half full or half empty?

Now it comes down to it. This is where the innate and almost primitive drive to create comes full on. This painting is going to be the end of me (Pam tells me that I say that about every painting). I am at a sticking point and have been trying to hammer it out all week to no avail. All the elements of newness, the new painting easel, applying oil pastel to huge canvas, a new sitting and arm position, have all arrived at once and it has been a challenge, not to mention that the painting itself IS NOT WORKING. I have scraped off twice and may have to do it again, though the thought of it makes me wince. But I will keep moving forward because I have to. I may walk away for a day or two, but I have to come back to it…sit down face to face in front of that monster of a problem. This is that drive I was mentioning up top and sometimes I don’t like it. At all, my friends.

Technique is important depending on what an artist is trying to achieve. And it is important in this particular painting, which I do not enjoy. It is curious to me now why I chose this idea. I do not prize technique over creativity and find technique to be quite a drain. I once thought it to be the end all be all, but now that I am more mature I place creativity on the top rung. Technique is nothing but a tool and anyone can learn it, yet this painting requires traditional realist techniques, something I don’t use a lot in my work and do not prefer to. I feel like I am back in college when I deal with traditional techniques. I left college because it permeated every class. I suppose this is why the modernist went in the direction they did, God bless ‘em.Maybe it isn’t as bad as I think (I am not normally a glass is half empty person, but a glass IS empty person, so this is a positive statement for me). Vincent looks marvelous. The work has been half sucessful at least…..or maybe I should look at the job section.

Frida Kahlo and the blessing of public tv

We decided to rid ourselves of the cable television last month. It’s purely a menas of avoiding what is important and a robber of time. So, that leaves us with a few channels of which only public television is of any interest. There are plenty of documentaries in between ‘Antiques Roadshow’ and the handful of cooking shows. Last week I came across an AE biography of Frida Kahlo.

I knew a few bits about her and always have been intrigued by her work. I do remember the first time I saw one of her paintings and recall that I had to turn the page. It didn’t make a lot of sense to me without knowing about her. This was before I knew of her lifetime of physical sufferings which was the basis for her work. Her paintings are about her and that makes them quite powerful. A lot of the art snobs like to point out her supposed lack of technique (like there is only ONE technique)…I think they are secretly jealous of someone who was self taught whose work has the depth of content they only hope for.

D.C. at twilight

I am totally wiped out. Apparently, poor sleeping ability runs in my family and in the last ten years I have found myself less and less able to get a good nights sleep. Sure, I have really bad bed mate (tosses/turns/snores) and I have had a handful of health issues that have certainly stolen my winks, but I think it’s just us. The Lantrip family….or at least the women. So, at certain points it catches up with me, like after a week or so, and by 2 pm I am dragging. If I keep moving, I am ok, but sitting down to read or paint or whatever and it’s all over, man.
We have been to D.C. many times in the (almost) one year we have been here and have walked many miles and seen all the stuff to see, but Craig convinced me that "No, we need to see it all at TWILIGHT. It’s more interesting and beautiful!" And off we went to D.C. at 5pm saturday evening stopping to have a quick pizza in Springfield. By the time we got there and all the pizza and wine and stuff I felt like I could curl up in the backseat of the car and let the D.C. fanatic go on his own. But off we went.
Craig has this lovely child-like excitement about him especially when it comes to historical or sports related things. Lots of fast talking, lots of fast walking, lots of eyeballs going crazy looking all around. That’s my husband. It’s great. I sure as heck don’t get excited about anything. I make sure I am well composed in any and all situations. One of the problems is that he wants me to get in all the pictures. Now, we have lots, and lots of pictures of the monuments, many with me in them looking stiff and sort of mad. I don’t think we need any more. He took 36 pictures of monuments and landmarks. It was a great time except for my exhaustion. And he was right that everything looked different and more interesting in the evening. And there were a lot of folks there just hanging out sitting and talking on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial or walking around the tidal basin. We weren’t the only ones. Someone elses husband or whatever said, "Hey! Let’s go to D.C. at TWILIGHT!" and there they all were, someone tagging along looking wiped out…..I have the most amazing husband……

9/11

At another anniversary of September 11th I watched again the Frontline documentary "Faith and Doubt at Ground Zero", a very fascinating film made a year after the event interviewing people either at the scene and/or who lost friends or family members in the tragedy. As someone who believes in God it strikes me how this film captures the ebb and flow of ‘faith’ and how that ‘faith’ either grows, reforms or perishes in the face of 9/11. Western christianity has the market on a self focused belief in and idea of God. Almost every person interviewed approaches the camera with a "how could God do this to me", in a sort of standing in the place of God as God and judging God. The phrases "America is a blessed country…how can God do this to America? ‘God bless America’ were spoken throughout. Certainly these are hurting folks and disillusioned folks. For them there isn’t only the tragic loss of life, but the complete loss of entire belief systems and ideologies, whole structures that lives were built upon. That happened to me when I went from athiest to true believer and it is tremendously stressful. But this attitude, and quite frankly the attitude dispised by much of the rest of the world, is very telling about our tendancy to form God in our own image. I do it myself. It is a product of a society raised from birth on entitlement. We feel entitled to have everything go swell, we live to avoid pain, discomfort, difficulty…and are offended when we encounter it. These are the things that most of the rest of the planet faces on a daily basis and because we have the means or drive to mostly avoid them our faith, our character, our growth has been gravely injured. And I talk to myself. I get pissy when I have a runny nose. Every time.

