Paradigm Shift
I am not much of a painter. I leave that up to my brother. For all the exposure we had to music and art growing up it was clear right off he was the more gifted with illustration. Even so, a few months ago, on a Saturday, I woke up with this acute image in my head and had to do something with it. I was in a kind of funk on the creative side as it was, so this was a strange change in direction. After coffee I ran off to Meininger’s and roamed the aisles figuring out paint and canvas size etc. The last time I touched paints and canvas was easily my freshman year in college.
The funny thing was in order to finish this painting I had to find a suit, doll size. After roaming various Toys R Us and random antiques stores, probably looking a bit like a weird stalker or Smithers shopping for his doll collection, I had to turn to Ebay. It took a few different bids, but I found a Ken Doll suit – vintage apparently – to complete the painting. I am sure the people who sold it to me thought I was some sweet doll collector and would cry if they saw what I did to their sale.
This much I discovered in the process of this painting, that when the writing runs dry, the music isn’t there, and I can’t afford film for my Holga, the painting seems to at least keep the flame going. A new discovery. L’Engle used to say how she used the other arts in much the same manner when her writing was stumped. Granted she could play Mozart on the piano. Me, not so much.
Something, too, that I experienced in the process was learning that much of the art we create is for ourselves as much as for others. I needed the tactile of texture and light and color, to play with them all, and respond, let myself be moved. Maybe creating art in and of itself is re-humanizing, if we let it be; something direly needed in our fragmented dehumanizing world.
You can see a larger shot of the this painting HERE.
The funny thing was in order to finish this painting I had to find a suit, doll size. After roaming various Toys R Us and random antiques stores, probably looking a bit like a weird stalker or Smithers shopping for his doll collection, I had to turn to Ebay. It took a few different bids, but I found a Ken Doll suit – vintage apparently – to complete the painting. I am sure the people who sold it to me thought I was some sweet doll collector and would cry if they saw what I did to their sale.
This much I discovered in the process of this painting, that when the writing runs dry, the music isn’t there, and I can’t afford film for my Holga, the painting seems to at least keep the flame going. A new discovery. L’Engle used to say how she used the other arts in much the same manner when her writing was stumped. Granted she could play Mozart on the piano. Me, not so much.
Something, too, that I experienced in the process was learning that much of the art we create is for ourselves as much as for others. I needed the tactile of texture and light and color, to play with them all, and respond, let myself be moved. Maybe creating art in and of itself is re-humanizing, if we let it be; something direly needed in our fragmented dehumanizing world.
You can see a larger shot of the this painting HERE.