Promise of Color

Today was a very misty, foggy day. It rained all day and the fog just never cleared. It was a great day to go out and capture the gray world around with my camera. Official first day of spring is only four days away but the plants are  already filled with buds poised to do their thing.  All the promise of color is wrapped tightly in those tiny buds just beyond our sight. I just read an article in the latest Scientific American that we human beings are able to see the full spectrum of colors and hues because of 'trichromacy'. It was a fascinating article on how the color vision in humans evolved.  And it is amazing that I never give a second thought to something that is so unique and special to me as a human!   

Sweet Memory

Bus 26 is painted in watercolors on hot press paper.  I wanted to capture the excitement and adventure of  'the first day of school.'  I have fond memories of that day for both my children and it is especially sweet now since they are both busy adults. Painting this was a sentimental journey for me and I enjoyed it immensely.  

Less is More

I always want to fill the paper with color and details when I paint.  To leave some of the paper untouched and use negative painting is something I have  to deliberately work at.  There are plenty of studies that show that brain is very good at filling in the gaps of information -- but my brain needs to be reminded of that constantly when I am painting. In 'Birds', I experimented using bubble wrap, cardboard for pattern and texture.  I started the painting in one of the classes I was taking but as usual I  had a difficult time finishing it. I didn't know how to transfer the techniques demonstrated over to my painting. Slowly, over the course of a few weeks I defined and darkened a few shapes, and working hard at keeping the color and details to a minimum. I also learned to paint negatively.  Even when it seems illogical, often less is more. 

Birds watercolor 11x14"

Tangled Web

This past week in between sketching and thinking about my next painting, I came across an old half sketched abstract design and for some reason abandoned project. I even had some paint on it. I was looking for a diversion and needed to just play on something that I wasn't too attached to.  I picked up some masking fluid and merrily made abstract lines/designs with it. Once the masking fluid was dry, I started painting and defining a few shapes  here and there with no particular design in mind. I thoroughly enjoyed the process since I didn't have to worry about messing up the painting! After a few hours I decided it was time to stop. So of course, the painting does not have any up/down orientation :). 

As I was painting, I was listening to a program Art and Evolution  on NPR's "On Point".  Host Tom Ashbrook's guest was Denis Dutton, who has written a  book " The Art Instinct, Beauty, Pleasure and Human Evolution."  It was interesting to listen to Dutton argue that art is what helped humankind evolve from the caves and that art is instinctive. As Ashbrook put it "....cave drawings, natural selection, and Picasso. Mating habits, sexual selection and Pavorotti. Art, he argues, is not sublime. Its intsinct,  from cave to concert hall."  Its something to think about -would we be humans without art? 

Tangled Web watercolor 16 x 13" 

The Surprise Gift

Mother Nature is full of surprises and we were given a gift of a beautiful snow fall couple of days ago.  Snow fall in March is very unusual for our region and it has been a celebration. The newspapers and TV have been showcasing the fun children and adults alike have been having playing in the snow. It has also been so cold that even the somewhat brackish water in the river that flows by our backyard has had a layer of ice on it for the past couple of days.  I am grateful I woke up early today and watched  the sunrise over the frozen waters. The osprey actually was standing on frozen water before it decided to check out the scenery from the pole.

Best Seats

A group of Tibetan Buddhist monks are invited by The Hampton Arts Commission/American Theater to town every August to create a sand Mandala. They start on a monday or tuesday, and  complete  it usually on the following saturday morning. On saturday around noon, to illustrate the Buddhist principle of impermanence of everything, the mandala is then ritually deconstructed, the sand gathered into a container, taken with fanfare in procession to the river where prayers are offered for peace and prosperity as the sand is released into the water.  It usually attracts a good crowd, and there are always many children.  The Monks also set up a table for a 'community mandala' where visitors  use the traditional instrument chakpu and participate in creating a mandala too as the monks continue to work on their intricate creation.  Its a wonderful week filled with cultural and spiritual programs -lectures, ritual dances and entertainment etc.   And I have hundreds of photographs taken over the years documenting their visits.  Since most of the monks are from my home state Karnataka in India, I do visit them often during the week and host a dinner one evening along with two my of my friends.  Its a treat as well as a meditation to watch them patiently and diligently 'paint' delicate, elaborately detailed, colorful mandala.  What serenity and discipline the monks exude as they construct the symbol rich mandala. 

