Cartography for Creativity

I am going to take a short break -- about a week -- and when I return to the blog, I'll start analyzing the inspirations for the past 25 or so paintings.

Maybe by categorizing the inspirations and finding out what they have in common, we can come up with a road map to creativity!

Hope all of you are enjoying the start of another beautiful autumn.

Rusting Near Monticello

A 2007 visit to a ranch north of Monticello, New Mexico provided lots of photo opps. One sight that got my attention was two old cars, rusting away in someone's barnyard.  I took several photos of the old cars and filed the photos. A friend of mine liked the pix, too, and did this collage, which she called "Gentlemen: Start Your Engines."

"Gentlemen:  Start Your Engines!"

Then, this past summer I attended a Sterling Edwards workshop in Cloudcroft, New Mexico. In preparation for the workshop, I dug through my pile of resource photos and came up with this one, then added it to my workshop materials.

At the workshop, I pulled the photo out to work from for one of the exercises. The painting is little more than a sketch, but somehow a sense of humor and a flavor of the place came through.

"Rusting Near Monticello"

I couldn't resist putting the ravens in -- ravens are everywhere in the canyon! Enjoy!

Inspiration:  More old New Mexico stuff -- cars rusting away in the yard, New Mexico colors, and ravens!

Two Souls, One Heart

From the first time I saw rock art in New Mexico, I was enchanted. Whether the people who made them ever thought they would be seen in another, far distant time, or maybe just thought of them like today's "taggers" think of their messages, we'll probably never know. But from my perspective, as a viewer in the 21st century, they are messages from the past. And just what the message says is left up to my interpretation -- reader relevance way beyond what my literature professor was talking about in freshman world literature.

The square shouldered anthropomorphic figure - single or in groups - is a theme that appears in rock art all over the world, covering many centuries of time. So it seems to be a theme that is common to all people.

"Two Souls, One Heart"

I find these themes and images so universal, so personal that they must be part of my own work. It's important, I think, not to literally copy the designs of other people and time, but by picking up the general idea of the image and placing it in my work together with my techniques and ideas, I'm extending the theme even farther.

"Two Souls, One Heart" was inspired by anthropomorphic figures in a group, combined with an ethereal background and ladders -- another image from a distant time that still has meaning for us. I like how it turned out, and may re-interpret the idea in the future.

Inspiration:  Rock art images from another time.

Serenity Calling

Today, I am wishing for a simpler, less complicated life. Maybe that's what drew me to this painting -- it reminds me of a time when, as children, my sister and I depended on each other and on a less complicated environment for entertainment.

One game we played will be recognized by many of you. One sister would pick a yellow flower (usually a dandelion in our world), hold it just beneath the chin of the other and look for the yellow reflection. If it was there, the answer to the question "do you like butter?" was "Yes!"  (Of  course, the yellow reflection was always there.)

Here in the high desert, if there has been sufficient water the autumn prior, springtime presents us with acres of yellow flowers -- California poppies. That sight took me straight back to childhood one day and I felt compelled to paint it.

"Do You Like Butter?"

The answer to the question is "Yes!"  Who doesn't like butter? And I like the peaceful, unspoiled landscape just north of my home, approximated here in "Do You Like Butter?"  I'm praying for rain now so we'll have poppies next spring!

Inspiration:  Memories of a simpler time, juxtaposed with that gorgeous New Mexico landscape.

Pieces of the Past

Just a short walk around the Gila Wilderness area where I was last weekend reminded me again of the connection between the folks who lived there perhaps a thousand years ago, and those who use the land today. Fragments of tools, burned rocks from fires, shards of black and white Mimbres pottery, as well as nails, hinges, horseshoes and other historic items lie all about. Each little piece is a tiny message from the past. If we put them all together, we can read the script of the land during man's occupation of it.

"Sprung"

"Sprung" started out as a painting. The idea was a blossoming prickly pear, coming up through the pieces of an old Mimbres bowl. I wasn't completely happy with the painting, and added some cactus pads and blossoms to make it a better composition.

I like the painting - it speaks to me about the continuity of everything -- life continuing.

