01/29/12 Settling into the year of the Dragon

We are well into the Year of the Dragon and I am just beginning to find myself fully almost fully moved into my new apartment and studio "Rooms of: this way that,up". By tomorrow I'll have my new drivers license and with my new address. This will be the first time in...um...roughly 23 years I haven't been a resident of Massachussets. 23 years ago I lived in Concord NH, before that I lived in Plattsburgh NY and before I was on Cape Cod and 30 years ago I was in Boston.

My dream, 30 plus years ago, was to travel about but it didn't happen. Love, lust, drugs, a complete lack of confidence, a desire to feel safe, a desire to feel dangerous and hurt, and an overwhelming obsession with alcohol kept me from pursuing any type of dream. At my core, I wanted to be in NY and or Washington state but I didn't have the tools to get there. At some point I found myself pregnant, in a horrible relationship (with several inappropriate ones to follow) and wanting to go home - which was both a huge mistake and the best choice, and here we are 23(?), 24(?) years later living in a whole new state and with a whole new life and with the tools to attempt to navigate myself in the unknown.

I was thinking this morning about where I was even 6 years ago and how different my life is - now: I am single, parent less, no longer working for an abusive boss, not working at all as matter of fact, losing my ability to fight back against my own body physically; I've certainly transported my art from expected/average/acceptable images to works that feel like they transcend the painter, and stuck watching my grown son navigate himself from a very, very far distance - an even wider distance than he would allow me to stand and watch 6 years ago... life has changed. Some of the changes have broken my heart and made me into a fearful person, other changes have made me into a stalwart but, I believe,  all of them were somewhat necessary to get me here. Either that or life was unrelentingly cruel and I've learned to adapt. And so there we are and here I am.

Onto the work of the day:

The beginning of "in einem entscheidenden Punkt, aufgeben or Punkt "

Applying thick acrylic on aerosol

Adding oils - my preference is Gamblin paint company colors and materials
http://www.gamblincolors.com/materials.html. They're products are sumptuous, rich, creamy and never contain grains - although my work can look like I might not care about the feel of paint, it is, in fact, THE most important determining factor to my work. The wrong paint or material(s) choice can destroy how I feel about a painting or help me transcend time I spend working on a painting. If the products are inferior, I'll spend my time frustrated and trying to make do. If the products are brilliant, I get to focus on my work instead of the struggle between me and my need to control my materials.

My poor little milk glass palette needs a good scrub. I love using milk glass, it's fairly easy to clean, it's weight is substantial which makes the processes in painting feel substantial, and, as it turns out, my favorite American painter, Norman Rockwell, used it as a palette - a  fact I just learned a few years ago!

Breakfast.

And oh, those lips! They will be a sumptuous red when I'm done. Trampy, bourlesque, Joel Grey in "Cabaret" red...with a hint of Norbert Leo Butz sexy.

Okay, back to work...