I Got Liebstered

I got an award!  I got an award!  It's a Liebster Award, which means there is no accompanying trophy or achievement or anything, but who cares?!  I got one!  Let the cavorting commence! 

Okay, so the fabulously talented and amazing artist Denthe gave me this honor (go look at her blog RIGHT NOW PLEASE, and then come back, please and thank you).

These are the rules for the Liebster Award, which Denthe broke, because she is awesome.

1. Link back to the blogger who nominated you. (DID IT!)
2. Answer the 11 questions given to you by the blogger who nominated you.  (GONNA DO IT SORT OF!)
3. Nominate 11 other bloggers with less than 200 followers.  (OR MAYBE 6, AND I DON'T KNOW HOW MANY FOLLOWERS THEY HAVE)
4. Go to the blogs you nominated and notify them of your nomination.  (SOON!)
5. Give your nominees 11 questions to answer. (SO BOSSY!)

 Denthe (bless her heart) gave me five questions, instead of 11, and there they are:
  
1. Which kind of art do you like and why?

First and foremost, I like the kind of art I can have.  No, for real.  Museum art is every kind of amazing, and El Greco makes me weak in the knees, but after years of trading mail art, I am WARPED.  I want it. I want to hang it in my house.  I want it to be mine.  

Also, I like art with people in it, or animals wearing clothes. (Damn you, The Slumbering Herd).
  
2.  Is there something you really want to do in your life that you haven’t done yet?

I mean, yes.  Of course.  But honestly, I quit my high-paying corporate gig to live the life I wanted to live, so in that sense, I did the most important thing I needed to do to be happy.  Everything else I get to do just feels like a bonus. 

Meanwhile, I am terrified by the idea of real spelunking,but maybe someday, I will get up my nerve.
  
3.  How would your best friend describe you in one word?

She gets one word?  That's it?  There should be more words!

On that note, let's go with "bossypants."
  
4.  Do you do any kind of sports? (just want to see where I stand compared to other people ☺) 

Errummmm.  Let's see.  Does cribbage count?  Magic the Gathering?  It's totally competitive!  There are even tournaments!

Okay, seriously - I walk competitively, which is to say that I judge others who walk with me but can't keep up.

Okay, okay, okay.  I don't do sports.  NO SPORTS.  Sigh.
  
5.  Do you sell your art, or would you like to?

I do!  And I'm always up for selling more!  ;)


I am passing on the award to:

1.  Mellanie, aka Genxster.  http://genxsters.wordpress.com/
2.  Cindy, aka CindyD  http://www.theslumberingherd.com/
3.  Cathy, aka catpratt http://www.catillustrates.com/
4.  Annie, aka Eraserqueen http://eraserqueenstudios.blogspot.com/
5. Leah, aka leahfelicity, http://www.leahlucci.com/starling/
6. Michelle Lydon, aka mlydon http://www.michellelydon.com/my-blah--blah--blog.html


Here are the six questions:

1.  What / who is your favorite thing to draw?

2.  Describe your perfect weather.

3.  What sort of teenager were you?

4.  What sort of oldster do you plan to be?

5.  If you had to pick the five pieces you were most proud of in your entire career, how long would you need?  Would you know instantly?  Could you put them together in a night?  Would you need a week?  Or would you run from the whole question?

6.  If you could have work hanging in one place in the world, what would it be?
  

50 Canvases in 2014: Robot!

This week's wonderstrange canvas challenge was deliciously simple: ROBOTS!  I fell asleep Wednesday night picturing a sexy robot in a boudoir pose on a chaise lounge, but when I woke up Thursday morning, I decided to ditch the chaise in favor of a standing pose and an alluring hat, which is sort of a fun juxtaposition of chastity (it's white, with a veil) and carnality (hey, robots have needs, too!).

Here are the progress pics, starting with a background that I decided right away would be monochromatic:

Wait! That's not monochromatic!

But after a coat of Soft Quinacridone red, it plays that way.

