unbound confine: September 2009

Friday, September 18, 2009

Hollyhocks

Today was a better day. Thanks to everyone who offered support. I appreciate it.

Yesterday was a challenging parenting day. Somehow I've gotten to where I have no local support network, no friends I can call when I need help. As a single parent, I needed someone's help yesterday so that I could take one kid to a party and leave the other one home. But I had no one to call.

We managed okay, the three of us. But I want better than okay. I need better than okay. For me, but especially for my daughters.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Thank you! Thank you!

Thank you to the generous reader who sent me these presents! Everyone loves presents. I'll let you choose whether to remain anonymous and please let me know if you'd like a drawing or painting in exchange for your generosity!

I have really wanted this Uri Shulevitz book since I stumbled upon a reference to it somewhere online. I first heard of him when I found the book One Monday Morning at a neighborhood tag sale.

I love his artwork. Here's my very sloppy video reading of it (complete with messy house in the background)...

I also want to thank Culture of Truth for giving me a highly coveted link at the big blue house.

And now, back to making art.

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Another in a Series of Self Portraits with Produce

self portrait with watermelon

There were four this year in the garden. This is the second we've harvested so far. The bad news: the girls, having been raised on seedless watermelon, found the seeds not joyful for spitting but extremely bothersome, to the point of despising this poor defenseless fruit.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

100 in 100, Day 100

(96)
self portrait, dirty brush wash
painted with left hand
oil on paper, 12x9 inches

(97)
self portrait with head scarf
painted with left hand
oil on paper, 12x9 inches

(98)
self portrait, a smaller cucumber
oil on paper, 17x14 inches

(99)
self portrait, brush cleaner for #98
oil on paper, 12x9 inches

(100)
self portrait with sun hat
oil on paper, 12x9 inches

Whoohoo! I did it! If you'd like to see them all as a gallery, here's my facebook album. Yes, there are really one hundred! I have enjoyed this project. Thank you again to Rowena for being the ringleader. It has been a long time since I've made art a daily practice. It feels good to have my artist self reawaken.

Over the course of these one hundred works, it was much easier for me to create a finished piece using pastels. Painting, especially a painting in a day, or an hour, was tough for me. My brush handling skills are rusty, so things sometimes turned to mud. There have been some drawing and painting disasters here, along with some good works. It was liberating to have committed to the challenge, and just keep moving forward. I learned a lot and had fun.

What's next?

Friday, September 4, 2009

100 in 100, Day 96?

self portrait with cucumber

Yes, I think this is Day 96. I have all kinds of excuses why there was a gap here, near the finish line. The garden harvest is demanding my attention. The girls needed to get ready to go back to school. I'm lazy.

The real reasons are more likely that switching to painting was much harder for me than drawing with pastel, and also that nearing 100 forces me to think about what the heck I'm doing and where I want to go next. So. Of course, I ran away ran away ran away! But I came back! And though I value creating everyday, my realistic goal for this project was to complete 100 works of art in 100 days.

I did number 84 on Tuesday night, and it turned out pretty clunky, so I was discouraged. So I skipped a day, and then, on Thursday, I did numbers 85 through 90. Then today, I did 91 through 95.

4 days left to complete 5 more works to make it to 100 in 100.