Inspiration:  Pieces of the past juxtaposed with life today.

Still Wishing for Rain

One of the neatest features of our beautiful New Mexico skies is that we can see for so many miles. Without trees and large buildings to get in the way, the skies and the horizons get their full due.

And when what is in the sky and on the horizon is rain and the promise of rain, we can get really excited. Our expected annual rainfall here in southwest New Mexico is only about 10 inches. According to the digital rain gauge on our patio, we've only received a little over an inch and a half in the last 12 months. That makes images of rain so much more precious.

When I was a child, my mother sometimes explained what was happening in the skies according to the way she had been taught in eastern Nebraska. Rain seen from a distance often appears to be falling diagonally, due to the accompanying wind. The Indians (nearby Sioux -- or Lakota -- people) called that "walking rain," she told me.  I loved that description.

So when I saw walking rain that appeared to be red and pink, falling onto the nearby Robledo Mountains from riotous violet, orange and gray clouds, I was mesmerized.

"Red Walking Rain"

Great Spirit, send some of that rain walking this way!

Inspiration:  More New Mexico skies, color and wonder.

Instant Recognition

I create papers for collage without any idea of what the papers will eventually become. Just to enjoy the process is enough. Brilliant colors and unexpected textures are pure pleasure to me.

Textures are created through an endless variety of techniques. The brilliant orange and pink in the sky of this piece was created by pushing and wrinkling plastic wrap onto wet paint and then leaving it to dry. When I saw the dry piece later, I recognized the gorgeous colors of a New Mexico sunset. Then I recalled watching the swooping and diving silhouettes of nighthawks as they chased insects at sunset.

Photo courtesy of Kim Taylor http://www.flickr.com/photos/kim/6134931718/

I cut silhouette nighthawk shapes from various shades of blue and gray, then moved them around on the sunset background until I was pleased with the rhythm.

"Nighthawks at Sunset"

The mountains in the distant background were made by tearing shapes from grays and tans.

Inspiration:  Pure joy in the New Mexico sunset and in the paper colors and textures.

Beauty of the Desert at Night

Sacred Datura (datura stramonium) is a beautiful -- and deadly -- plant that grows all over the Southwest. Its beautiful, trumpet-shaped blossoms have a delicate, feminine scent. It seems impossible that all parts of the plant are deadly.

But it's true, and this fact seems to add so much mystery to the plant. And the sphynx moths that enjoy a special relationship with them are mysterious, too. These moths have very long tongues, which they use to sip the nectar at the bottom of the night-blooming datura. Some of the sphynx moths have red eyes, which adds even more to their mystery!

We have a large datura plant that grows on the east side of our home. The fragrance that wafts on the summer night air is intoxicating. I love to go outside at night and look at the blossoms and the moths.

One night, several years ago, when I could not sleep, I went outside to look at the large plant. There were so many blossoms, it was staggering. I decided to count them, and came up with an astounding 235! Absolutely amazing.

"Sacred Datura and Sphynx Moths"

Inspiration:  Beauty and mystery of the desert night.

Crossing the Centuries

Ancient pottery has always been particularly interesting and inspiring to me. I study the designs for relevance to more contemporary arts, and I look at the bowls and  pots, trying to guess how they were used and by whom. To me, these old artifacts are an instant connection between me and the women who made them, perhaps a thousand years ago. I listen for the whisper of voices from the past, I try to imagine the smells from the simple kilns, I wonder what was cooked or stored in the pots and bowls. Perhaps a woman like me designed a pattern that reminded her of a celebration or of favorite grandchildren or perhaps the design was a prayer for rain or healing or safety.

"Summer Bouquet"

"Summer Bouquet" started out as a painting featuring the black-on-white ancient pot with large white flowers in an oblique movement against a blue and violet background. Then I began to add layers and layers of flowers and twigs in different sizes, colors and shapes.

As I added in the layers in different colors and shapes, I tried to think of the beautiful wildflowers that grow in our desert!

Inspiration:  Beauty from the present (the flowers) combined with beauty and mystery from the past (the pot). 

