Naked Birdwatchers....

Lately I have been thinking of new imagery to put on the pots and also trying to stretch out to some new forms.
This is what I have come up with so far.
These guys are the naked birdwatchers.
There is a nudist colony not too far from my home. I drive by there on the way to a friends house and it always gets me thinking. Thinking about doing things naked. I hate being naked. I always have. But there are many people who love it and that fascinates me to no end. So, I was thinking what activities I would do naked that didn't cause too much discomfort to the private areas. Birdwatching seemed a good choice.

Building

I have been working on building up the surface of this painting a bit.
Now it is again totally wet so I will have to wait for it to get sticky before I can go any further.

Embarrassed

So I had some friends over this weekend for dinner.
We had a great time. The food was good, the wine was good, the company was good. The table setting was horrible.
Can you think a of a worse thing than a potter who doesn't have a dinner plate for each of her guests? I was so embarrassed. So first thing Sunday morning I went out to the studio and voila! Here are 3 of the 6 plates I made for our cabinet. I wanted to make really fast ones so I stenciled the crows on. I don't have time to carve for myself....well that and the fact that me and Will are such klutzes that I know we will break them and I will have to replace them. So I wanted to make something easy to replace or add on to.

2 Bird Girls

Here is the beginning of the first of the Bird King series. As you can tell I just started and the girl on the right is a little neglected. I feel bad leaving her so unattended but I have to stop to fix dinner. We are having guests tonight for an easy but yummy dinner of peanut chicken and pesto pasta. And.....chocolate turtle cake for desert. One of my specialties I learned to make in childhood. It is a box cake all spruced up with caramel, chocolate chips and peanuts. If anyone wants the recipe I will be glad to post it. It is always a big hit and everyone always thinks it is made from scratch.

Every now and then....

I get bored. I get burned out and washed up with clay. I struggle with my images, what I want to draw, what direction I want to wander in. It is these frustrating times that I lean on my favorite vice....stories. When I get potter's block I start making up stories and shortly the images follow in a stream, a happy flashy stream of pictures.
And so this year after a fall that was wonderful and crazy but all in all very unending...I felt used up. Dry. A desert.
So I started to think up a short story about the Bird King and Queen. I have been doing images of the Bird Queen for a long time. She would appear now and then when I was working with crow or raven images. But I never really thought too much about who she was and what her story would be if I thought it out.
Well the story is coming to me and I am actually writing it. Which I don't usually do. I usually just draw and paint the ideas instead of writing them in word form. But this one
seems like a fun story to see if I can get it into a readable idea. We'll see how it turns out. In the mean time I have been drawing various characters in my sketch book. Here is one of them.



She is one of the girls that the Bird King can choose from to mate with. They are human girls so they have to dress in a mask with a beak.













Here are some with girls on a pot.

Finished Sweater

Here is Will's finished sweater!
It is unblocked in the picture so I hope it will shrink a little bit in washing.
He loves it even thought it is a bit too big.

Inspiration

My friend Janet gave me this book Water for Elephants
to read a little while ago. Recently while painting this idea came up and I started to remember a couple of scenes in the book. It really is a wonderful book and the imagery that came to mind was fantastic! I highly recommend it.

Purse for a Fundraiser / Auction

The Theatre Arts Gallery is having an Art Purse auction next month and here is my contribution. I wanted to keep it for myself.
Alas, I sent it in yesterday.

I'm Back

Finally I have something to post. Christmas was crazy and after the shows we took off to Syracuse to see Will's mom and step dad. We had a blast. I am trying to post a video of us sledding down this huge ravine. I hope I can figure it out.
This is a painting of my favorite tree in the yard. Just finished it today and because it is a study, I think it is done. I am painting in the yard as a kind of exercise to get me back into paining on a daily basis. If I make them studies it takes the pressure off of me and I feel free and light hearted about the work. I know there is serious work to be done and I am looking forward to it but in the meantime I am working out my painting muscle on some fun studies.

Update

New work and of couse....new pictures of Rabbit

Here is a close up of little Rabbit's face...as close as we could get. She doesn't like to stay still very long and by the time Will took the shot she had turned away looking at something else.

And then she is with Blue on the couch. I can't believe they are already such fast friends but they Love each other already.















This picture is the absolute latest. Taken this afternoon while the dogs were out int he yard. Rabbit stretches out long, especially those legs and loves to show off her big kitten belly. This cat loves to eat.



















