Calendar Series: 40th Month / Imaginary Brothers with Questions (1989)

This is the first of 30 images painted in gouache and watercolor, using paper from 18 x 24 Arches watercolor blocks, as well as being the first image from 1989.

Calendar Series: 31st Month / Singing Tool with Full Moon Rising (1988)

Try as I might, I was unable to adjust the color of the sky to anything near Payne's Gray. The full moon is rising, hidden by a cloudy Northwest sky. Below is the true sky color. The rest of the colors are fairly true. 

What was it that the tool was singing? The song was written in "code." If I looked at the letters long enough, I would probably remember. Both sides of the tool are singing the same song. The tool was loaned to me by a friend who found it in his parents' garage. It was rusty and beautiful in the way old tools can be. As I recall, it was used in connection with the car his grandfather owned in the 1920s. 

The painter, Jacob Lawrence, having observed carpenters and other builders, said, "It was beautiful to see them use tools as extensions of their hands. I've loved tools ever since. I collect them and I use them as subjects for my paintings." He also said, "Many hand tools haven't changed for centuries. They have such balance and are so functional. The human body is like a tool. Any living thing has this kind of structure." 

In the spring of 1997, there was an exhibit of Jacob Lawrence's work at the Museum of Northwest Art in La Conner, Washington. One of his paintings from his Builders Series, done using gouache on paper and titled "Carpenters," was used on the poster for that exhibit and is one of my favorite paintings in all of art history. 

Lori Witzel from Chatoyance, a lively blog featuring her "pictures, poems and other souvenirs and artifacts," tagged me for my ten favorite movies. Here they are: Cinema Paradiso 400 Blows Smoke Signals The Last Temptation of Christ The Gospel According to St. Matthew (Pier Paolo Pasolini) The Last Waltz Shrek Rabbit Proof Fence Masked and Anonymous Fast Runner I'm not going to tag anyone specifically. Feel free to be tagged for this meme.

Middle of the Journey (1984)

In 1984, I was 34 years old, conscious that I was nearing the middle of my life assuming I lived to old age, and painfully aware that I didn't like the direction my personal life had taken. 

The image may be seen as what C. G Jung called an animus. In the process of taking myself seriously as an artist, I had begun moving out of a dark sense of myself to a place of acceptance of both my shadow and light. I was also thinking about a man my age whom I had known since I was 17 and trying to picture him moving with me into a dynamically balanced life. What appears to be black in this watercolor and gouache painting is what is known as Payne's Gray, a versatile color in the watercolor palette.