Opening Night for the Madonnas!

"Isis Dreams of Horus" mixed media. H. Marsh

It was a busy evening on the Kingston arts scene last night with at least 3 openings, ours at Sandra Whitton Gallery, another across the street at Aroma and another at Gallery Raymond. The snapping cold weather didn't seem deter anyone as the gallery was packed for our Black Madonnas opening. Tim out did himself with amazing "black" foods like marmite, olives, dates, blackberries etc. I contributed licorice, cookies with black sprinkles. Later dark cakes and what looked like black rice crispy squares arrived. No black drinks tho there was plenty of the red stuff! Despite all this, the art managed to hold its own. Some patrons even claimed they saw a Madonna moving.... The carefully selected music was drowned out pretty quickly by enthusiastic chatter. Here's a very little sample of the event, click on the arrow:




And a few photos:

Mounting the Black Madonna Show

On the left is one of 5 pieces I have in the Black Madonnas show. It is about 2 feet by 10 inches, mixed media. I call it "Full of Grace" a phrase I remember from an oft repeated prayer.

I spent most of yesterday helping Tim Soper (curator, he's in the photo on the right) and Sandra Whitton (gallery owner) hang the Black Madonna show. It was a good experience, Sandra has lots of expertise and seeing her in action was great. I'll be mounting a group show in July and have come to appreciate that displaying the art is an art in itself. Each piece needs to be considered in terms of lighting, neighbouring pieces, wall surface, height, and the impact of distant and close viewing. We finished up by 5pm with most of the work effectively mounted and ready for the opening on Saturday. Tim's vision is coming to fruition. Sandra has kindly let her gallery be "hijacked" for a unique show that features artists of all ages and all levels of experience.

Bushman Madonna

This is a small piece (10" X 10) with lots of texture inspired by very old pictographs by African Bushmen. It needs a little more colour variation before I am satisfied that it is done. I haven't altered the image of the woman, I think she looks strong and lovely though to western eyes her body is exaggerated. She wasn't pictured with a baby so I added the seated infant and some hints of a spirit life with the gold spots and swoosh. Not sure how this one will be received.... but she definitely IS a Black Madonna.

Dutch Madonna

This Madonna is almost done, maybe a little tweaking with the colours.

My inspiration was the statue which Mom and Dad had in the dining room. It was a replacement for one they brought from Holland which fell off its little wooden shrine and broke. This one too is from Holland and the shape and symbols are quite traditional in Dutch depictions of Mary (apart from the black).

I suspect there may not be traditional madonna figures in the upcoming show so perhaps this one will pay homage to history.
My next one will be a Bushman Madonna, African.

Black Madonna

possibly the Black Madonna of Chestochova, 6th century

Last week I met fellow artist Tim Soper at the Sandra Whitton Gallery. Tim is planning a group show exploring one of his long time interests, the Black Madonna. Here's the Slate description of his upcoming show:

Black Madonnas – a group show curated by Tim Soper. Dark statues
and paintings of a mother and child exist in hundreds all over Europe, and
especially in France. They are revered as the image of Mary and the baby Jesus.
However, their origin may go back to pre-Christian pagan times. They share a
kinship with with ancient statues of Isis and Horus, and Cybele and Attis. These
mythical figures tell a tale of a mother and her God / Son who dies and is
reborn. Over the past year, Tim Soper has been creating his own Black Madonna
sculptures. He has invited a collection of artists to create their own pieces
symbolizing their connection to, or perception of, the Black Madonna. From
literal translations, to dynamic and challenging representations, the pieces in
this show capture the evocative and mysterious nature of the Black
Madonna.

I told Tim about a Madonna I had created, a watery blue-green figure as she was inspired by an incident I witnessed by the riverside at Kingston Mills. Some kids had caught a huge salmon, very heavy, and as they dragged it along the shore it spilled what seemed to be hundreds of golden eggs. The kids were thrilled with their big catch, I was sad. Here she is, rather Byzantine, swimming with silver eggs.

I think she will be in Tim's show next month and perhaps I will make another, this time black and more like the Madonnas I remember from church. Or perhaps like the one we had in the house when I was I child.

If you have a Madonna to share Tim would like to hear from you!

Grasslands

Grasslands 20 X 40

I finished this last week but it was lacking in depth and the colours were a little flat too. I'm happier with it now, especially the sky. If you click on the image you will see at least 8 glazes in the sky. I've done several landscapes like this. The strong and simple horizontal is always a big attraction for me. Perhaps having lived near a strong horizontal for most of my life (Lake Ontario) I am compelled to paint it, tho rarely in the form of water. Tomorrow this piece heads to LSP Designs for a show with 12 other recent paintings. The show runs til Christmas and some of the proceeds go to a charity called Kingston Grandmother Connection. KGC is a fund-raising organization in support of African grandmothers raising their grandchildren. I hope we both do well!