Prickly Beauty

It's been said that cactus flowers are among the most beautiful flowers in the world. I think I agree with that. So amazing that these tough desert dwellers with vicious spines produce such beautiful blossoms. The common prickly pear is no exception.

Opuntia macrorhiza

I love the beautiful, ruffled yellow, gold and red flowers that appear in April (if we've had enough rain!) and continue into early summer. Bees and hummingbirds also like them!

"Prickly Beauty"

To show off the yellow flowers to their best advantage, I chose a violet and blue background. I layered the cactus pads, added some fruits and then scratched out thorns!

Inspiration: Another desert dweller, compelling and beautiful despite its nasty spines!

Takes my Breath Away!

That's how I felt when I walked out the door of the conference center at Sagebrush Inn in Taos, one April evening. Gasp! The moon was barely hovering above the sunset, only a fingernail showing. The sky was a real Tequila Sunrise (sunset!) of orange, pink and gold, with a smoky-red smudge just below the clouds, from forest fires to the west. Above the clouds, the stars were beginning to pop out. Wow. Absolutely breathtaking.

Anyone who paints would have been compelled to paint that. I couldn't help myself. I returned to my room, got out paints and did my best to commit the scene to paper.

The breathtaking skies of New Mexico have been, and continue to be, a source of inspiration for me. I never tire of watching them change throughout the day and into the evenings. Gorgeous night skies are just as compelling as the sunrises and sunsets. When it comes to BIG SKY COUNTRY, Montana's got nothin' on us!

Inspiration:  New Mexico sunset. Need I say more?

Glorious Color

Ask me, on any day, to list the visual stimuli I respond most strongly to, and color is always going to be at or very near the top of the list. Scanning memories of all kinds -- from early childhood to recent, happy to sad, easy to traumatic -- a prominent feature in almost all of them will be color. I can recall the color of dresses I wore at six; a dream of a blue cup, age seven; golden aspen against violet mountains, age 10; a boyfriend's eyes, age 16; pink cheeks and blue eyes of my baby daughter, 35 years ago...  Why color impacts my emotion so strongly and remains stored in memory, I don't know. I suspect one day we'll learn how the electro-chemical action of light hitting and reflecting and being received by our optic nerves burns data onto our physical "memory chips." 

For now, it's enough just to revel in color of all hues, intensities and values.

That's what I was doing when I made "Ocean Wave." Reveling in color. I had just discovered how to create watercolor papers intense colored, in a range of textures from smooth to rich. Cutting the papers into shapes and placing them next to each other was exciting. So I did a lot of it, and continue to do that in my collages.

"Ocean Wave"

"Ocean Wave" was the first in a long series of cut-paper collages based on antique quilt block designs. Frankly, the first and the best. I do wish I could re-capture where my head was when I did this, because I love the richness of it. 

Inspiration:  Color, and the rhythm of the geometric pattern.

Mugging for the Camera

When I was in college, my painting instructors gave me a hard time about wanting to paint something from a photograph -- and it wasn't MY photograph. I thought they were being difficult and I thought I could overcome the obstacle and make a great painting anyway. It took several years before I realized what they were really talking about. It goes WAY beyond the issue of copying someone else's work. It has to do with relevance. In other words, MY ability to relate to something I hadn't seen. How can you have an emotional response, really have something to say about a thing you've never seen or a place you've never been? The answer is simple: you really can't.  I finally got that.

"Mogollon Mugs"

"Mogollon Mugs" (Mogollon is pronounced muggy-own) was a big challenge because I've never actually seen the mask faces at Hueco Tanks, where masks similar to these are painted inside a cave, where they have been protected from the elements for hundreds of years.

I WANT to see them, I just haven't had the opportunity yet. So why DID I decide to paint THESE "mugs?"   I felt an instant connection - maybe through humor and a continuity of human experience - when I saw photos of them. They are so much fun, they gave me an appreciation for the human-ness of the Mogollon people who painted them in that cave.

