Just got off the phone with my dear friend, Marie, whom I’ve known now for years and years. She told me she reads my blog every week. Well, here’s to you, Marie! She and her husband Dave are two of the finest people on the planet and we consider them most excellent friends. Which you’d have to be to wade through this blog if you’re not an artist!!!

Tomorrow is the first day of the new session of art class, in which a wondrous group of artist friends get together to push the limits. Stay tuned.

My new art site is www.deepdishart.com. Both the name and the site will change in time. It’s a very basic site. I was able to work from a template and put the stuff up myself. This has given me the freedom to think through what I want on the site, gather the work together and arrange it in an order that makes sense to me.

It was an interesting process because I found I have a lot of art that just didn’t need to go up. I want to focus on new work and that is evolving—more rapidly than I expected. So, this is a work in progress, like so many these days it seems, but something that has given me a lot of pleasure to compose. Hope you enjoy it too. I will be posting new art there regularly.

Grrrrrr. Getting pissed off is a good thing….sometimes. What a week. Spent four days organizing old art stuff to make promotional foray into an area I’d left behind already and with much gratitude—both for what it had once given me and for the fact that I could now leave it behind. It took me a while to get it. Grrrr. Just couldn’t do it. It’s over. No going back and that’s a good thing. Had to feel that impatience. Then, presto—done! I cannot go back to an old life—there’s no room for it with all the new things happening.  So that was interesting.

Then an old friend called to say that her marriage had broken up. It didn’t come as a surprise. Still it’s always sad. So we felt sad and concerned. We know the path ahead has its own trials and its own brilliance, if you pay attention and do it right. So we wish them both well.

Then, yesterday, a wedding. One of Dear A’s students, a lovely young woman and her sweet chap, head over heels in love and just twenty-two. His parents were not pleased. They just could not flow with this and the hostility burned bright. But we wish this sweet young couple the best. We wish that they have the courage to stand up against the disapproval lobbed their way and that they can simply be themselves and nourish the love they’ve found. Stay true to themselves.

Today, a lovely invitation—to be in two art shows.  I have to marvel at that because I make no effort in the direction of art. Right now I make paintings for pleasure and to explore. But I did, in fact, turn away from the old this week. And stay true to myself. And here, already, like a miracle, are new possibilities. More than interesting.

This painting emerged from a spontaneous urge. It was Sunday morning and I walked into my studio with a cup of tea. I did not intend to do a painting. I intended to sit down and write. I’m nearing the end of a long project and I have a fairly clear idea of what needs to happen now but I know too that things need to sit at this point and gel. At any rate I sat down at my art table and saw that my gouache paints were right there. Without thinking much I took a sip of tea and prepared a piece of paper. The act of preparation and the fact that I had no pressure to do anything at all allowed me to think of continuing on from the painting I’d done a couple of days before, posted below.

This one didn’t take long. It flowed because I was able to get out of my own way. And that’s not always true. So I’m thinking of the ways I get in my way—the things I tell myself. It’s usually that. I tell myself that it must be like this, or it must be done by Tuesday, or that it’s hard, or I haven’t any idea what to do next. All that mind chatter is a road block to creativity.

Yoga has been so useful in learning to observe the mind and body. Where am I in the moment I sit down? Can I just be present? Can I let go of the judgments and petty anxieties? Can I just sit down and empty the trash?

Not always easy. But I know enough now that it’s worth the effort to pay attention to the state of mind and buff it up before beginning. I also know that it helps a lot to have a clear idea of where you’re headed before beginning. Sometimes I have to wait for that. And while I’m waiting it doesn’t hurt to make a small painting that has a beautiful energy all its own and tells me to now sit down and get on with it.

Putting together a small portfolio of graphic art for kids this weekend and I became aware in a visceral way that the past is done and only the now matters. I’ve been away from doing much graphic art work for a few years now but thought I’d like to make a bit more moulah because that matters too and makes certain things possible. I’ve been focusing on doing my true work because I can now but it’s also really a fine thing to be able to put out some good fun to the wee folks on the planet. I’ve done hundreds, if not thousands, of drawings for publication over the years so I thought it would be nothing to drag out some images and put together a mailer just like I did when that was my primary focus.

But it was not easy. It was downright depressing. Some of the old stuff I liked. I even liked it a lot. I throw the other stuff away mostly. But even so, I wasn’t happy. The past is over. Done. Whatever I do now needs to be created from this moment in time. So down I sat. I wanted to do something fiercer, richer, freer.
The thrill of making art for me is discovering what is possible. It’s an endless quest, a constant surprise and, if you do it right, you’re connecting with an unseen stream of present moment energy which you’re getting to make manifest.

But that was the latter part of my day. I started out this morning by making a small painting for a lovely young woman who gave me an amazing acupuncture treatment a couple of days ago and then charged me the ‘friends’ rate. I’m a fan of acupuncture and know its wondrous benefits and also that it reaches into the same realms that art does. The wee painting was to say thank you but, in fact, it gave me a great gift. It revealed another possibility for imagery and I went on to make two more.

So it’s been an art day, an unexpected one. A day in which I just followed the energy. A good day. And the drawing here is one I did towards the end of the day along with many others. Tomorrow more. It’s amazing what gets done when you get out of your own way. If only I could remember that.

I made this small painting today for a lovely young couple who got married in June—it’s personalized with their initials in the vase. I think it’s rather cheery, like they are. I love the velvety appearance of gouache and the flatness. Flat colors are really useful for the kind of bold imagery I’m using at the moment.