Over the years,  I have been inspired to paint various scenes of mandala creation.  This past week I completed painting the children watching the monks pour the sand into the water. I used a bunch of photographs to sketch this scene. The only thing I really worried about when sketching and composing the scene two months ago was to get the proportions right.  Little did I realize that the scene was full of various textures to tackle! It turned out to be a meditative process for me as I figured out slowly over the past two months to use watercolors to paint hair (three kinds!), cloth, wood, siding, glass, shoe, reflection etc.  If I had been aware of the difficulties I would be facing as I sketched and planned the composition,  I would have never tried to paint it!  I am grateful that I persevered and completed "Best Seats" (20x15")

Passion to Create

Today I spent my afternoon marveling very beautiful, extremely creative and colorful quilts at the "Mid Atlantic Quilt Show" in Hampton. The colors and textures in yarns and fabrics were indeed a feast to the eye and exciting to touch. The talent the quilters showed in selecting the materials and colors, designing the quilts, and the craftsmanship they displayed in sewing the pieces, without a doubt elevates them to status of artists. What I saw today is 'fabric art.' The pieces were truly innovative and labor of love. And the gadgets the vendors were selling were indeed fun to explore!

I have never quilted anything even though I have tackled various, often foolishly ambitious sewing projects over the years! But that was before I started painting. Unfortunately these days I rarely go to the sewing machine other than for repairs :( . The only quilt I have created is in watercolors in 'Welcome' (22x30"). I sketched the horse weather wane at an antique shop during a Dough Walton workshop a few years ago and decided to paint a quilt for the background. The resulting composition I think is whimsical. It was selected as a top piece of the week which made me very happy!

Artistic Vision

Another Place was painted using only three colors -red, blue and yellow - and of course, mixing blue and yellow gave me green. It was an exercise in using limited colors and painting an imaginary subject. Trying to conjure up a painting from my imagination was challenging - and I realized how few details of what I see and experience I commit to my memory. As a visual artist who paints, its crucial for me to able to see and look and look again so I can capture the essence of the subject on paper. Or so I thought until I read today in The New York Times an article 'In Blindness, a Bold New Vision' about the artist Mr.Bramblitt. It is astounding that even though he can neither see his subjects nor the colors on his canvas, rather than giving up painting he has reached new artistic heights. " It wasn't until I lost my sight that I became brave enough to fail." He has adapted to his blindness and has invented new ways of painting and identifying colors and conveying to viewers the shapes and colors he now perceives. The article concludes by mentioning that he may never regain his vision, but that he no longer views his blindness as a handicap. "Life for me now is way more colorful than it ever was."

Cabbage Concerto in Red

Giving a title to a painting is usually not easy for me and mostly I end up with somewhat bland explanatory ones.  When my children were still living at home, I often tried to recruit them  to help me out.  That was sometimes a perilous task - since I was never sure if their suggestions were  tongue-in-cheek! But they did come up with quirky, creative ones.  Cabbage Concerto in Red is done in watercolors and the title was courtesy of my son.  I think all those years of piano lessons didn't go to waste. 

Frequently Asked Question

One of the questions most frequently asked of an artist is 'How long does it take you to paint something?' I am someone who needs a lot of 'incubation period'! I will think about a subject, play around with composition in my head long before I even attempt to sketch or paint it. Even then, all that planning and thinking doesn't really guarantee that my painting will look like what I imagined it to be - and I get a surprise myself! Fortunately or unfortunately lots of them don't even make it to paper. And then there are some paintings which just pour out of my brushes as if they have a life of their own! Sometimes I will take a piece out years later and work on it some more to make it just right (or ruin it completely!) So, in my case, how long does it take is anybody's guess.

Flying Fun - (22" x 30") was on hold for many years. I had barely started it in a workshop by Doug Walton. I was at loss as to how to complete it then using what I had learnt during that week and struggled with it for a long time. Once every few months I would pull it out look at it and try to resolve it. Along the way the watercolor painting was transformed to a mixed media piece as I used crayons, pastels, acrylic and gouche. Meanwhile I painted two other paintings School's Out and Fishing Eyes using parts of this composition.

I realized how much of a luxury of time I have been enjoying as I watched a video Paintbrush in hand and Nothing to loose in New York Times web site on artist Cordula Volkening. Doctors have given Cordula Volkening, a Brooklyn mother of two, three months to live because of brain cancer. She has decided to forgo one more round of treatment. Rather than lose her ability to paint in the last few months of her life, she has found solace in painting. She is painting furiously so she can sell as many as she can with the proceeds going to her children.

I know I will now be painting with a renewed sense of committment as I keep her in my prayers.