And I set an even bigger challenge for myself by trying to combine a semi-realistic painting with the "quilt block" collage technique. It sure wasn't easy. I wanted to convey rhythm and a sense of fun. The black-on-white patterns mimic ancient Mimbres Mogollon ceramics, setting up a frenzied rhythm. The primary palette I chose for the masks is simple and fun. And stacking the masks in a totem arrangement, I think, strengthens the whole idea.

Inspiration:  pictograph images that transcend time, speaking to us today about our connection with people of another time.

Music in the Night

In the wee hours this morning, having trouble sleeping again, I ventured out to the patio. Usually it is the twinkling stars in the night sky that command attention. But this morning, sounds got my attention -- the sounds of coyotes yipping and singing in unison.

Many nights, here in the Chihuahuan Desert, we are treated to a symphony of sounds made by our local wildlife -- not only coyotes, but owls, crickets, and unidentifiable others.

One night a few years ago, listening to this night-time symphony, I imagined dancing spirits from ages past when native people who lived here recognized the power in those same sounds.

"Night Music"

"Night Music" is about the mystical power in our gorgeous desert nights -- dark skies, twinkling stars, a luminous moon, invigorating scents of datura and desert willow, and the mesmerizing songs of fellow creatures.

Inspiration:  Alternately chilling and pleasing sounds of the night here in New Mexico.

Going with the Flow

Sometimes I find a process so enjoyable that I get lost in it and forget all about going in any certain direction -- I just go, letting the process carry me along.

"Orgullosa" started out that way. (Orgullosa means "haughty" or "prideful.") The process used the polyester "spider webs" and dropped on, brushed on, dripped and splattered liquid watercolors. I avoided a large area away from the center, trying to keep it light and mostly paint free. For the rest, I chose a mostly warm palette with deep magenta and golds, allowing the colors to mingle any way they wanted.

When the paint was dry, I removed the polyester webbing and admired the interesting colors and textures that resulted. I turned the paper 'round and 'round, waiting for it to speak to me. At some point, it said "I look like purple lace." Those were the magic words. I remembered a photo I had taken of a friend, years before, posing with a purple lace mantilla. My friend, a native New Mexican, had some classically Spanish facial characteristics which reminded me of a painting my mother had owned in the 1960's. That old painting, also a watercolor, was painted by a Santo Domingo artist who taught at the junior high in Santa Fe where my father taught. Dad's friend offered Mom a painting one day, and she chose a picture of a dark-eyed Spanish lady, standing in front of a window, admiring a rosary. For some reason, that image always haunted me. Perhaps it was those haughty Spanish eyes...

"Orgullosa"

After I decided WHAT the underpainting would become, I began to pull the face out of the background, identifying the turn of the head, the lift of the shoulder. Because I'm not a particularly accomplished portrait artist, the process was laborious. But bit by bit, the haughty lady appeared, proudly showing off her purple lace mantilla and letting the viewer know exactly what she thinks of him!

Inspiration: Recognition of a couple of old images, already stored in my memory, combined with the enjoyment of a fun and interesting technique.

Sensual Overload

Some PLACES are magical, pulling expression from me with a wave of their magic wands. Mogollon is one of those places. My husband and I did the "ghost town tour" in 2007, visiting about 15 southwest New Mexico communities in various stages of abandonment. Of course Mogollon was on the tour.

Seven and a half years after that first visit to Mogollon, snapshots of moments there pop into my mind, begging to be expressed.  The little tin house that teetered on a rocky hill was one of those snapshots that just wouldn't wait. Everything, it seemed, was filling up my senses: crisp, cool air scented by huge pines; sparkling light playing hide and seek in the trees and winking at me through the cloud that had settled around us; birds of all kinds calling to each other from treetops and gliding down to grab goodies -- these and many other sensations were waving the magic wand.

"Tin House at Mogollon"

The painting begain with  wet-into-wet layers of liquid watercolors and acrylic inks. I had fun just watching the colors mingle and resist. After the paper was dry, I re-wet it and floated in some white acrylic ink to approximate the cloud that had wreathed the area. Then I cut the pieces for the little house, bushes, rocks and birds, and moved them around to find the best arrangement. When those decisions had been made, all was glued down and left to dry. Finally, I used paints to add details.

