Compared with Hillary...

After watching the Democratic National Convention, when Bill gave a long speech about Hillary Clinton’s bio, I feel like comparing myself to Hillary.

Hillary Clinton is a few years older than my sister, older than I am, and while she's been spending all years apparently doing public service, improving the ‘lives of millions of people’, I've been painting and drawing.

I've been getting a lot of rejections from juried shows lately but I finally got to show put on by ArtSpan in a swanky Mission Bowling Club where I can showcase the big new work. I was less excited when I delivered and realized there were four other artists in the show, but heck, it’s still cool. (Terrified that two of my paintings are hung really low on the staircase to the eating area, in reach of greasy fingers, and will be damaged.)

Standing in front of 2 large paintings at the opening

Mission Bowling opening

I also got in a group show in a real gallery, a cool gallery, in Berkeley, called Ube, opening next week.

So why have I dedicated myself my life to art? When I was in grammar school, I was the kid in the class or maybe even the kid in the school that was good at art. (Okay, there was another girl who was better than I was, but she was getting private drawing or art classes outside of school. She was really good.) I was good at school, but best at art.

In fourth grade, I drew horses for the other girls for cash. I founded The Little Artists Club (LAC), which had two members, my best friend, Mary, and I. We had an art opening in her parent’s laundry basement and both families attended. I would loiter around friends’ mothers who were artists, asking them about their work. As a child I wrote stories, plays, and comics. I also knitted, crocheted, embroidered, sewed, did macramé, did leather work, took photos, made films, built a tree house, etc. My sister was really good at art but she never pursued it.

I went to an early feminist art show in my first college and a photographer overheard me saying, “I wish I could be an artist.”

     And she said, “Well, why don’t you?”

     I said “My mother wouldn’t approve.”

     She said “It’s your life, isn’t it? She had her life.”

And of course, this changed my life forever.

Later when I had my interview to get into the respected art school there, SUNY at New Paltz, the Dean said their policy was not to admit many women, because women would get married and quit art. I assured him I would not get married. They admitted me, but I decided to go elsewhere for my art degree. (I did marry later but art was always my mission.)

On National Public Radio, a female stockbroker said that women who pursued creative careers have hurt ourselves twice, partly because we don't have a lot of income, and we also don't have a lot of money to invest in things to get the society that we want.

So a lifetime spent painting and drawing and studying a lot. Attended drawing sessions all my life. Went back to school to study graphic design so that I could find work.

I probably worked as hard as Hillary. I always had to have two careers. I guess you could say she had two careers also, she was a mom and a public servant. But when compared to her, someone who has helped ‘millions of people’… I've basically learned how to paint and draw, somewhat, somewhat. (Mastery as an artist is never reached.)

So she's helped ‘millions of people’ get a better life and I've gotten pretty good at something that seems like an anachronism, something that doesn't seem wanted anymore, something that is way out of fashion. If the future was a river, I am stranded on an island off to the side, not even in the river. A peculiar place to find oneself after so much hard work.

However, art what I was best at, at so that's what I pursued.

Do I have regrets? Possibly, I will, if the future doesn’t want what I did, if my work ends up in the rubbish bin. I don't have regrets spending my life doing what I love. I’ve been a gambler with my life and it's not over yet.

When I was in college, Sue Penwarden and I got to interview Joey Ramone for my punk fanzine. In response to a question about gaining success, he told us “You can just never give up.” I guess I've been kind of following his advice all these years. 

Joey Ramone did okay.

Drawing rabbits

Some of my newest paintings contain a portrait of my pet rabbit(s) painted at home, from life. I think these portraits are pretty good.

Folks keep telling me "Hope you can find some people who like rabbits to buy those paintings."

rabbit with papaya and apples, acrylic on canvas

And it's funny, but I don't think I need rabbit people. Since I don't have kids and live alone, I think of them just as figure paintings or life studies and would think that anyone would like them. I thought art history buffs would like them (since they are sort of a riff on the tromp l'oeil paintings that have dead rabbits in them.)

And I have a book project about a rabbit that I am working on, and just opened up another old project, "Dumbbunny", a story about the Easter Bunny that my best and most long-time friend, Mary, and I started many years ago. Her mother wrote the story originally in the 50s or 60s. It was sort of mostly done but we had problems with the plot (for the 21st Century). Mary just fixed it and now I am making final drawings and trying to figure out color and layout.

Anyhow a day drawing rabbits is a good day.

I have rabbit models at home, and now with the internet, it is easy to find models in the poses I need. Well maybe not easy but I can find poses lose enough to extrapolate the rest in my head. It was so much harder before as I have never been good drawing out of my head. The book "Rabbit Language" and the first version of this one was really hard for me to draw. Also having digital cameras is huge -- I can take photos whenever I find a rabbit in the pose I need. I can put various things together in Photoshop to help me think about the composition before I start. And I will probably do the color in Photoshop (not sure yet).

The idea is the hardest thing. Once I have it, it's easy to just try to draw it freehand. There is a very high fear level. It is even harder than painting because in painting you can go over it again if you have to. A messed up drawing you need to start fresh (although there may be some Photoshopping). It is funny after all these years of drawing that there is so much fear, that "I can't do this". And then really it's one drawing at a time.

Am procrastinating. It can be really hard to sit down to work! I could go to the gym, look at Facebook, or do a million other things. I guess that's why I have an art studio in the first place!

However, I find once I get started, it really helps to have some uninterrupted time such as a really long weekend. I now understand why novelists book hotel rooms to get away and work on their books. Every interruption (such as going to work, going to the gym, a Giants game) can completely stall me in my tracks.

Battling with roses

I just finished a long battle with the vase of roses. It's gone on for months. I am not a flower person but I thought I could probably paint roses. Since they wilt, I've used four different groups of roses.

One of my first mistakes was leaving extra roses in the vase that I didn't intend to paint because I wanted a lot of leaves. That turned out to be confusing as I'd forget which ones I was drawing, get the stems mixed up, etc. 

I was too lazy or rushed to draw all the leaves exactly. I schmeered them in and then did some refinement, but not enough. Leaves need to be specific in order to look like leaves. 

I painted the roses over and over and over, in all different shades of pink, red, purple, yellow, greys, beige and browns. I tried adding chiaroscuro to make them look 3-D. I finally re-thought and re-drew them in petal-by-petal in paint. 

They were still not right. I schmeered some paint over some of them so that they would go back in space and become atmospheric. That helped.

I painted in delicate, frilly edges and shadows, but they still looked odd (and did not match the rough, casual feel of the rest of the painting.)

Finally, I knew the new shapes well enough—I went over them with a bunch of pink paint, quickly, while squinting, just dabbing at them with a large brush, making them blockier, and trying to make them feel like roses. Three are sort of in focus. The actually look less like roses then before, but feel more like roses.

final

What have I learned?

– Must be specific, not general, not lazy

– Look until you really understand the shapes in 3-D

– Paint loosely and confidently

– Hold the feeling in your mind while you are painting 

– Paint what you love!

early versions

this one was cute—maybe I regret the guitar.

Logistically I had to keep the two rabbits separated from each other and from the flowers and the guitar (so that tends to throw the proportions off).

Now that I painted the blue guitar, it is for sale. Nice Gibson 135, fantastic sound and sustain, easy reverb, nice set up ... I just don't need it anymore. Any takers?