Drama and Splendor

We went to see an exhibit on photography by Ansel Adams yesterday at the Peninsula Fine Arts Center in Newport News. He was a pioneer in photography and has captured the beauty of various places -most notably Yosemite National Park which he visited almost every year throughout his life. I read that he believed "place matters, the world around us is a marvel to behold and to respect and to honor." The 48 photographs were selected from the collection of The Turtle Bay Exploration Park, Redding, California. According to the exhibit notes, "It represents about two-thirds of a selection Adams made late in his life to serve as a succinct representation of his life’s work. He himself felt these photographs were his best. Called “The Museum Set,” it reveals the importance Adams placed on the drama and splendor of natural environments."

I post the above photograph as a homage to the master himself. It was taken a few years ago when our backyard was blanketed with a heavy snowfall. The sunrise was so beautiful across the river, over the snow covered trees and chairs on our deck - I am grateful I was there at the right time to capture the beauty.

Looking and Seeing

I did a blind contour drawing with a new twist. I followed Marvin Bartel's instructions for teaching children to draw and made myself a 'blinder buddy' -basically a sheet of paper through which a pencil has been pierced. This shielded completely my hand and the paper I was drawing on. There was no way to quickly steal glances at the drawing I was working on! I really liked sketching that way in a very mindful, deliberate manner and was pleased with the results. I hope to use it often in my practices.

I am still nursing my cold and have spent more time reading and surfing than painting. I came accross a study by scientists at British Columbia that looked into whether 'color can color performance or emotions.' According to the New York Times article 'if a new study is any guide, the color red can make people’s work more accurate, and blue can make people more creative.' And the article concluded by mentioning that the New York Times newsroom walls are all 'tomato soup red'! I also enjoyed listening to NPR's version of it. Now, I am leaning towards purple backgrounds to make me creatively accurate :)

Drawing from Memory

Yesterday, while searching for art exercise ideas, I wandered all over cyberspace for inspiration and stumbled upon a couple of wonderful sites. One of the ideas that appealed to me was drawing from memory. I learned that Leonardo Da Vinci recommended that artists review in their imagination the outlines of forms they had studied during the day.  In the same vein, Sir Joshua Reynolds told his students to draw from memory what they had previously drawn during the life class. Artist and educator Marvin Bartel has a wonderful site about teaching art and fostering creativity in children.  The exercises there are good for all artists.  

I then rummaged through my kitchen drawers and found a wine bottle opener to practice  a modified form of the exercise. I studied it for about a minute or so, hid it from my sight and then started drawing what I thought it looked like. I know I need to work on my  observational and memory skills! 

The Age Old Question

Early this morning, as on most days, I was listening to 'The Writer's Almanac' on NPR. Garrison Keillor was reciting a poem  "He Gets Around to Answering the Old Question" by Miller Williams  which ended with this stanza:

So now you have asked me the oldest question of all,

You want to know how I'm doing, I told you before,

I'm dying. Been at it for years. Still, I think 

I could hang a few more calendars on the door. 

This reminded me of a conversation my husband and his brothers had with one of their Uncles -whose portrait  'Narayan Mava' (color pencils 13 1/2" x 10 1/2") is today's post. Couple of summers ago they were visiting their uncle and one of them asked 'the age old question.'  When Uncle replied with a twinkle in his eye  "Sometimes I am not sure whether I am here or there' - one quick witted brother urged "Please Uncle, Just  be here more often than there!'  

This portrait was done using as reference a bunch of  photographs taken during that visit.  I wanted to evoke the feelings he expressed that evening. 

Celebrations

'School is out'  is a very special painting for me. Its one of my very first paintings and also my first 'sold' piece as well. Its always exciting to see it hanging in our friend's house whenever we visit them.   A few days ago when I was going through my sketches, I came across the photograph. I was delighted since I didn't remember documenting it.  

I am also very proud to share a first by my daughter - she filmed the Lion Dance Parade celebrating the Chinese New Year in New York city's Chinatown.  I think she did a great job! 

Memory

I have to post this photograph of the beautiful snow scenery from Colorado. Snow covered mountains and valleys are just a memory now. I am back at sea-level Poquoson and finally not feeling so out of breath by merely walking a few steps!  All that snow and cold weather (or the air travel with a few sniffly fellow passengers) did take a toll on me and now I am nursing a cold and flu. As I spent the day cuddled on the sofa with hot tea, surfing and catching up with e-mails and news etc I came across this NPR story explaining the biology and physics of a runny nose.  But it doesn't matter and I will happily stay out and explore the quiet and beauty of snow and take photographs again.  

Art and Nature

Yesterday we celebrated our 35th wedding anniversary :).  We spent the better part of the day going up and down in the gondola taking pictures of the snow covered mountains and valleys. To add to the excitement, because of the very cold weather and extremly low temperatures, the gondola got stuck and we got to enjoy (even though it got a bit too cold inside the gondola) the beautiful scenery for extra 15-20 minutes or so! 

