Damp and grey days. I’ve spent too much time in traffic, wishing I could twist up the highways, wring out from the concrete the dripping exhaust, motor oil, dirty rain.
Holiday shows, commissions, donations, all things came to a head finally, and now I find myself with a buoyant break in my schedule that allows me to think about my process. I’ve had my head down, working, for so long that the extra space makes me feel a bit off balance. And yet, the mind craves space to think critically. Maybe that’s why the west enamors me- the vast, uncluttered. I need a lot of space to feel free. “These visions of Johanna keep me up past the dawn.” Dylan’s on the playlist (naturally), and I kind of love thinking of him somewhere in the Midwest on a payphone. The land, the moon, the rain; all of these have some effect on us.
I’ve been working on panel and plaster for a couple of years now, and I feel comfortable with the way oil color must be laid into the dried plaster- the absorbent qualities make it somewhat like painting on clay, I’d imagine. I’ve got a new show going up at Kettle Art next week, and I am excited to push the more surreal aspects of my landscape and flora series. My beautiful Texas, threatened by oil mongers and pipelines and walls- I paint the landscape and hope that it offers a reminder that this home of ours is fragile and worthy of protection.
Working the plaster is my way of working the land. Friends and family know I’m no gardener; the best thing I can do for the land is to paint it. I scrape layer after layer of plaster, then sand it and burnish it until it glows, glass-like. There’s an element of chaos to the way the layers and colors interact, to the way an image must be resolved out of a colorful mess. Here’s to rolled up sleeves and dirty hands, and warm color in winter.
