my newly rekindled love of singing and guitar playing. It's a tough choice - visual art or music. Mostly I can only do one at a time. My attempts at combining the two usually end with me paralyzed with indecision. So for now, the one who calls the loudest wins.

Illustration Friday "Skyline"

Protecting the Night
Even though I love the IF theme this week, it doesn't look like I'm going to be able to do a new illustration for it. So I'm posting an acrylic painting I did last year. I think it relates to the theme in its own special way.

I've been taking a small break from drawing because I've been focusing on music instead. I love to sing and I started learning guitar many years ago. Recently I felt a strong desire to pick it back up again. One of my lifelong dreams has been to play in a band. Well, I wasn't able to get one together before but now I have a really great opportunity to start playing with some friends and I've been practicing like mad. I'll probably just sing at first but then eventually, if things work out, I'd like to play guitar with them as well.

Illustration Friday "Sticky"

Honeysuckle Fairy
This little fairy is enjoying a bit of
sticky nectar from a honeysuckle blossom.

I was not particularly inspired by the topic "sticky" so I did my best to get around it while still sticking (heh) to the theme. I'm not entirely thrilled with the results but thought I might as well post it anyway. It seems that the group of 9-year olds that were hanging around when I was working on it really liked it so what do I know? Created with soft pastels.

Illustration Friday "Rain"

The Rainmaker
I took a break from pastels and decided to have some fun with acrylic paints.

Illustration Friday "Dance"

"Dance of the Sunflower"
Nature always seems to me to be doing a very well choreographed dance. Here she is in all her glory ... vibrant, graceful, soft and sweet. Medium: Soft Pastels