I like the finished painting. It takes me straight back to that gorgeous morning in Mogollon.


Inspiration:  the magical place, magical moment. Sensual overload. 

Wind Horse to the Rescue

Another workshop, another day. This one was in Cloudcroft, New Mexico, hosted by the local arts group. The lady teaching the one-day class had been painting and teaching for a long time, and had a loyal following.

Although I don't recall any of the instruction, or what she was trying to impart to us that day, I do remember she wanted us to paint a floral in a way that was unfamiliar and uncomfortable for me. I responded again by cutting up the painting! (Hmmmmm.....is there a pattern here?)

I must have been looking at some Buddhist prayer flags somewhere that week; they were wafting through my mind. I began cutting banner shapes and pinning them to some scribbly lines strung obliquely across the now-defunct floral.

"Prayers on the Wind"

Later, at home, I cut more banner shapes in some orange and gold mulberry papers and added them to the line. The floral in the background all but disappeared, making a lovely textured backdrop for the flapping flags. I think the painting is a great success, and so did the friend who bought it and hung it in her home.

Inspiration:  Almost automatic, unconscious response to a frustrating situation. The images I used were things I'd seen recently, and something which I already had a strong emotional connection to.

Artistic License

This painting is an example of bringing together elements from different times and places.

The rusty, old car - a 1928 Ford 5-window coupe - was rusting away in a yard near Cloudchief, Oklahoma. Because I've always been charmed by old cars and trucks, I told my husband "Stop! I want to take a picture of THAT!" Of course, the ravens weren't roosting on it, and the green stuff around it was Oklahoma green stuff, not sagebrush and chamisa. Those elements I found on various trips through New Mexico. But they combined nicely with the car, and I named the picture accordingly: "Saved by the Sage" (referring to the car, of course).

"Saved by the Sage"

So often I feel compelled to paint or collage something I've seen in travels. But the inspiring object or sight doesn't always occur in surroundings that are aesthetically pleasing, or even interesting. I have to transport the thing that compels me to paint it into an environment that supports it and appreciates it.

This is called "artistic license." My paintings aren't documents, architectural renderings or botanical illustrations. They MIGHT be called a snapshot -- but they are a snapshot of my impressions, feelings, and responses to something. What is "real" is up for interpretation -- maybe "real" is how I "really" feel, not necessarily what someone else might see or feel.

Inspiration:  An emotional response to an object, combined with elements that support it in a different setting.

An Ah-Ha! Moment

We all hear people talk about light bulb moments, but I've had very few of my own. I don't know if that's because I'm too dense to recognize the moment of enlightenment when it's presented, or maybe I'm such a know-it-all that I'm not receptive.

At any rate, I did have one HUGE light bulb moment about 12 years ago while attending a painting workshop at Ghost Ranch in northern New Mexico.  The teacher had us painting rocks -- something that really didn't interest me. Rocks would probably never show up on my list of inspirational subjects!

Totally frustrated with my painting, but recognizing what needed to be different compositionally, I began to tear the painting apart and move the pieces around. I had no glue with me, so I used the hand stapler to staple the pieces around the edge. Wowee! Something with a lot more texture, more depth, more INTEREST began to appear. The light bulb came on. At that moment, I recognized collage as a tool for me to get the texture and depth that had been lacking in my paintings.

"Venus Setting Over Red Rocks"

I felt like I'd gotten a B-12 injection, rejuvenated, renewed, re-energized. I couldn't wait to get home and get started making more collages with torn papers. The really amazing part of this whole process was that when I studied art in college, I did not like or appreciate collage as a medium. It wasn't anything that interested me. Most of the collages I had seen were really assemblages of found-object papers -- old movie tickets, pieces of wallpaper or newspaper, uninteresting photographs. I did not aspire to be a collage artist. So the discovery that collage could be used in a more representative way was a shock to me!

Inspiration:  The "ah-ha!" moment - a complete surprise, but fortunately one I was awake for. Seeing old things in a different light was the trigger.