Too sweet?

Lovers' Tree 16 X 20

Artists can color the sky red because they know it's blue. Those of us who aren't artists must color things the way they really are or people might think we're stupid. Jules Feiffer

I must admit this is my first red or rose coloured sky. I rarely do blue skies, usually gray, yellow, white, beige - anything but blue. My landscapes tend to earth tones, usually fairly "real". The above painting seems a tad too romantic or sugary. Hence the title. Maybe it is not the sky rather the composition or treatment of content that is mushy. I'm going to post this on WetCanvas and see what the crtics have to say... I'll let you know.

Exploring Colour

This odd little painting (8" X 16") is an exploration of colour. I saw this palette on a large abstract in a Toronto gallery, warm reds and golds with a splash of cool light blue for contrast. The combination has potential for a bigger piece I think...

Consistency is highly over rated

Just when I thought I would be in the running for the most inconsistent artist in the country I am now convinced there would be no contest. I would win. As my painter buddy said today "Consistency is highly over rated". We both played happily in the studio all day, experimenting and teasing the acrylics with brushes, scrapers, sponges etc. I picked up a brush (as opposed to a mini roller, knife) for the first time in weeks and these popped out. Both are works in progress. They do not look like my work. BUT just maybe this will be the real me.....




Some interesting quotes about consistency:

CONSISTENCY is contrary to nature, contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are the dead. Aldous Huxley
CONSISTENCY requires you to be as ignorant today as you were a year ago. Bernard Berenson
And my personal favourite:
CONSISTENCY is the last refuge of the unimaginative. Oscar Wilde

Wolfe Island WIP

My daily walks take me to the shore of the St. Lawrence where it meets Lake Ontario. Across the river is a large island which has been sprouting windmills, an eyesore or a delight, depending on your point of view. Above is my rather fanciful view. I have yet to add the ferry that travels back and forth. Not sure about adding more windmills with the blades? There are going to be over 80 windmills, not all will be seen from my vantage point:

http://www.canhydro.com/newprojects_wolfeisland_wind.htm

Some residents are pretty unhappy:

http://www.truveo.com/Wolfe-Island-Wind-Turbines-Life-on-the-Front-Lines/id/2623355125

Lean...

Here's one I've been working on, very lean acrylic paint, looks like watercolour. I'd like to keep it soft and calm but I think it needs a little more definiton to make it interesting.

Spinning my Wheels

It has not been easy get back to work in the studio. While I've been in there almost every day I have little to show for my efforts so far. Two months away has filled me with a tremendous amount of stimulation and my brain whirs with anticipation of creating a masterpiece! I can see the finished product but the road is not clear. I am frustated with the quick drying time of acrylics but also seduced by it. It may be time to head back to oils for a while.

I did tweak this one, so now it is ready for an upcoming show:

"Grow Baby Grow" 24 X 24 acrylic on canvas

We're back!

After 2 months of travel I am back and ready to dip into the paint again. My husband and I have been to Iceland, Netherlands and the UK. We visited over 10 galleries/museums and I'll copy some of the info over from my trip blog in the next few days so you can have a look.
Above is hubby at (or in?) the Dubuffet part of the sculpture garden of the Kroller Muller Museum. The Kroller Muller is in the Hoge Veluwe National Park near Arnhem (Netherlands).

http://www.hogeveluwe.nl/default.asp?language=2

It is an elegant building, low and simple, set amongst manicured lawns, sculpture gardens and woodlands. We first visited in January of 1995. Many parts of Holland had been experiencing severe flooding; when we arrived the grounds around the museum were soggy and the entrance flanked by a row of 5 blue porta potties, neatly connected in a row. How unfortunate we thought, the flooding has caused the museum plumbing to fail. Sure enough, when we were inside the smell of ammonia was powerful. Fortunately it had not permeated the Van Gogh hall, we enjoyed the paintings immensely. Leaving the permanent exhibits behind we headed for the temporary show areas, past a huge mound of burned chairs. More problems! The museum certainly had been having its share of difficulties. Nearby unopened crates, addressed to the museum, were stacked and unopened. Staff shortages? We were now close to the restrooms but no stench was apparent, in fact they were clean and functioning. The smell of ammonia was elsewhere….
This was our first experience with installation art. The ammonia smell wafted from a small house made entirely of salt cod, the burned chairs were another installation. The unopened crates contained art which the artist had submitted but with the stipulation the crates not be unpacked - a statement about the commercialism rampant in art. Now wiser about this “new” type of art, we checked out the porta potties. Yup! Art!!! The connected stalls were empty except the last one. We entered to check out the TV monitor mounted over the only toilet. The program on the screen was a simple one: a buzzing fly. This installation was called Virtual Reality for Poor People. Someone had made a statement about the piece by leaving a rather large deposit in the toilet. That part was real.
Our second visit to the Kroller was llast month. It has expanded and is probably my favourite museum. It is spacious, elegant and one is immediately aware of being in the presence of greatness. There are numerous VanGogh’s, Mondrians, Toorops. The Van Goghs are superb, you rarely have to share the viewing space and you can get up close and personal without the docents or the alarm system throwing a fit. Photos are permitted (no flash). I took lots!

