This watercolor painting, The Flight, was completed as a two-step maneuver. First, I laid out the background to the painting as wet-on-wet watercolors, so that the ocean, beach sand and light would move back and forth as a series of reflections. Once dried, I superimposed the birds in flight, using a combination of watercolor and ink.
In my earlier attempts to paint these birds, I figured out their positions and got them arranged and interacting with the water in useful ways, but still felt that there was more to do than simply positioning. Somehow, the division between birds and water held and I wanted them to be more intertwined. I wanted the birds to be in transition to flight and to represent this by mixing the various approaches to water, the concept of time, the colors of reflections, making it more chaotic. This time, I feel that I got the movement back into the painting as I had initially wanted.
Using this same technique of wet-on-wet followed by ink, I also painted the birds in a more regal way, as they stand, pre-positioned in the water for flight, but not yet moving. The colors of the background are less agitated with reds, and the birds are positioned more stably in the water.
Feeding Time Watercolor and ink
What did I learn from this exercise? I learned that it takes patience to incorporate new techniques into paintings.
I feel that I am finally back on track for painting with my natural style, but with the privilege of understanding some new techniques recently learned from exchanges with other painters. Taking lessons and studying under other painters both digs up new ideas, and also dredges up old habits, allowing these new ideas and old habits to interact, creating new opportunities, but also feelings of frustration.
I am happy to continue working across these two major zones of learning and intuition with new paintings, and am thankful for the lessons learned.
A young Afghani girl, perhaps 10 years old, tries to see the group of foreigners who are traveling through her village. The walking paths between the rural homes are small which does not allow her to get close enough to see what is happening. Other curious onlookers, who also want to see, crowd around the team leaving the young girl on the periphery.
I was leading a United Nations team of international demographers and statisticians, visiting Afghanistan on a potential census assessment, when the frustrated and curious little girl caught my eye.
I noticed her as we were walking a very narrow path when she ran through a back alley and moments later appeared on the roof of a low building next to us. As our team moved forward to visit homes, she kept showing up on the next straw roof. I saw that she was jumping from roof to roof in order to keep up with us. The distance between homes was not far, but she was still brave to be doing so. I was amused by her persistence and quickly photographed her while she knelt down on the roof to watch us. She gave me a shy, satisfied smile, knowing that from her position she could see everything.
Here I am with Kabul, Afghanistan in the background. Photo from census mission, 2003
Since then, I have wondered many times what has happened to her. It was 2003 and she must have been about 10 years old. Now, if she has survived, she is close to 30. Time has marched on, but things are still not easy for the people of Afghanistan. I often wonder, where is she now and how has she fared? Women have recently been ordered by the Taliban, the current government, to cover their faces once again. She is likely wearing the burqa, or bright blue robe that is worn over a woman’s face and body when she is outside of the home, or in the presence of strangers.
When I paint such memories, I am not sure whether to call them paintings, or portraits, or illustrated short stories. But whatever they are, they are often about children whom I care about and wish that I had a better way to keep track of. These children, like the clouds that float by after a heavy rain, or like quick creek waters in the spring that noisily rush by, come and go so quickly, yet they leave lasting effects on the mind. Painting this Afghani girl portrait brings her back to life. I see her wonderful smile again. I remember the palette of her life colors.
Children at Work
Yes, there is artistic beauty in the faces of these rural Afghani children, in their soft beige clothing, adding interest to the modest brown environments in which they live, the mud huts, the clay homes, the straw roofs. The sky above shoots light streams through the nearby foothills of the mountains adding reflective color which further contributes interest to the even-toned homes and softness of people’s clothing and faces, especially at sunrise and sunset.
Below is a combination of photos taken during that 2003 United Nations mission showing the palette that I chose for my painting of this Afghani girl. It is a palette largely of soft browns composed from earth reds and marine blues, with the added bright blues of a woman’s robe.
Palette chosen for this painting
So, here she is, my little girl, this high achiever, who was curious, interested and ready to learn, and certainly very motivated to see what was going on in her unusually disrupted rural village by these teams of foreigners.
