Tag: inspirations

thoughts behind the work

When drawing freehand can be a strain

Michele B. Naquaiya

lady-oshkanwaska-thI have always drawn freehand.  This means no outside aides such as  projectors or outside electronic devices.  Now I’m on a venture to get bigger and bigger in my artworks and I need to at least make my photo and apply a grid to it so I can get my proportions correctly.  Yesterday I spent 3 hours drawing and erasing a medium sized layout on watercolor paper.  It was a nasty experience and I still don’t have it right, so I’m feeling frustrated.  The last time I used a projector was in 2004 when I painted a several big oil paintings.

This was a very large oil on linen that a good friend in Washington is holding for me.  It is rolled up in a tube with a few other big oils and someday I will arrange to get them back to me in Mexico.   At the time, I had an old projector and I remember that I hung the linen on the wall and did an outline of the composition in oil and the color I recall was burnt umber.  That’s all I can remember at the time.  But I think I worked on this painting a really long time…..maybe a few weeks.

lady ashkanazi

Once again I am toying with the idea of going back to oils but right now I have a major focus on watercolor as I feel I need much more attention to getting better and better at the elusive water media.

I know it’s a well documented idea but it’s important to never compare yourself to others.  One thing I am know is that I had classical artistic training that I am grateful for it every day.

thoughts behind the work

Painting Scissors: trials of life-art lesson

Michele B. Naquaiya
scissors.jpgThere is a story to these scissors.  It is about how I love tools and figured out a way to keep them, in spite of letting them go.  Loving tools can be a good thing or a bad thing.  When I left my home in Washington, I was determined to get rid of everything that was not absolutely essential.  My new chapter in life had to be bare bones.  I was successful.  My wonderful friends helped me de-stash.  If you have never done it, it is hard.  They did a big 2 day garage sale for me while I left the premises for those days.  That was a good plan.  I did not want to mess things up.  I know I would have cried and acted weird so they took over.

 

Here are just a few of the things they sold for me.

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So how does a painting evolve from this?  I took pictures before I left the house and even though they are not posted here, there were two photos that stood out.  One was where I laid out all my hammers, every kind of hammer you could think of.  The other was I laid out a shot of all the types of scissors that were in the sale.  I drew the hammers on my sketch pad with walnut ink. Then I drew the scissors with a black pen on white watercolor paper, thinking maybe it would be a good coloring book page.
So what I did was paint these 2 sketches: hammers and scissors became patterns for clothing. aka wall art.   I underpainted the scissors drawing  with inks and then painted several layers over that when it was very dry. First I used blues and purples for the background, (cobalt blue and violet) and then several layers of transparent yellows and golds for the scissors.  My favorite orange was the Maimeri “orange  lake” which is a gorgeous and very transparent color.  I layered a little Maimeri gouache white over the ribbon.
scissors-raw-dark-web
available scissors watercolor
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hammers wash watercolor in Walnut ink  available: hammers

So here’s the point to this story. …You never lose things in life.  They are in your memory, your heart.  That’s what this making art stuff is all about.  You make an effort to try to enjoy what’s in front of you before it disappears because you know you will disappear too. If you leave a little art behind, maybe somebody will get a chance to enjoy what you did too.  amen

 

flora and fauna, thoughts behind the work

Painting saves my life

Michele B. Naquaiya

I had an accident on the carretera a few weeks ago (the main drag) and damaged my knee.  I now have a few weeks of pain under my belt: a leg brace, a walker and general all around disability that I am ready to leave behind.  I want this to go away but it’s not happening yet.

In the meantime I am still working on my Spanish, I go to class when I am up to it and I try to fumble through as much speaking as I can.  It’s getting better.  Painting makes everything fell better.  It’s my comfort zone.  If I am not feeling any pain I can paint– if I have enough energy.  If I can speak a few words to my friends and neighbors en espanol,  it makes me feel like I’m getting something done.  I have amazing friends and family.  That makes all the difference in the world.

pink flowers-web

I am painting flowers and sketching them almost on a daily basis.

I am posting to my POD sites online pretty regularly.  I’ve got two major sites I’m working with and my almost daily Facebook postings keep me in touch with my friends here in Mexico and also in the states.  I am corresponding with the art community here and online.  I love people and they are holding me up almost on a daily basis.

The fall has been very hard on my psyche and the recovery is very slow.  Cracked bones don’t heal quickly and it’s tough being temporarily disabled.  Mostly it’s the trauma of the event that can be depressing.  I try to not think about it because it’s so scary.   I am grateful for my internal time table that pushes me to produce so much art.  It’s not every day in your life that you can be motivated to paint and draw.  Only since I have been in Mexico can I actually do it and not just think about it.   I have the vision of painting the people here, their simple daily lives and the work they do.

Ever since I can remember I have had an obsession to document my little life, from sketchbooks, to articles, to letters, to greeting cards.  It never really goes anywhere except to realize that it’s a part of me and who I am.  I am learning to accept it.

This recording of events may be silly and useless to lots of people, but it has been my way of coping with good and bad happenings.  It is what it is: so if I can turn it into something that others can gain any hope or encouragement from, I’ll just continue to do it and then forget about it, and move on.

In the meantime, the work is accumulating and I am healing.