Livin' life, man

An aspect of my personality type according to the Myers Briggs test is a drive to be authentic and to figure out who I really am. Apparently, I also need to find meaning in everything, which could really mean that I need to RELAX. After weeks of soul searching and struggle (see last post) Craig and I were on our one hundreth deep discussion about the whole art thing. He has readily participated and bantered with me about it all, but I think he was over it by week three. I once again presented my arguments and concerns, my deep feelings and fears about myself and my work. There was a pause as I waited for his much needed response. He then says, "You are just livin’ life, man. That’s all it is…just livin’ life." Part of me feels I needed to hear that all along.

one more time

The last three weeks have been some of the most challenging of my life. Craig and I have always lived our lives conscious of the paths of our forebears and determined not to follow in those steps. Running away when its hard, choosing the easy way out or ignoring things….settling for less. Fighting these paths is a grand ideology but it can be quite difficult and painful when that ideology meets the asphalt. When God gives you a gift it not only means it will be a working out of that gift but that He will use that gift to uncover, expose and do major surgery on other things as well. Yeah, right, following Christ is a cop out….that one always cracks me up.

The journey of seeking to become a full time professional artist that began several months ago really came to a halt about three weeks ago. I hit the wall. All of my beliefs and convictions that have made me as an artist were suddenly called to the table as I researched galleries and seriously began working on the brochure with the printers. Somewhere on gallery number two hundred and somewhere on the fourth time we returned there with a new file and found it once again not up to par I began to crumble. All of the negative voices and words I have heard about being an artist flooded in and I began to listen to them. You know the ones, "No one will buy your work, you will be a failure, they will find out you are a fake, this is all a silly dream, be practical, be realistic!" and on and on I could go. Listening to those words put me in bed for several days and seriously made me consider returning to vet medicine. I began to walk in the steps of thousands…..I decided to give up. The fear and doubt were so overwhelming and the path before me was so unsavory to me that I wanted to go the easy way. And then the apathy set in and apathy in the worst. Apathy says "You aren’t afraid, you just don’t want to be part of the whole gallery thing….you never wanted to do it for anything but the art. You don’t want to violate your principles and prostitute yourself and your work! Why do you need the input of other artists? You know exactly what you want to do! Look at all the oney and time you are wasting when you could be painting! That’s what you really love." (Part of me still believes this, by the way.) Apathy is very convincing. After listening to all my repeatative arguments about not pursuing this stuff my dear friend and supporter Pam said, "Everything you say makes perfect sense and sounds real and I believe you…….but its a cop out."

I was feeling quite exhausted by this battle around last thursday. We were off to Norfolk and the whole trip Craig and I replayed it all again and again. Over the next few days I began to see stripped of skin all the major control issues I have especially with my artwork. I also have a really hard time trusting the leading and judgment of others. For all of us there are things that we cannot see without the insight of others. I learned that I am completely untrustworthy with determining the purpose of my work because I lie to myself and believe it so that I can have it my way and stay in control. This is hard to admit, by the way and I still feel the last vestiges of apathy like after one has a really greasy meal……I could go back for another one of those meals if I am not dilligent.

So the choice is laid before me. All my creeds about life choices I have believed over my whole life are now put to trial. So, one more time to the printers today……..wish me luck.

Asalin keeping me company on my bed of decision…

Craig and I celebrated our sixth anniversary sunday. Our wonderful friends Paul and Nic gave us full use of their home, pool and hot tub over the weekend while they were off to Boston. Really nice. They are probably the most generous folks I have ever met always having us over for dinner and letting us drink their alcohol. It was a nice break from being so focused on wanting to start a new painting and feeling the discomfort of that waiting.

But it’s time once again for the between paintings slump…… I can tell when I sleep more, but get less quality sleep. Lots of push and pull within the realm of the business and the potential new painting. I do feel like I am in the third trimester of a pregnancy. Huge. Miserable. Uncomfortable. ‘Phobetor’ is still forming in the dark…….but he will come forth. It’s inevitable.
I am working on the gallery database today in lieu of any birth pangs. I am not sure whether to smile or cry (see?!). Most of the work is so uncompelling yet is represented in a gallery…..uugghh. Makes me feel pretty good about my work, but not so good about my prospects. I have a real negative bent today, so maybe the gallery surfing is a bad idea.
After many false starts with the brochure (more than is natural, if you ask me) hopefully they will got o press this week. This is a really important project to get on the road. So, I continue to work on the database………(sigh).