50 Canvases in 2014: Atypical Color Challenge

I am doing the wonderstrange 50 Canvases in 2014 challenge, and last week's prompt called for the use of a color palette you wouldn't normally pick - or at least, that's the way I (mis)remembered it.  As it turns out, the prompt was to use an established palette - that is, to pick a palette before beginning the canvas and stick with it, all the way to the end.  Whoops.  Good thing I did that, too!  I just did it with a color palette I wouldn't normally use.  Seriously, this is so far outside my comfort zone that you need a passport and a long conversation with a customs agent to get from one to the other.

Parlais vous pinky-purple?

Okay, to keep everything else simple simple, I decided to work on a 4x4 black canvas, and I made myself a pensive little alien.  I am pleased to report that I had a ball!

The flash really changes the way the colors look!

Before I painted the background, by the way, I Googled some images from the Hubble telescope.  The image I chose was associated with an article called, "Galaxy 'Spills Its Guts' in Space."  Who can resist a tell-all galaxy?!  Secrets of the Universe, come sit by me!

Fake Saints

There has been a gathering of fake saints in my house.

First up is St. Atarica, patron saint of old school gamers from the days of Pong, Pac Man, and Space Invaders, as well as mothers whose children FIRST want to spend hours playing on the xbox and THEN want to follow them around the house narrating everything that happened.  I pray to St. Atarica on the daily.

Next up is St. Chaotica, patron saint of new parents, people moving across the country, people who get suckered into planning large events, and anyone whose phone never rings - until it rings all night long.

Finally, here is St. Malevica, whose canonization was a long process, fraught with controversy.  While she had divine visions and even seizures, she also stole from the poor (and anyone else who held still for too long).  Malevica is the patron saint of pick pockets, petty thieves, shoplifters, and people who take candy from babies.

Oh, and I should probably add that I made these with Copic markers, Prismacolor pencils, and gel pens - and that I now love Prismacolors.  My wallet is not speaking to me.

50 Canvases in 2014: Song Lyric Prompt

Last weekend, I saw Rhett Miller perform at Radio Radio, and he was super amazing and energetic and adorable, on top of which, he put his arm around me, which shows him to be a man of taste and discernment.  Or a man who was taking a picture with me.  WHATEVER.

Rhett.  You can also see my hair, but the rest of me didn't look so hot.  Hi hair!

Anyway, the whole experience got me extra fired up to paint a canvas for last week's wonderstrange 50 Canvases in 2014 challenge, which was to paint something inspired by a song lyric.  Of all Rhett's many brilliant lines, I chose these:

Happy.  Baby, I'm so happy.  Baby, I'm so.  I got my imaginary friends.

And if you don't love me, would you please pretend?

Here's a parade of progress pics for the mixed media canvas those lyrics inspired:

By the way, those dominoes-style numbers above her head?  They are 4 and 5 (which make 9) and 1 and 6 (which make 7).  Rhett is the lead singer of the Old 97s.  GET IT?  Yes.  Ahem.

Good night.

Dealing with Dinner (in the Name of Art)

I have a deeply vexed relationship with food preparation.  I enjoy it - oddly, never more than when it is as stupidly complex and demanding as the American tax code- but I also hate it, if only because it always interrupts me in the middle of something I want to finish.  Like . . . a canvas.  Or a salt shaker.  Or a crocheted serial killer.  OR ANYTHING AT ALL.

Now that I say that, maybe I don't have a food preparation problem; maybe I have an interruption problem.

At any rate, this week, I am trying something new.  To satisfy my love for the stupidly hard and ridiculous, I am making the following this week, all from scratch:

• Chilaquile Casserole with Southwestern Black Bean Salad and fruit salad
• Golden Pear Soup, Country Bread, cheese, and Roasted Green Beans with Onions and Garlic
• Black Bean Chili, salsa, and Banana and Cheese Empanadas
• Mexican Potatoes with Oaxaca Bean Salad
• Tofu and Sweet Potato Stir Fry with Javanase Vegetable Salad

To accomplish this feat, I am working on meals two and three days in advance, a bit at a time.  Yesterday, I soaked and cooked beans for the Southwestern Black Bean Salad, and then I made dough for the empanadas.