A Few of My Favorite Things

As the exhibitions chair for our local watercolor society, and as a teacher and coach to people who enter various exhibitions, I often hear complaints about required themes. Many people don't like them and consider them to be unnecessary and perhaps even unfair. They may be interpreting the theme too literally and therefore see it as confining.

I see required themes as being challenging -- in a good way. The theme is like a place to start, a spark that gets my locomotive engine going. Then, if I am able to stay on the track, I'll get where I'm going. "Scorpius Cryptoluna" was at the end of one of those tracks. A local gallery, which presents a juried, themed show each Fall, offered this challenge a few years ago:  "Celestial Seasons." Works had to have some connection with 'heavenly bodies or seasons.'

My response to the challenge ultimately resulted in a work that combined some of my favorite things: night skies, the moon, a raven, and yellow roses. There was literally nothing that connected these four things, other than the fact that they are things I love. Figuring out how to combine them in a painting amounted to choosing a color shceme (in this case, complementary - violet and yellow), creating shapes in various sizes and moving them around until something clicked.

"Scorpius Cryptoluna"

Once I had settled on the colors to be used and the position of the objects, I started the background/underpainting by masking out with adhesive plastic the lightest areas -- the moon and the yellow roses -- and creating an ethereal, fluid blue and violet wash liberally sprinkled with coarse salt while the paint was wet. After the wash was bone dry, I  brushed the salt away, removed the adhesive plastic, and sketched in the shapes of all the elements. The rest is no more than a combination of painting techniques -- wet in wet, dry brush, glazing and more glazing. It took a while to figure out what to push and what to pull.

I like the finished painting. It has a lot of value change, an interesting color palette, good arrangement of elements, and MYSTERY!

Inspiration:  Here it was the challenge, which I responded to by combining a few of my favorite things.

Prayers Answered

"Prayers Answered"  seems so appropriate for right now -- with only 1.52" of rain in the last 11 months, we are praying for rain daily.

Living in the desert has given me a greater appreciation for the connection and synergy between all things -- the day-to-day struggle for life, stark beauty and ugly pain, florescence, harvest, hunger, and death. Nowhere else is the cycle of dry and rain so apparent.

The native people who lived here for perhaps as long as 15,000 years before the Europeans came had an intimate relationship with the land that was so dependent on rainfall -- even more so after agriculture came to be crucial to their survival. Rainfall was affiliated with life and therefore with fertility.

My collage, "Prayers Answered," just evolved one day as I listened to some Native American flute music, cut images out of old monoprints and paintings, overlapped and juxtaposed colors and shapes.  I let the colors, shapes and textures tell me how to use each piece. A dark piece created with polyester cobwebbing became a night sky with lightning. Birth figures from a monoprint combined with flowers from a monoprint and a shaman figure cut from gold colors.

"Prayers Answered"

I think the final work is one of deep mystery and plain answers -- the connections between prayers and rain, spirituality, life and death.

Inspiration:  Mysterious and compelling images, colors and textures; a deep appreciation of the cycle of life and death in the desert.

Morning Joy

Today's painting is a cut- and torn-paper collage that resulted from a moment of pure joy when our grandson, Chance, was visiting about six years ago.

We rose early to enjoy the cool desert morning by watching the sunrise and drinking "Mexican Coffee" made with coffee, milk, brown sugar and cinnamon. In the picture, Chance is sitting on the low stone wall that divides our dooryard from the desert scrub. To his left - on the north - are the Dona Ana Mountains. The sunrise is so brilliant it wraps half-way round to the west.

I began with an underpainting in pinks and reds that looked so much like the desert sunrise. Mountain silhouettes were cut from various brown and rust papers. I did try to make the mountain shapes look just right, so they would be recognizable as the Dona Anas. The creosote bush is assembled from many pieces of green in different shades, interlaced with some thin, graceful branches of brown. I really struggled with how to do Chance, cutting, painting and discarding several before settling on this version. I wanted everyone to be able to recognize what's going on - a young blonde boy drinking from a mug. I had to simplify, simplify, simplify and then add many layers of watercolor glazes to strengthen the modeling on the figure.

