Fishing Eyes

I subscribe to e-mails from TED  - an organization that spreads most innovative ideas by the world's leading thinkers, artists, scientists and others. The videos are anywhere from 5 minutes to hour long and are amazingly inspiring. Just yesterday I watched one by David Gallo with footage of wonderful sea creatures.  

Fishing Eyes is a mixed media piece using watercolors and color pencils on masa paper(size 14 x 18".) I painted it a few years ago, framed it and put it aside.  A year ago I took it out of its frame and changed the parts that were bothering me a bit. I think I am happy with it now. 

Lace and shadow

One of my goals this year is to sketch something everyday.  Two days ago, as I was removing my shoes after my daily walk, decided it was as good subject as any and set to work.  But what I liked was how the sunlight created the shadows of the metal rings in the spiral bound sketch book this morning when I came to pick up the book for today's sketch.  

Frayed Nerves

I just finished jumping rope --I am trying to keep warm while waiting for the repairman to show up and fix our heating system.  Yesterday afternoon it started making awful noises and to be safe we decided to switch it off. Its almost noon today and the repairmen haven't showed up yet. We have a few spot heaters out and running but its 34 F/ 2 C, cloudy and drizzling outside and about 50 F/ 10 C indoors (I keep checking the thermometer we have) and my nose and fingertips are just COLD :(  I have been alternating drinking a lot of hot coffee and tea (and even just hot water to keep my caffeine level under check!) I have rubbed my hands together vigorously and stood in front of the heaters but was still cold and so decided to jump rope to keep me warm.  My mind wandered all over the place as I was skipping rope and I suddenly remembered The Post done in color pencils a few years ago.  We live not too far from Colonial Williamsburg which showcases and interprets life as it was in the 18th century.  There are lots of horses in the colonial replica of the city and many posts to hitch them when they are resting. I loved the look of the weathered wood, frayed rope and the rusting metal chain and had to try and capture them on paper. 

The Post color pencils on colored paper. 9 x6"

Happy New Year!

May a year full of splendor unfold for you and your family!

And on a lighter note- which one are you? - " An optimist stays up until midnight to see the New Year in. A pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves " -Bill Vaughan.

Butterfly  watercolors and color pencils  12 x10 1/2 "

Symbolism

This past weekend we went to Washington DC to visit the Smithsonian Arthur Sackler Gallery's special exhibit "Garden and Cosmos: The Royal Paintings of Jodhpur" The 60 newly discovered 17th century paintings are from the collection of the royal court of  Mewar-Jodhpur.  They were commissioned and completed for the various Maharajas. The paintings are surprisingly large and tackle the ideas of cosmos especially the challenging concept of 'Brahman.' Not much is known about the artists but scholars have discovered they were hindus as well as muslims. The details and colors are exquisite and the difficult concepts are handled with care and imagination. 

I painted  Illusions  in watercolors and color pencils (size 11 x 14") a few years ago soon after I started listening to lectures on Vedanta, Bhagavad   Gita and Upanishads at the Arsha Vidya Gurukulam.  I was attempting to illustrate the often given example : confusing  snake and rope-  as a way of explaining the illusionary world we live in.  I used one of the photographs of a snake charmer from our various trips to India as a reference.  

Season's Greetings!

Letting Go

I am always anxious when I am working on portraits. Trying to capture at least a small part of the essence of a person on paper is a daunting task. Again and again I come across the advice :Let go - enjoy the journey and don't worry about the outcome. If only it was easy to follow!

Just today I finished reading a wonderful book of essays "Learning from the heart- Lessons of living, loving and listening " by Daniel Goltlieb. He expesses at one point "Personally, what I want is 'not to want' ." I know the feeling. What makes it powerful is that Gottlieb "happens to be a quadriplegic". -as the blurb explains - "which makes him somewhat of an expert in self-acceptance. And while he says his condition has taught him to listen, learn and care deeply, one senses Gottlieb is a born mensch and a man with a big heart. Warm, wise, compassionate, humble and often funny, he displays not a shred of self-pity or false modesty. Best of all, his message has the unmistakable ring of truth to it: love rather than change yourself or anyone else. “Trying to change others is about intolerance, which is at the core of so much enmity. We cannot find peace unless we are trying to help others find peace also.” I highly recommend this book. I loved the way he explores and reflects on what it means to be human. Its Bhagavd Gita and Buddhist philosophy in action and very timely advice.

Lost in Notes II is done in color pencils on black paper. Its a painting of a street musician that I really enjoyed listening to in Seattle, Washington on a summer night. I painted it a few years ago and later gave it away as a gift.

Harmony

 These ducks along with some geese are a familiar sight by the trail I go walking regularly.  They swim around  the lake so gracefully and yet you know they are kicking away underwater.  The ducks  project such peace and harmony as they go about their daily business. Watching them eases my stress, calms my anxiety and soothes my emotional turbulence.  The ducks like the lotus stay dry and the water washes off its feathers. I guess we just have to look around and there is lesson to learn everyday. 

'Website' is done in graphite and color pencils(size 14 x16").

Renaissance

Today I watched a documentary "Dalai Lama Renaissance." Forty of the West's leading, innovative thinkers in their fields met at Dalai Lama's residence in Dharmashala in Northern India to discusss the world's problems and to see how they could solve them. What happened there was a transformation - most notably of their egos. Dalai Lama's simple message was that people all over the world only want happiness and 'secular ethics' together with compassion is the way to go. Thats a journey everyone was invited to take to bring about greater consciousness and understanding. 

Lotus - in Hinduism and Buddhism represents beauty and non -attachment. It grows in mud but floats on the water and remains unaffected by either the wetness or the mud. We are urged to live in this world without attachment to our surroundings. Lotus is also a symbol for the centers of consciousness -chakras - in the body.  I painted Lotus in watercolors on masa paper as a part of the series of paintings I created for my November show on India and on Mandalas.  I noticed that I had missed including it in the slide show on my earlier entry - so here it is :) 

December Gifts!

Its amazing to see some flowers still blooming in December -especially after a hard frost.   We have a bunch of  purple and yellow pansies, white snapdragons, red camellias and even a few white and pink roses lending color to the winter landscape in our backyard while everything else is brown or bare. I find it truly inspiring to see such resiliency and beauty in these harsh cold winter months.

 The Snapdragons were painted a while ago in watercolors - freehand with no sketching. 

size:13x9"