Thoughtful Thursday: A Prodigal Return

I feel I have wasted time. A lot of time. A lot of paint time. The loss of drive is hard. I'll post how I have felt about this year later, but for now, I have finally updated by 2015-2016 gallery. These pieces are some of the proudest and bravest I feel I have done. At some point, they will get a post about why I painted them, what inspired them, how I feel about them. I think that is part of why I waited so long to post photos of these works. Out of fear. The fear of exposure. Yet, I still have others to share. And art should be shared shouldn't it? 

If you feel the need, visit the 2015-2016 gallery under Paintings. Maybe you'll enjoy, maybe you won't. Either way, it's okay. 

If it's one thing I have truly learned this year, I never chose to be an artist. 

Art chose me. 

Currently Listening to "The Heart of a Cold White Land" by Swallow the Sun off the album Songs from the North I, II & III.

Currently Reading Neil Gaiman's "The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction"

Thought Tuesday - St. Sebastian (and I'm Terrible)

Scold me please. It's been about a month since my last blog. I'm going to make it up. I'm promising myself to do two a week for the next couple of weeks. This is supposed to help me stay motivated, and of course, when I did not blog, it was hard to make things...then life changes occurred. 

My work schedule changed which means no more Studio Mondays, it's back to Studio Sundays (but I'll still blog on Mondays because urg Mondays). Back to the old Monday - Friday. On a cuter side of things, my dude and I got a puppy. That in itself is a brand new experience, tiring, cute, lots of biting, lots of accidents on the floor, but so much cuteness and cuddles and fluffiness. Now that's it's been a week or so with the new lil guy, it's time to get back into this week's Thoughtful Tuesday for the painting I did last year, St. Sebastian. 

Looking back on this painting, I see a lot of good things and bad things. I could probably attempt this better based on what I've done lately. But I love her. 

I remember getting this idea based off a different painting I did years ago. It was about a nightmare I had. The idea came back to me, but this time I wanted to imitate the imagery of St. Sebastian's death, which you can research. I didn't want blood on this one, I wanted the flowers' petals to represent any "blood" since the flowers do represent arrows. There's really no pain. I think subconsciously, that came from a feeling that it sometimes feels no one understands pain of another, the abuse. They'd rather look at the pretty flowers. 

Thoughtful Tuesday - The Maid

I skipped a week. On the plus side, I finished a painting I'm really excited about. However, I'm not ready to post it. I am ready to talk about the next piece in my 2015-2016 gallery: The Maid. Sometime in early 2015 I was really inspired by a song by the band Leaves' Eyes titled "Maid of Lorraine" - aka, Joan of Arc. 

At first, I wanted to do a traditional burning at the stake, but chose not to. Instead, I decided Joan should would be 'burned' by grass instead of flames. Further, the small sparks and ash would be flowers and petals floating away. I also wanted to keep her image ghostly and undefined. This is not my favorite of my pieces last year, however, looking back on it a year later, I do see joy in it. 

I could have taken a very dark route with this piece, but I decided, Joan is not dead - she's living. She didn't die at the stake, she became immortal. This is how I magically took this historical and religious figure, and connected her to my usual imagery of plants, life, and death. Fine. That's not very magical. 

The Maid

What's also not magical is me neglecting to blog last week, and I had to force myself to type this post. Sigh. There. I did it. I didn't proofread. I will promise to upload two or three new, finished pieces next week, and see a lil bit of what I'm working on next. 

Studio Monday: Old Tricks

I always wanted to incorporate live (or dead) plants in my work. If the piece eventually decayed - even better. I used to do this, and a stopped. There will be more on this later as a song I listened to over the weekend really peaked my interest and now I want to do a piece inspired by it. Once that piece is in the works, I'll be sure to elaborate more on the concept. In the meantime, I continued working on a piece and started a new piece inspired by another song. I've been working on one for a while, but decided to revisit the old concept of using live plants into my work. Here's a sneaky peek of the concept with peek of new WIP: 

Don't you love the blurry?

I hope this all works out. I'm very slow when I do paint because I wait for my pieces to dry before adding more layers. I'm usually one color at time, but trying to break that. Also acrylics dry fast, but in the dry time, I get distracted. I'm working on it. Tomorrow or next week I'll post a Thoughtful Tuesday on a piece from last year as well as a recently completed piece I haven't added to my 2015-2016 gallery. Excited for all the new things and inspiration. Thank goodness for good music.

This weekend's motivation brought to you by Insomnium's "Shadows of the Dying Sun" album.