I really like the way this painting turned out. Whenever I see it, I'm reminded of that beautiful morning and my heart nearly bursts with love for my darling grandson.

"I Love Mornings!"

Inspiration:  just a few of my most favorite things, my most favorite time of day. A snapshot of pure emotion.

A Labor of Love

"Grandmother's Fan" is a very old quilt block pattern that can be set together in several different ways, resulting in some designs with very appealing  names, like "Snake in the Hollow," "Fluttering Fans" and "Twirling Fans." It's one of very few patterns I like that aren't created from right triangles.

"Miss Miranda's Twirling Fans" was one of the earliest of my quilt block pattern works. Searching for papers that looked like printed fabrics, I turned to a stack of "failed" paintings. Then, carefully tracing around a template for the fan pieces and the negative spaces, I cut and sorted about 200 pieces by color and value.

 

 "Miss Miranda's Twirling Fans"

Next, I began to arrange the pieces, either alternating color and value or placing similar colors together. The "twirling fans" began to emerge. Fitting the pieces together was very difficult. Everything had to be just right, which wasn't easy. When the pieces are hand-cut with scissors, edges tend to not be perfectly straight. So I did a lot of trimming with an X-acto knife! When the painting was finished, it reminded me of pieced comforter tops my mom  made, using scraps from dresses and shirts she had sewed for us. Looking at the pieced work, I was reminded of the older paintings that were cut up to make the fan pieces.

The work belongs to my granddaughter Miranda, now. Surprise!

Inspiration: Once again, familiar images and items from my childhood, combined with a desire to create something special for my special granddaughter.

Rising Spirits

"Espiritu" began as a demonstration to our local chapter of the New Mexico Watercolor Society. Several of us had been asked to discuss ideas for salvaging or resolving "failed" paintings. I never have any shortage of THOSE!

"Espiritu"

For this work, I  chose two paintings that had nothing in common but a color scheme. One was a figurative work -- unusual for me -- created with dyed tissue papers in very dark values on top of a red-gold-orange wet-in-wet wash. The second work was of a stand of trees in brilliant golds and oranges against a cerulean blue and white sky. Neither work was finished, but although I thought there was nothing I could do to fix their problems, I loved the colors and couldn't throw them in the collage bin.

The technique I wanted to demonstrate was weaving two "failures" together. To do this successfully, the two paintings to be woven need to have something in common. I picked these two because of their color schemes. I decided on a kind of radial weave to support my idea of rising spirits, and began to cut one painting horizontally in kind of an arc. The second painting was more or less cut into vertical strips, but these I also curved to make a kind of wavering pattern.

After weaving all strips, I went back in with paints and strengthened the figures on the strips that were from the "trees" painting, then splattered the whole thing with white acrylic ink to get a little sparkle back in the piece.

I think the finished work is very successful; I like the effect of rising spirits and I still love the color scheme.

The inspiration here was responding to a challenge by using what was available, letting the piece evolve gradually.

Sensual Memory

This painting -- a collage, actually -- began with a wish to express something about corn and the Southwest. My childhood in the Midwest -- The Corn Belt -- acquainted me with green corn plants in the field. Cornfields were a familiar and everyday part of everyone's life there. I learned to know corn in sensual ways beyond just eating it. The smell of a freshly shucked ear, revulsion at borers spoiling beautiful ears, snapping and popping sounds of corn growing at night, seeing the stars  in a dark sky through the leaves and tassels, jumping away at the sudden pain of a cut when you brushed against a leaf the wrong direction -- all of these are ways of knowing corn that could only be learned in a corn field.

So later, studying anthropology, when I learned of corn's importance in early agriculture, I wasn't surprised at all. It seemed a matter of course.

Quilts were another everyday feature of life when I was young. One grandmother pieced quilt tops, the other made embroidered and appliqued quilts. Later, my mother began to piece tops. She and I spent many hours searching for antique pieced tops that she later made into quilts for the family. Quilts combined necessity with strong design and beauty.

In the mid-1990's, I began to create a series of collages based on antique quilt patterns. Maggie Malone's "1001 Patchwork Designs" has been inspirational for me ever since. I like to look for patterns that might work well together, as well as communicate something to my viewers.