I exaggerated the color of the sky to juxtapose it more seriously against the girl’s soft earth reds and browns by mixing marine blue and bright cobalt, to highlight the feeling that one has when one sees the enormous contrast between the color of the sky above and the foothills, the mudded homes and the brown-toned clothing of many people walking the streets.
In this particular painting, I use this improbable blue color to suggest her possible future as a woman tucked under a blue robe, face covered, rather than as she is seen in the portrait, young and free and covered by the bright blue sky.
In the last six months, I have painted the same canvas numerous times, to reflect on my feelings during this Global Pandemic. It is an old, used canvas that I purchased at Goodwill for a couple of dollars. In the beginning, I painted the entire canvas white with Gesso and then began to use my oils to describe how I feel.
It all started with a celebratory painting filled with color and exploding with light, when things were looking good, the first major surge of COVID illness subsiding, people standing in long lines to get vaccinated, distances softening and it looked as though the pandemic was coming to a conclusion….but
Early Sunrise
It followed with a shift in color and emphasis based on the fact that there was a significant portion of the population refusing to be vaccinated even when vaccines were offered for free. Ironically, there are numerous individuals in other places eager to be vaccinated, without any access to vaccinations at all. The blues began settling in.
The Blues
Pausing with bright colors to consider whether the fog will ever lift, whether we will ever make it to the other side of this global pandemic, whether it might be better to soften colors and expectations even further.
Fog Settles In
Gliding softly into sadness about what would happens next, darker blues, softer light, yet still appreciating the silence of ever shifting remoteness.
Night of Darkness
Stuck in gloom as reality hits hard, floating in dark waters, far away from realizing the end of the pandemic. Many more lives are unnecessarily lost, years of schooling missed, food sources cut short, distribution systems weakened, life expectancies shortened, quality of living amended again, even farther, bending to the severe isolation and rapid surge of hospitalizations and deaths, mostly of the unvaccinated, during the pandemic.
Doomed
Hope is lost, the painting reflects on shapeless darkness. In some ways, this particular painting was very satisfying, as I lost myself in the darkness covering the entire canvas in dark blacks, reds and blues.
Then, the painting returns to shape and form, but this time, without much sentimentality. This time, it is based on the assumption that life is short, and that today is all there is.
My conclusion? Any painting we may do about this pandemic is true to life, each varied color and mood may be augmented for differential emphasis on our interpretation as to how things are going.
Not a Chance, But Life is Short
These are my ups and downs of painting during a global pandemic.
I hope that you enjoyed this reading these short notes on painting my way through pandemic blues and may consider sharing your own experiences on this notably historical event as well.
We may no longer write long paper letters, but we do know how to blog our way through tough times.
A big part of the enjoyment of art for me, is playing with ideas.
Front yard in moonlight, Abaco, personal photoEdited version, more focused on lightInterpreted scene, oilsInterpreted scene, inkInterpreted scene, Water colorPersonal Photo of our front yard, Abacos
Do I go forward with an oil painting of this, with more vivid colors?
Or should I play with something even more abstract?
What will be gained from taking this to a different concept of artistic thought?
Will anything be learned about its value as a setting?
If I do take such a leap, how can I add to the idea of luminescence?
What is it that lures artists to repeat paintings, differently?
Part of the beauty of gardens are all the hiding places for baby birds who can’t yet fly, for small animals seeking safety while nibbling at low greenery, protecting busy bees and butterflies settling into cooler places during the hottest part of the day. I find when painting these darker places, that they point like arrows to colorful flowers, often contrasting the showers of light that shoot carefree through grasses, and sometimes pointing straight up to daisies announcing, “over here”, “over here” to thirsty birds in need of the bird bath.
This is an oil painting on canvas, 20″ x 24″. My husband asked for the painting before I even took it off the easel in my art studio. I think that he likes it.
Landscapes we paint, no matter how big or small, are wondrous moments witnessed through our abstraction.
When thought of this way, there is nothing real about a landscape, other than the fact that light is shifting, objects are reflecting and atmosphere hovering, and we experience constant movement of ideas and thought, while traveling through these variable, natural compositions.
Nature is for painters, our most wild and beautiful challenge. Lucky for us, nature is everything, and we have many opportunities to paint, to write, or simply observe its amazing show.
There is no right or wrong painting or poem as all abstractions are personal.