Today, I made the Southwestern Black Bean Salad, and I am soaking and boiling beans for the Black Bean Chili.  Oh, and the Country Bread Dough is rising on the counter.

This salad looks even more beautiful after the cilantro and parsley are added - but please, judge it on its inner beauty.

Rise up, Country Bread Dough!  Fight the system!

To finish things up, I am about to make the Chilaquile.  And the Pear Soup.  Both.  Wait until my sous chef (aka my son) finds out. He'll be endlessly thrilled.

I am hoping that all of this daily work will help me accept that food preparation is just a part of life, dammit, which no amount of whining, hiding, resentment, pouting, or bargaining will change.

I am also hoping that by planning ahead, I will really appreciate and savor the rest of the day when I am not cooking, when I can sit at my table and create.  Because that is precious time!

I did have a moment of panic today, by the way - which is a great sign, on Day 2.  I thought, "I AM MAKING TOO MANY THINGS!  I CANNOT POSSIBLY DO THIS!"  Then I laughed, though, because seriously?!  I can do whatever it is I ask of myself.  If I ask a lot, I will get a lot.

Here's to a new experiment, and here's to delivering what I demand!  Let's hope it's all a great success, because I have one million things I want to make, and I don't mean in the kitchen!

P.S. When I went to cut the slits for the second rise, I almost cut through the loaf on the left.  Now I feel like the extra asshole-y killer on [insert crime show] who is so violent that he almost severs the spine. 

Mixed Media for My Grandmother

This is a companion entry for my Living with Art piece from March 7, 2014 on wonderstrange.com.

On Wednesday night, I stayed up very late working on a mixed media piece honoring my grandmother.  Going in, I thought that the piece would come together almost spontaneously in a rush of love and nostalgia.  In retrospect, how ridiculous am I?  Who could fit 35 years of memories into a 4x6 space without some serious artistic agonizing?!  Sheesh!

First, a couple of my favorite stories, in brief:

My grandmother started out as a teacher.  She and my grandfather had to delay their marriage by a full decade, in fact, because married women could not hold teaching jobs, and my grandparents could not afford to be married at the time on one income.

Grammy & Papa at a costume party, 1938

While she was teaching, my grandmother also had to keep up appearances, which means that she had to sneak down to the basement to smoke cigarettes with the lights off.  (She didn't inhale, mind you - not then, and not ever, which I find totally endearing.)

On their wedding day, after all that time waiting, my grandparents got into a fight and didn't speak from the time of the ceremony until they arrived at the hotel for the first night of their honeymoon.  Their marriage proved far happier than that long, silent drive and lasted until my grandfather's death, by which time, they had three children, six grandchildren, and two great grandchildren.

I was going to use that picture of my grandmother up there for my mixed media piece, by the way, but she didn't wear her hair like that; she wore it in a French twist, like Kim Novak in Vertigo.  After she could no longer lift her arms to do her hair herself, I remember lying on her bed, watching my mother do it for her.

So in the end, I couldn't pick that picture of my grandmother - or any one picture, because all of the pictures exist simultaneously in my head.  Instead, I painted her.  I gave her the clip-on earrings and pretty necklaces she always wore, because she was always put together.  (When my mother was growing up, my grandmother would change her dress before my grandfather returned home from work, and she would sit in her chair and wait for him, sipping a Manhattan.  My mother and my aunts all know that was my grandmother's private moment, sipping her Manhattan.  That was the reason I chose the amber color: It reminds me of her drink.)

I also included her favorite flowers, azaleas, and eggs in a nest, for her love of birds.  The number 19 is the number of children, grandchildren, great grandchildren, and great-great grandchildren, all here on the earth because of her.

Last, a word about breakfast. My grandmother got up early, and as a child, so did I.  I'd always find her in the kitchen, watching the birds, drinking orange juice.  She'd tell me to have "some breakfast food," by which she meant cereal.  She herself wouldn't eat until my grandfather got up.  I'd eat my cereal and watch her arrange her pills, which seemed magical to me: Tiny pills, some white, some blue and shiny.  I never knew why she took those pills.  Now I have a pill box just like hers.