"Corn, Beans and Squash"

I began by combining two patterns -- "Corn & Beans" and "Squash Blossom," using colors of sky and cornfield. Then using a simple Native American corn plant design, I began to paint corn stalks in a semi-opaque green on top of the quilt design. The result wasn't good -- somehow it didn't make a strong design statement and the corn plants sure weren't a good focal point. It needed something more -- much more.

Frantically digging through my stacks and piles of hand-colored collage papers, a bright red-orange with splatters of gold caught my eye. Just for grins, I cut out a stalk, leaves and tassel and tried it against the collage. Zowee! Just like popcorn! The magic happened, I finished the piece, framed it and entered it in the 2009 Black Range Fall Membership Show, where it was awarded first place.

The inspiration here seems to be a combination of things -- my own early experience, interest in anthropology and a basic need to accomplish strong design in my work.

A Wish for Enlightenment

The painting to be examined today began with an underpainting that was created "just for fun." Was my subconscious at work the whole time? I'll never know.

“Golden Heart of Bodhichitta”

In 2008 I attended a workshop in Cloudcroft, New Mexico, taught by Mary Ann Beckwith, a real visionary with new and interesting ideas, and a really great teacher. Among other techniques offered at this workshop, her polyester webbing technique interested me greatly.

When I returned home after the workshop, I continued to play with the technique, developing my own ways of using it. One idea that really appealed to me was that of pulling a latent image out of the background. In the raw beginning of what would eventually become this painting, I saw blood vessels against a glowing golden shape. The idea of a human heart occurred to me, and I worked to pull out the heart shape, complete with major vessels, by negatively painting around the heart with the darker teal and plum colors.

The heart began to emerge as a beating, living symbol of life and love and I thought of bodhichitta, a loving compassion dedicated to all life.

Inspiration: textures and colors that revealed themselves to me as a subject.


So in this instance, the underlying painting was already there, waiting to be revealed through interpretation by my own subconscious, perhaps. It makes me wonder if the same kind of quiet mind and just "being with" the painting would more often reveal a great subject...

Inspiration or Perspiration?

Thomas Edison said “Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration.”  This blog is about the one percent, the inspiration.

I have always been intensely interested in how and where artists get their ideas. And judging by the questions I am asked by students and people looking at my art, so are many others.

So, in an effort to discover how inspiration works, I decided to examine the process in a group of works for which I already know what the original inspiration was. Then maybe we could create an outline by seeing what is common among the group, and at the end, connect the dots!

“Current Residents of Dripping Springs”

Just east of Las Cruces, New Mexico, at Dripping Springs Canyon on the west side of the Organ Mountains, are the ruins of a late 1800’s resort built by an ex-officer of the Confederate Army, A. E. Van Patten. Not much remains but a partial building. Finding the setting and the idea of a resort up in the clean mountain air very engaging, I visited it a half dozen times between 1980 and 2000. During one visit, I was particularly intrigued by the idea that the only occupants in recent years have been wildlife and perhaps a few human spirits.

Taking this idea further, I created a crumbling wall, dark doorway and surrounding cactus that have encroached. My very favorite high desert dwellers are ravens, so they HAD to be there, along with the spirit of a fellow in a western hat, slouching just inside the doorway.

To make a lot of strong texture, I soaked 140-lb. watercolor paper, then wadded it tightly to create wrinkles and lines on the surface. Then I established the top outline of a crumbling adobe wall and filled in, painting negatively around tall and short cacti and the doorway, leaving plenty of white for sparkle here and there. The background canyon wall was painted with a large brush in blue and slate colors, the doorway filled in very dark. The last steps were painting in a variety of greens and golds for prickly vegetation, creating the ravens in a dark blue-black, and lifting out the spirit figure with a thirsty brush. Final touches included scraping and scratching out a few more whites around the cactus and making the spirit outline more indistinct.

Inspiration – a fascinating place and musings about who and what might remain after many years of human absence.

So the first thing to do is go out and find those places and sights that result in an emotional response!