Portraits

Looking for a new nest

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Bird

Bird on nest
© 2010 Margaret Sloan
Pastel on paper

It has been many a long month since I’ve blogged. Life has been busy! And for the last two weeks, we’ve been fluttering about like two meadowlarks before a bulldozer as our rented home has been put up for sale. In the Cities by the Bay—a metropolitan area crammed with overpaid hi-tech workers and floating on rivers of investor cash—we probably don’t stand a chance of building or buying, although that won’t stop us from trying.  But our best hope is to find a rental we can afford (dear reader, if you know of something, please let me know…).

Home is a tenuous place. Lots of people in the world don’t have homes. The economy sneezes and lives fall apart. Tornadoes rip off roofs, and earthquakes crumble walls. Water drowns foundations, and  fire sends all to ash. War…well, thank God we don’t have to worry about that in our country right now.

And when you come down to it, home isn’t just a structure (although structures shelter you from rain or wind). It’s in your heart, with those you love. And the fiddler is my home, his arms my shelter, and his music-filled heart the center of our family nest. (Yeah, yeah. Sappy, I know. But scary times call for large amounts of sap.)

Fiddle Nest

Brendan Behan in ArtGraf black carbon

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BrendanBehanYoung

Shawn Hatosy as Brendan Behan

Saturday night I watched Borstal Boy, a romanced version of the early life of Irish patriot, playwright and poet, Brendan Behan. Mr. Behan was a man of letters—he wrote in English and in Irish—who unfortunately died quite young from the drink. He was the public face of the stereotypical Irishman, as well as typifying a whole generation of artists:  brilliant star and stumbling, mumbling drunk. He once described himself as a drunk with a writing problem.

BrendanBehanBrendan Behan as Brendan Behan

The above painting is from a Youtube video here, where Mr. Behan sings the Auld Triangle.

These were painted using my new toy, an ArtGraf black carbon block. It’s a neat little block of water soluble carbon with which you can draw on wet or dry paper, or just rub a wet brush across the block for shades of gray. It’s an easy and clean way to practice brush work while watching television, so long as you don’t kick over your pot of water. The paper is my new favorite, cheap cover stock from the copy store.

José Emídio paints with the tailor shape of ArtGraf in the video below. Beautiful!

Loss and a call for help for a fellow artist

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With great sadness I read that of one of my favorite bloggers, Gretel Parker at Middle of Nowhere,  has suffered the terrible loss of her long-time partner. I’ve read her blog for years, and have admired her for her strength, talent, and courage. I have gotten to know her lovely needle felting, her charming illustrations, and the bits of her story she shared with the world. My heart is breaking for her loss.

The blogosphere is a strange place. You write about yourself as if you were on  a secret desert island and then float your carefully chosen words like messages in a bottle bobbing on the interweb sea. And you find messages from other castaways who have sent out their own words corked in the smokey glass of a blog post.

In this way we build shipping lanes of friendships and acquaintances from messages floating on the digital tide. And we make connections whether or not we know we are making those connections. Gretel’s blog had a way of doing that.

To help Gretel, who is not only suffering from the grief of losing half her heart, but will also be going through some real financial upheavals, two bloggers, Suzanne Houghton and Tara Change, have started a fund raising effort on her behalf called the Gretel Parker Project. If you have enjoyed her blog, I hope that you will be able to help her out.

And my friends, hug your loved ones. Tell them that you love them and hold them close.

Music Sunday

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JohnFiddling

Portrait of a fiddler (but not my fiddler), done in a Canson sketch book with a Pigma Micron pen.

Music is an essential part of my life. You all know what that means. I almost never play much music anymore.

People are funny that way; the things that mean the most to us often take a back seat to everything else. And despite the fact that the fiddler and I love to play music, (in fact, playing traditional Irish music is the oldest, strongest part of our relationship) we are both scheduled to the hilt with non-musical tasks, and so we don’t often have a day devoted to tunes.  To break this trend, we decided to make last Sunday a music day.

The first event we attended was the 9th Annual Santa Cruz Harp Festival at Our Lady Star of The Sea Church, presented by Shelley Phillips of the Community Music School of Santa Cruz. I hope you’ll see more about this wonderful school in future posts.

Harp players

I’ve never seen so many harps in one place! Pixie harps, celtic harps, concert harps, wire strung harps. The music was lovely, the church was beautiful, with lots of milky winter ocean light pouring through etched-glass windows. Perfect for drawing, but the sanctuary was crowded, and I was, of course, struck with extreme shyness.  Someone might look at me! Oh! The Horror! But I dredged up some grit, got out my journal and sketched while the musicians played. If anyone watched me, I didn’t know about it. I listened to the music and drew. It was like a little bit of heaven.

WomanFiddling

If you click on this sketch, you’ll be able to see a blurry bit on the fiddler’s chin (also not my fiddler) where my pennywhistle dripped moisture as I played a tune over the half finished drawing. Although the pen was a Pigma Micron, and supposedly waterproof, I guess it’s not immune to pennywhistle drool. 