Here is some newer work. I have worked with the idea of conception and what happens afterwards since my niece Haley was an embryo. I followed my sister's pregnancy through a picture book I got in the library. I like to bring back old ideas on new forms and here is the first one.





















And a tile marking the beginning all the way to the birth.

More Painting

I was firing again today and because of that the studio gets super stinky with fumes. Thus I am forced out of doors into the wondrous sunshine with my palette and brushes in hand. I was puzzled by the arms and hands in the painting. Will actually modeled for this painting in the kitchen while I, armed with the trusty camera stood on a chair ( I am incredibly short and couldn't get a straight angle shot of him unless I climbed upwards). Because of this there was a weird tilt to the picture that came into the painting which made the image confusing. Trying to rectify that today, I changed the arms quite a bit. Now they are a complete mess that I can't fix until some drying occurs. But look what happened in the change. A tree grew out of Will's hand. The reference is positively screaming at you but I am okay with that. The thing that troubles me is the direction I want to push the painting and the fact that I am using the image of my husband. I am not exactly sure how to explain my thoughts. I like my paintings to go too far. I like loud color and big defined images. I like kitsch and if it is gold I could possibly swoon. I like to push peoples ideas and their limits. Choosing to paint a painting that suggests Jesus puts me on shaky ground to begin with. And then my mind is going wild with limit pushing and some really risky ideas. And then there is the fact that my sweet hubby is the model. I will have to think on this and maybe this will be a painting that stays in the collection of the artist and is never shown.

Picture update

In the middle of the fall season I rarely have time for anything but getting ready for show after show after show. This year I swore to myself that I would paint at least one day a week. Well, that went down the tubes after the first shows came to pass. I just can't keep up.
On the rare occasion that I do get a space to paint I am excited and thrilled.
This is the second picture of Will in the tree/heart series.
There are some major issues with the composition that will be changed next go round. But all in all it is getting there.
I think as the painting has its way it will mean bigger hands coming off the panel and water to the waist. The hands will be lifted slightly. There is a religious undertone to this painting. I have always done Madonna's throughout my career but I have never done a picture of a male religious figure. This is the first. And Will really does look like some images of Jesus.

It is like Christmas everytime.

Every time I open the kiln there is an excitement, a thrill at seeing just what everything looks like with a glaze on its surface.
Here is a group of face mugs and pot that are meant to touch on the old tradition of the North Carolina face jugs. The traditional ones are super grotesque and used to scare me as a child. Now I am kinda in love with them but at the same time wouldn't want to run into one in the dark. I try to make mine a less scary and maybe a little goofy. I like making the mugs because they are fun to look at in the morning with their grimaces and teeth bared as if to say," i understand that this morning thing sucks!"

This little picture here I have tried to delete but it wants to stay for some reason. It is actually the bottom of the face jug. And the picture below is the Christmas-like gift I saw this morning.

Paranoia

Sometimes, especially after watching a super scary show, I feel like there is something behind me watching. I have a great imagination and I let it run wild now and then. Today was such a day and hence....the eyes pot. Many, many sets of eyes staring and staring as I was carving. Towards the end of the carving I started thinking about evil eye charms I have seen through the years and decided this is an evil eye pot to ward off any lingering bad spirits or mojo in the air.

Just in time for Halloween!

The crows have descended on the truck for a crow convention. People have been bugging me to paint the truck for a year and I have procrastinated and procrastinated until Will (super husband) primed the truck for me and then painted it the green that I choose. All I had to do was make the stencils and spray on the crows. I am not sure if I am finished. I may put some words on the truck. We have had a great time driving around with the new paint job.

It was an Owl Day

Inspired by a local owl, and just trying to get in the mood of Halloween, I had an Owl day. Everything I carved yesterday was all about Owls. Here are 3 of my favorites. The bottle is actually a water bottle. You fill the bottle with water and put it in the fridge. I usually leave mine in the fridge at least 2 hours. When you put the bottle on the table, the water will stay cold all through dinner without ice.

More Rabbit

Rabbit was laying upside down on the arm of the couch with her belly up. So cute!

What is this little gift?

It is Rabbit the newest member of the family!
She is adorable and the light of the whole family's days. The dogs love her and would nuzzle her all day long but she swats them into place when she tires of all the attention. She is like a little rock star with the dogs and me and Will as groupies. Here she is after an exploration into the fireplace. What a mess that was!

I have been Critiqued!

Criticism
Here is the link to the article that was written about the show. All in all I was happy with it although I didn't agree with some of his thoughts.
It is really weird to be written about. But it is good also to have the experience.
Weird.