A rather saucy little nude by Van Gogh

A new widget

In a few weeks hubby and I will be heading for Iceland, Holland and England. Of course I plan to see as much art as possible. We've been to Amsterdam a few times before an have visited the fabulous VanGogh Museum as well as the Rijksmuseum and the Kröller-Müller in nearby Otterlo. All of these are incredible places to visit. I've added the "Rijkswidget" to my blog, you can see it on the left. Click it to have a look and visit the museum website too.

Abstract Art with Ben Darrah

WIP or just process? (32" X 45)

Monday evenings are taken up with a trek to our local community college to join in Ben Darrah's abstract art class. We are using acrylics, loose canvas and found materials. Ben's approach to working on unprimed and unstretched canvas is new to me and quite a revelation. Likely oil paints would not be quite so forgiving and flexible but travelling to class with your painting rolled or folded up is a boon. The raw canvas soaks up the washes and has a tendency to shrink a lot so I have now learned to prewash or account for shrinkage if I'm going for a specific size. As the canvas is not stretched, one can crop and stretch it later to best fit the compostion.

The piece above is an example of the loose canvas and the class in which we painted to music. I was listening to Buddha Bar, my favourite all purpose dining, painting, working music. As we are focusing on process rather than product, ie playing and exploring, I am free to take this further or flip it over and reuse the canvas for something else...
Maybe it should go like this? -

Finally!

Kingston Mills, Kingston Ontario

Yes 2 months between posts is far too long. My excuses are numerous, not the least of which is I'm outside now that the weather is wonderful. I think I may be a foul weather blogger but I'll try to post more often and not wait for a rainy day.
I don't paint plein air much and when I do my work usually reflects the atmosphere of a place rather than a representation of the scene. A few weeks ago S and I spent the day painting at Kingston Mills, a favourite spot for both of us. Last week we headed across the river and across the border to Cape Vincent New York. My friend D is manging the hostel at Tibbets Point and we sat under the sun sketching the lighthouse, the waves and the lilacs.

Tibbets Point, New York

Yesterday my backyard was our studio and the yellow irises prompted me to to start on a fanciful abstraction of petals, leaves and shade. Looks more Hawaiian than Canadian but the weather was sultry: hot and humid.

work in progress, June 08

Enough Eyeballs?

Homage # 2, 24 X 36, WIP: work in progress

Now that I've posted this here I can see a couple of colour adjustments I need to do, but how about the flying eyeballs? Are there enough? This is the second homage piece to Hundertwasser and is more fanciful than the first. I love the streaming windows, an image one sees frequently in his work. Hundertwasser thought windows had "rights" ie the right to be prominent and the right to house trees which of course had rights too. Trees had the right to have a special floor all their own and windows just for their growth. Below is one of his sketches for how this might work:

SOLD!

"Slow Dance in the Moonlight" 18 X 36 acrylic on canvas

Sally Chupick and I continue to have our work on display at Frameworks gallery until April 25. On the weekend I had a happy surprise, an email from someone who had just purchased the painting above, the 5th one to sell since the show opened! I've never done this well before so I am pretty excited and of course motivated to do more. It has been a revelation to see what has sold and what hasn't. A couple of my favourites are still available (Red Hills, True North) and a couple that I wasn't even sure about showing, have sold. I had neglected to take a picture of one, being pretty sure it would be coming back home. So you just never know...

Hundertwasser's House - done?

Hundertwasser's House, 24" X 36 mixed media

I've adjusted the colours somewhat, highlighting the edges and smaller forms. I think it is done tho' the lower half seems quite dark.... What do you think?

Hundertwasser's House

Here it is with the first layer of colour. I'm pleased with the composition but not sure how far to take the colours, more highlights are needed to define the smaller figures and forms. As it is highly textured I may just keep it limited to earthy tones with of course a gold dome. It wouldn't be Hundertwasser without this bit of gilt. You can compare it to the sketch below to see where I have made some adjustments. This technique of cutting and pasting allows me to move the shapes around to get just the composition I want before I glue it permanently. Then the colour work begins.





The piece below is another I've done using the same techniques, this one was inspired by a Byzantine Madonna and a large female salmon with eggs. A slight force fit of ideas but both images were in my mind at the time.

Iconic Form, mixed media on board 21" X 26