Afterwards we stopped at The Poet & The Patriot Pub for the last bit of the Irish session. It was brilliant fun, and once again I forced myself to open the journal and draw (mostly while the other musicians played tunes I didn’t know). No one even payed attention; they were intent on their jigs and reels. And that was the most lovely thing of all.

Celtic harp

Last year and next

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Luke_unfinished
Luke (detail of unfinished watercolor painting)
© 2012 Margaret Sloan

Finding time for reflection on the past year is difficult, smack dab in the middle of several projects I’d like to finish before the week is out. But after reading Rose Welty’s lovely New Year’s post, I thought I’d take a stab at casting a backwards glance over 2011, and peering forward into 2012.

Here’s what I accomplished in the last year:

  • Entered and won an art competition
  • Had my first solo gallery show
  • Painted. A lot

I admit, I’m not good at marking time over the long haul. The concept of time, longer than a few hours, gets away from me. The past, even just a few weeks ago, seems like it happened in another lifetime. As for the future? I never quite believe that next year (heck, tomorrow) will actually show up, hat in hand, at my doorstep and demand to be let into the house. I realize this grasshoppery attitude probably bodes ill for my little-old-lady future, so occasionally I do try to plan.

My goals for next year:

  • Make an artist website
  • Blog more often
  • Make it possible for people to buy my art
  • Enter  a few art competitions
  • Apply for a residency.

But my main goal? Paint. A lot.  Which may supersede all the other goals. Because painting is what makes the long year worth the heavy slog.

 

P.S. Don’t forget to comment on this post to get a free gift.

 

 

For the love of a hound

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Cordelia and Jack

 

Cordelia and Jack
© Margaret Sloan 2012
Watercolor on paper

My friend Cordelia has two rescue greyhounds, a little female and a great big male. I was surprised to find just how big they are, and also, what great dogs they make for working people. She says her two dogs sleep most of the day, frolic a bit when she comes home, then need to rest up. They are lovely dogs who will take a lot of petting from the houseguest with the big camera.

It was great to spend a day with her, photographing and sketching. I got my dog fix, and had a nice long girlie chat with Cordelia.

First show!

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Landscape Study of Nevada desert
© Margaret Sloan 2012
Watercolor on paper

If I’ve been absent from music parties, family functions, and the blogoshpere, it’s only because I’ve been preparing for a show. My first solo show! (You can read about it on Facebook here, although I’ll be posting more about it as the time draws near. Oh yes, you can bet I will.).

I’ve been painting my brushes ragged to complete a couple more paintings, but as usual, it’s a slow process, with many studies, and lots of time spent staring and pondering. I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again, painting (for me) is not a relaxing weekend hobby. It’s Work.

Okay, I admit,  it’s work that I like to do, but that doesn’t mitigate the struggle of forcing my interior thoughts onto smooth white paper. It’s focused work, which means I have to take a break every couple hours and do something that’s not work, like cleaning the bathtub or doing the laundry. And yet, while I’m scrubbing, I’m still thinking about the painting, still considering colors, shapes, and brush strokes. While folding socks, I ruminate, talk to myself, and plan my next few passages.

The picture above is the landscape I’m putting into one of the paintings. Below, you’ll see a study for the man in the portrait. In my mind, he’s inseparable from the landscape where we met. When he’s finished I’ll tell you that story.

Big heart in a small package

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Ruth
Watercolor
© 2012 Margaret Sloan

I finally finished this portrait of my fiddler’s aunt (my aunt-in-law, I guess). She was a tiny thing, but her heart was as big as the world. She accepted me into the family with joy and kindness, even though she’d never before met me. She loved to feed people. She loved to be around people. She was funny, opinionated, and caring.

The yiddish in the painting says, “small hearts surround the big world.”  
I’d have to work to grow my heart to be as encompassing as hers.

 

Building better habits

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Fox in Snow
Watercolor sketch done as part of nightly habit-building practice

Since surgery, I’ve been having trouble climbing back on that part of the wheel where I paint and draw. It’s not just the exhaustion and residual pain that keeps me from picking up pencil and paintbrush; it seems like something deeper. It’s as if my drive chain got rusty from all the anesthetics and antibiotics.

This will never do. A few days vegetating in front of Netflix is okay, but I would never be happy with this as my lifestyle.

But serendipity often smiles on the frustrated. This week, Paul Fox at Learning to See began a daily practice forum that will last for a week. Only 6 days. And the beauty of it is, he emails every morning to remind us.

The idea is this: To develop a habit (any habit, but in this case, a daily art practice habit), you look for a trigger action. It can be anything small, but definite. Like drinking a cup of coffee. Or combing your hair. Something that’s routine, so that you’ll do it everyday.

You use this trigger as an entry point into the habit you want to create. It reminds you of the following action. For example: After you drink your coffee, you take out your sketchbook and draw.

I chose the trigger of our nightly walk, which is a longstanding habit that’s triggered by eating dinner (believe me, we never miss a meal). After coming home from my walk, I stretch a bit, take off my shoes (putting them away), and then start to paint.

It’s worked for 4 nights in a row. We’ll see if I can keep it going after this lovely little habit-building forum is over.