Fragments, Resistance, Passion and Shadows

Most of my days are made up of fragments, bits of this and that, intertwining but not quite connecting. The fragments are often in motion, falling away, leaving shadows in their wake - shadows that haunt, shadows that disguise, shadows that cripple - preventing forward movement.

Fragments is this oil painting, a pictorial record of how life appears at times. Red for passion:  passion for my family and my home; passion for my two littles kittens, Mim and Pip; passion for nature - fauna and flora; passion for earth and all it's glorious bounty; and passion for creativity, however it chooses to express itself. Still with all that passion, I resist living life to the fullest.

Fragments
20" x 30" oil, slate and paper on canvas

Fragments are oftentimes obstacles, cold and grey like slivers of hard slate dappled with blood, sweat and tears. They fall all around and avoiding them can be hazardous...so you let them fall and you accept the shadows they cast. Fragments, like words, can cut and diminish. Fragments, like incomplete thoughts, keep you suspended. Fragments of life, love and loss...

Still, every now and again you tune in to the passion and once again you rise and greet the day with enthusiasm. That day is at hand!

Exploration Continues

In the very small community that I call home it is not often that the opportunity comes around to take an art course but in January I got lucky. Amber Lounder, a beautiful artist in her own right, offered painting classes which I quickly enrolled in. (You can see some of her work by following this link to Visual Literacy, her art journal/blog( http://amberlounder.blogspot.com/  ).

I decided to take the opportunity presented by theses classes to use oil paints rather than the acrylic I've been use to. It was an adventure, to say the least. For some reason, I also decided to use spatulas rather than brushes. Below are the paintings I created in the 10 weeks the course ran, as well as a couple I did at my studio and one that I'm still working on.

  

Snowed In
12 in x 12 in

Sky Ways & Water Ways
6 in x 12 in /each

Ice Cold
12 in x 12 in

Northern Lights Reflecting
6 in x 12 in /each

P'tit Feu Sauvage I
20 in x 24 in

P'tit Feu Sauvage II
Work in progress
20 in x 24 in

 

Where am I going with this? I wish I knew! Yet another medium to contemplate, yet another choice, yet another way to express myself, or not! I guess the last thing I need is another technique to neglect. The constant exploring, analyzing, experimenting is wearing me down. I can't seem to stop. I seem to be looking for some answer or something. I need somebody to tell me what the answer is so that I can latch on to it and focus, focus, focus!

Through the Mist

   It always seems so slow at first...coming out of a deep freeze. But, little by little, things begin to thaw. I'm not sure that the process is complete but I feel things are beginning to stir; the ice has melted, with perhaps just a few crystals remaining.

    There's no doubt about it, life really gets in the way of blogging. And that's what first happened. Then I lost the ability to blog wherever the mood struck when the wireless card went on my laptop. Then I got two kittens. Then it was Christmas time. Then it was winter. Then is was this. Then it was that....A whole barrage of excuses. But maybe it was just that I needed a break.

Rather than analyze this to death, I should be grateful that one day I looked out my front window and noticed the fog was lifting and there was a breathtaking vista in the mist.

It was so breathtaking that I jumped in the car to get a closer look. I ended up at a graveyard across the bay. I think the pictures speak for themselves. 

    The snow is gone now. The fog has lifted and all that is left is the awe...The kind of awe that leaves you speechless!