Knowing this, brings freedom of our own thoughts and choices of shifting moments we remember.
There are people whom I carry with me, in my head and my heart. I am finding the time, through my paintings, to bring them back into view.
Street children have lingered in my memory for decades. In this case, I recollect two boys playing cards on a heavily utilized footpath near the dhobi ghats where their parents were working as laundry washers, on the streets of Mumbai, India. I call this painted moment, “Unity.“
I took notes describing the scene.
“The boys play their game as though they are alone. Yet, in fact, they are surrounded by people swiftly walking past them. The boy’s feet touch, defining their play area. The sidewalk patterns mimic the shape of their feet and legs, further symbolizing the boys’ sense of land ownership and unity.”
Personal notes
“Unity”, Oil painting
I took a quick photo of the people walking nearby.
Walking area, personal photo
Most likely, the children’s parents were working in the dhobi ghats where laundry workers wash and dry clothing. The urban work space looks like this.
Personal photo of Mahalaxmi Dhobi Ghat area, Mumbai, India
Each laundry washer, or dhobi, has a small area to work from where clothing and bedding are washed and hung them out to dry.
Clothing drying on lines, Mumbai, India, personal photo
Children are around the scene, and on the streets, as many of their living arrangements are very nearby. In some cases, children are living on the sides of streets, with family members, some under difficult conditions.
Children living on the streets of Mumbai, India, personal photoHome of mother and son, on the side of a busy street, Mumbai, India, personal photo
Cars and trucks hurriedly stream by some of these tiny home shelters.
Street shelters, Mumbai, India, personal photo
Successfully capturing the surrounding light and colors, depicting the boys’ levels of intimacy, illuminating their likely concerning situation and yet at the same time, highlighting the strength and endurance of these children, abstractly, is the challenge for this painting.
Work developing ideas for this oil painting are showing in an earlier blog, here. This oil painting has been completed during the period of time that I have been taking the art class called Painting on the Edge taught by Michael Orwick, offered through the Oregon Society of Artists.
Somewhere between the art of tonalism and luminism is a painting of all the colors seen on the horizon at the moment of sunrise. It depicts the time when a night-darkened horizon line breaks loose from the underground with bright light. Colors go from soft grey to white streams of light that allow colors to jettison through the atmosphere, bouncing onto the grounds and waters below.
It is a moment of rainbow color craziness, lasting only a few seconds before the plain morning light breaks, leaving the simpler blues and yellows of breakfast sunshine.
An en plein air painter might have 10 seconds to observe the shifting array of sunrise colors.
Photography and painting alter it, limited by the technology, techniques and mechanisms used to depict it.
I call this painting, Alone Together.
These sketches were completed during the period of time that I have been taking the art class called Painting on the Edge taught by Michael Orwick, offered through the Oregon Society of Artists.
Calligraphic messages seem to be everywhere in nature. They emerge from our natural surroundings and are etched into our consciousness.
By referring to “nature’s calligraphy”, I refer to a form of art that is inspired by nature, yet looks like handwriting or calligraphy, and has artistic implications that go beyond the written word.
Sauvie Island Calligraphy, oil painting on birch wood
How do I ever know what to paint when standing in such beautiful natural scenery? Where does land end and water begin? What color is the in-between?
I know by my feelings when to start painting. I will sense when that moment is here.
It is when my eyes stop at a point, where I ponder what I see, where I wonder how this place even exists it is so ephemeral. Then it is time to paint.
This quiet moment is in March and occurs while walking off-road at Sauvie Island, near Portland, Oregon We are standing in a field, looking at almost still waters. The scrub bushes and small trees on the other side of the pond are sending what looks like a calligraphic message, punctuated by clouds.
It is our first time out in a long time, owing to COVID constraints. This is also a global pandemic moment for us, an outing free of other people, social-distancing not required.
There is no noise, but for soft sounds of birds. It is a perfect moment.
It is now a painted moment.
In my mind’s eye, I see this same scene in another way, as calligraphy.
I plan to paint this again, but in a much wilder, simpler way, via the style of a notan.
The above painting was completed during the period of time that I have been taking the art classes of Michael Orwick, offered by the Oregon Society of Artists.
marysgardens 