Inspiration all around

       Plantings have experienced a drought this August, but my heart soars with the inspiration in my painting world. Tomorrow, I will enjoy a members' look at the Obama portraits which have arrived at the MFA BOSTON. Last weekend, Joe and I made a rare 5-minute run into Harvard Square to see two major big portraits at the Harvard Art Museum, free on Sundays: See below: Kehinde Riley and Kerry James Marshall were a major surprise. The sculpture in a surrealism show and a new Jacob Lawrence series were a treat as well (click to enlarge photos)

       On-line I read an essay by Kerry James Marshall "I Paint Pictures Too" which led me to the Cezanne show at the Art Institute of Chicago, closing.  Picasso famously said that  Cezanne is the father of us all. Here, Marshall and other artists were explaining why. I wanted more details, especially since a classmate of mine was reporting as well. Rich. I found the catalog Cezanne on-line. Then I spotted the Still Life tome on our Harvard jaunt and was struck by the novel ways objects around us in the house and yard can be expressed freshly by Australian artists.  Of course a major treat will be a run to NYCity to see the Robert Colescott show at the New Museum. I got to meet him one day in Soho, and he is a favorite artist. The catalog is well written. All three books have super illustrations. I keep them out on the dining room table.

Drawing and painting from the museum galleries

      Time flies when you are having fun; and I recently rediscovered the joy of oil paints! I didn't want to lug oils and solvent into the museum for a class in drawing and painting. I had been using acrylics or watercolors (mistake) and drawing with fragile charcoal and chalk (mistake) when I rediscovered the fun of moving oils around and sketching with a simple Papermate 2B mechanical pencil.
Click photos to enlarge.

       It was off to the African galleries to sketch a mask or object that we could transform or use in our own art work, much as Picasso and Matisse and Modigliani discovered. I am no P, M, or M;  but I like to draw and I found several objects at the MFA and their on-line collection to sketch.

      At home, I first decided I wanted to repaint the watercolor still life I painted the week before that felt limp without oils. I added a self- portrait to the still life as I noticed Gaugin had done in many of his. My hair matched the bristles on the brush. I like to have the personal in a painting.

       From my sketches in the galleries, I chose a sculpted  lady who stood atop a grave post in Madagascar. I made an absurd quilter self-portrait using her. Then I painted a classmate, a doctor from Kazakhstan using information of her passion for apples. The Kazakh apple DNA shows them to be the earliest of apples we enjoy. I learned there is an effort to save these trees. My friend introduced me foods she enjoys from the Russian grocery stores here in the Boston area. I looked up the Kazakhstan flag and added some of its elements. I didn't have time to do something with Magritte's apple in the face, titled The Son of Man. 

       I drew other masks or sculpture that I related to  and may accomplish more before class meets tomorrow. But it was time for my monthly blog post! Tip for more fun: Prime the canvas with dark green, red, blue or orange acrylics, dry, and then let the oils slip and slide! Such fun.

(watercolor on the right)

Drawing and Painting to be continued

      Picasso said that painting is just another way of keeping a diary. So is my blog. This past month I report that I have taken up Life Drawing again and a course at the MFA called Across Cultures. I have been in a few juried shows and tried out some old approaches. I always want to be taking a course. It is fun to be with aspiring artists and to try both old and new materials. Of course all of the above are stressful as well...originating new ideas. So is showtime!

       Catherine Kehoe chose Unforgiving Vision for the SELF-ish show at the Cambridge Art Association. When asked for a blurb for the catalog, I submitted:

While painting myself as an exercise on cardboard, a red-tailed hawk dove from on high into the brush outside my window, an almost frightening force of nature following its laser vision to some oblivious creature. It struck me as the perfect metaphor for self-portraiture. Why is it that self-portraits are often unflattering, even at the hand of artists who famously flattered other subjects? In self-painting, the subject is oblivious, barren of artifice, a landscape of color, form and texture. The penetrating eye allows no escape for the quarry. 

         In class, we enjoyed making  contour drawings of the Tang dynasty horses to loosen up. Next we went on to draw the Meissen porcelain sculptures of birds at the museum, in order then to draw a context. I love researching the history of museum objects for surprises such as Augustus II's not only adding to art by commisioning these sculptural gems of birds and animals, but unfortunately hosting wolf toss socials for sport. After visiting the Dutch rooms, we will be working on still lifes and memento moris. Add to that, Paula and I are drawing and painting each other for works to be seen next time. I am keeping a diary for that project in a mixed media notebook where I add photos and materials to inspire me. Click to enlarge photos, and thanks for stopping by!

PINK Day at the MFA

        Recently, 75 pianos appeared on the streets of Boston in Luke Jerram's public art project, Play Me, I'm Yours!  Citizens donated the Boston pianos to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Celebrity Series of Boston. Artists or community groups embellished the pianos, inviting all to sit down to play them. The grand piano below, decorated by Hilary Zelson, is near the Huntington entrance to the Museum of Fine Arts through October 14.

Click on photos to enlarge

       Many young relatives of museum staff dressed in pink on Tuesday to visit the museum for photos. The group enjoyed "tea" in Bravo after a preview of the Think Pink show which coincides with Breast Cancer Awareness Month. After treats, Erika and I went outside where the children gathered on the steps at the Huntington entrance for more photos and balloons. Off to the side, Erika and I happened on a young man's playing Gershwin at the wonderful easel piano above. Erika took her turn.

        Erika and I had arrived very early for this PINK event and parked on the Fenway side. (At my age, what is the difference in the designated Huntington Entrance and the Fenway Entrance? A parking place on the street by the front door.) Before our 3:45 PINK date, the two of us visited the shop and the contemporary art areas. I found she was quite taken by the sculpture at the different spots in the museum, especially statues of people and Tara Donovan's undulating styrofoam cup cloud.

         By the end of the day, outside with others on the steps of the Huntington entrance, Erika still did not want to leave the museum. I noticed the MFA doors were starting to close, but the guards let us in. We moved extremely swiftly to the other side of the seemingly empty museum, to the doors where we had entered on the Fenway side. Thankfully, that entrance was still open.  I told Erika we must read the book From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. I understand it is about two children who run away and hide in the Met Museum. Once outside on the Fenway side, Erika and I examined the new installation of Paul Manship sculpture: a Native American hunter and his prey, an antelope. What a day! Huffa Puffa.

Mixing Media in Boston and NYC

    One day last week in NYC, Joe and I enjoyed the Chelsea Gallery area. The week before, at the MFA in Boston, I had seen fabric with stitching in the Blue and White show and hand sewing on paintings near the cafeteria area. How nice that my two loves, painting and stitching are showing up on museum walls, thanks to PostModernism when the art world opened up to appreciate many media!

     SEW again we saw the mix in NYC galleries.

     The Benny Andrews retrospective was my favorite show of huge paintings. collaged with clothing, fabric, wood and paint. A catalog is coming out, but most museums and galleries allowed photos.
   
      Our last gallery stop had stitched and painted fabric as well.

      I can't show everything we encountered. I did find very amusing the large paintings someone made of glimpses through his neighbors' windows. I am not sure they approved. Here is a painted tree memorial that I appreciated. Paint on photos were delightful as well.

      Of course there is always art on the street. Twice we saw young ladies dressed as baby dolls, posing, walking on the streets, riding the subways. They said they were just "hanging out."  The stuffed donuts were on the walls at Donut Planet. Four-year-old David wanted to know how donuts got into outer space. Please click on these photos I took in NYC to enlarge!