Earlier in the summer I thought I’d lost my paints. I was just on the cusp of setting out to buy new ones, at vast expense, when I stumbled upon them on a table in the basement. While they were lost I really missed them even though I don’t use them all that much. They’re a part of me, like old friends. A new set wouldn’t have been the same.

Once I get the paints out ideas begin to flow. The best is to just jump on an idea and go with it, without hesitation. Too much thinking kills art.

Speaking of which—last night, Dear A and I put on the Rolling Stones’ Beggar’s Banquet CD after dinner. We’d been talking about Mick Jagger’s voice, whether it was limited like Dylan’s or whether it was actually incredibly versatile. Dear A, who is usually right about most things, was adamant about the latter, I was putting up my usual fruitless objections which I’m fairly good at. We listened to the whole thing sitting at the kitchen table, beating our hands on the table, singing, and topping up our wine glasses mid-way. Mick’s voice is versatile all right but it’s the way he bends it that makes him the fantastic, fab one—he’s got Muddy Waters, Dylan, Leadbelly, Pete Seeger. He just uses them.

Salt of the Earth was the last song and Dear A choked up. He rarely cries(British)—the first time I saw him well up was at King Lear, then when his father died and, yes, last night listening to Mick. That’s what real art can do. And it’s real even though Mick steals like crazy. Stealing is okay in art when it’s for a purpose. The great, great thing about Mick is that he wasn’t shy about it. He latched onto what he was into and rode it all the way into the stratosphere. The stylist’s stylist. Real style’s all about the truth—and the truth is tough, baby.

Somewhere in the middle of Salt of the Earth, just after I’d set my wine glass down for the last time, I said I wished I could make art like that. Dear A dabbed his eyes, looked over and smirked. ‘But, my dear,’ he said, ‘you are not about desolation.’

Well, I could be. Maybe. Why am I trying to keep it light? It’s what I latched onto, way back, and I’m riding it—somewhere.

Taking a hint from Mick—I’m sticking with it but after last night will be amping up the volume. Why be shy?

It hit me tonight that it’s dark now by 7:30, pitch-black dark. Time is marching on and has out-stepped me once again. I’m just at the beginning of August, ready to put my feet up on the new lounge chair I bought and sip a glass of ice tea with a good book in hand. Could the whole summer have passed with just a couple of hours in that chair?

Dear A went back to teaching today as did my daughter, also a teacher. They both had good days and both found it hard to adjust to the discipline of being ‘back’ after a summer of ‘freedom.’ I always have freedom, of a sort. I’ve worked freelance since I was twenty-six and that’s a long time ago now.

This little chap is a drawing I did twenty years ago to promote my freelance graphic art business. Believe it or not he earned me about three years of solid work with a major newspaper. He was ahead of his time. Back then most graphic art was realistic and illustrative. I didn’t have the time or skill or inclination for that. Necessity was the mother of this invention—pared-down simple art based on my love of cartoons.

A couple of years ago I gave up my business to devote myself to the work that truly calls me now—both art and writing. I’d been chipping away at it for years between assignments. Now I still have a few faithful graphic art clients for whom I do work every month and I’m grateful for the income. Recently I’ve been tempted to market myself again. Money is such a temptation. But I know, mostly, what temptation is. We get what we ask for and, at this point, it’s not really money that I want—it’s making something that is thrilling in its authenticity. Old habits die hard and raise their thorny heads from time to time.

So, tonight’s dark sky reminded me that time is fleeting and now is the moment, children grown, for me to continue to devote myself to what calls me. So what if I need to take care with money? I’m blessed to be able to respond to what calls me and grateful too. So, day by day, I continue to act on inspiration—all an artist can do. How lucky we are!

Last week, this site went down for a day when technical difficulties hit the web host. When it came back up a couple of posts were missing. It reminds me of the obstacles we encounter as artists all the time and that there’s no point fussing. Just keep going.
Summer slips away here. I was out on an errand this morning and discovered that some of the trees along the highway have now turned a soft yellow. The change of season, especially this one, is a good time to take stock. I see that I’m not quite as far along with my main project as I’d hoped to be. Life intervenes, of course, but creativity also has its own ebb and flow, not one to be messed with. So it’s all perfect and I’m also noting that a huge amount of work has gotten done and that the end of this project is now in site.

I went with a friend and fellow artist to Boston’s new Institute of Contemporary Art. It’s a bare-bones building in a spectacular setting right on the waterfront next to the famous fish restaurant, Anthony’s Pier One. The photo doesn’t capture much of this but you can get a sense of place.
I didn’t find the art, however brillliantly done, as intriguing. Every piece in the photography exhibit focused on the underside of life, on suffering and confusion, so at the end of the visit I was exhausted and down on my knees with thanks that I live in a parallel universe. But what I’m really interested in is how those who suffer can be lifted up. No sign of that here.
Well, the pendulum swings and I’m eager to see where the art of awakened consciousness now goes. There are signs of awakening everywhere from the work people are doing to eliminate poverty in Africa to the beginnings of efforts to stem global climate change. With so much peril on the planet it seems like the art of peace might now tiptoe in and start lifting us in new directions. Curious, isn’t it, that that art does not seem to make it into this kind of venue. Those of us who practice it will have to be subversive.

Fall is a great time of renewal, I think. As the leaves get ready to fall, I feel my energy picking up. The lazy days of summer are gone and I’m thinking the timing is just about right. Good thing I’m not in charge—I might have stretched things out a bit. But now it’s back to business.