"Speak to me about art and I will learn more about you. Nature is also like that. When you look deeply into the natural world, you look deeply into yourself- when you describe nature you describe yourself" Adam Wolport in a Ode magazine article. 

Mile High Beauty

This is the Denver International Airport -I took the photo from the plane yesterday as we landed there. I am looking forward to a week's stay in the mountains and a family reunion.  Its been a fun two days already - and I am happy taking pictures of the snow and the mountains. Hope to get in some sketching in the next few days. 

Renditions

This is the companion piece for Low Tide - also done in color pencils.  Most of my subjects are things I encounter in my daily life and rendered in 2-D.  Sculptures and other three dimensional art fascinate me. Recently Scientific American had an article and slide show on seemingly impossible sculptures.  According to the article these "impossible sculptures can only be interpreted (or misinterpreted as the case maybe) by the visual mind. All of the accompanying slides show real objects. No photographic manipulation has been used. "  These artists remind me of  M.C. Escher.

Blue Blood

I spent the day yesterday glued to the TV. I couldn't stop marveling the smooth transition of power as Barak Obama became our new President.  Every four years we get to vote for the leader of our choice - no privileged 'blue blood' nobility assuming power through hereditary claims in a democracy. 

All that TV watching also meant I didn't paint or sketch yesterday.  So today when I was looking  through my collection to pick a painting for my blog,  Low Tide, in color pencils jumped at me. The way the brain makes connections is another amazing thing : Horseshoe crabs have blue blood - something I learnt as a biology major in college and never forgot because its such an interesting factoid.  I see these crabs washed up on the beaches around here quite often. Their colors and the shadow they cast on the wet sand even as they lay in pieces compelled me to try and capture their beauty on paper.  I have done two color pencil pieces on colored paper in the past couple of years. And I am grateful that the only 'blue bloods' I get to see here are horseshoe crabs.   

Low Tide, 11" x14" color pencils. 

Art, Beauty and Popularity

I had heard the comment that painting pretty things especially flowers in watercolor is not 'high' art. And yesterday as I was reading the obituary of Andrew Wyeth in New York Times I was blindsided with this statement : "Because of his popularity, a bad sign to many art world insiders, Wyeth came to represent middle-class values and ideals that modernism claimed to reject, so that arguments about his work extended beyond painting to societal spilts along class, geographical and educational lines. " Huh ? All I know is that art has remained significant throughout human history in various forms and will continue to do so.

Tulips watercolor 10" x 10"

Irony

"Nature-deficit disorder"  is a word I came across in the latest Audubon magazine. According to John Flicker, author Richard Louv, in his acclaimed book Last Child in the Woods, coined the phrase "to describe an array of health, education, and environmental-awareness problems afflicting children who lack outdoor experiences." I didn't know that phrase existed when I painted ' Irony' a few years ago.  I had encountered an adult who freaked out and screamed 'BUG'  upon seeing a beautiful, plant friendly lady bug crawling around.  That became the basis for this painting that explored opposing concepts. As soon as I heard her yell I knew I had a subject matter for my next painting.  I was glad to note in the article that Richard Louv "launched Children and Nature Network, a coalition of people working on environmental, health and education issues who recognize the importance of outdoor activities for children and promote efforts to reconnect kids with nature."   I hope we as humans will learn to live and let live with all of nature. 

Irony watercolor, 30" x 22"

The Creative Spirit

I just finished this watercolor painting of a group of children playing street Cricket. I used  photographs taken a few years ago by my daughter and myself near St. Thomas Mount in Chennai, India as reference.  I played with the composition and moved some children around, changed what was beyond the gate and finally sketched it a few weeks ago. Only this morning I decided to take the plunge and paint.  And I still  wonder to this day why the kid was watching instead of being a part of the game. 

Play is crucial for fostering the creative spirit.   Childlike curiosity and passion lead to 'eureka' moments throughout history  and of course in  our everyday life in things big and small.  Here is a TED video of Vik Muniz, a Brazilian born, Brooklyn based artist. He uses everyday materials like cotton, sugar, wire, chocolate and thread etc in unexpected and playful ways  to create portraits, landscapes, still life.  I am feeling rather inadequate for using only good old watercolors!  

Music in Unlikely Places

Sketching this musician from an old black and white 33 1/2 rpm record cover was  my yesterday's art exercise.  I am trying to get a likeness of objects in my sketching with minimal erasing and measuring. The goal is to get comfortable sketching in public - right now I prefer to draw in the privacy of my home.  I read about an exercise to just sketch only the shadows and decided to simplify the process and and start by using a black and white photograph - besides it was around 10PM  by the time I even got around to my sketch book last night.  

Speaking of musicians,  I heard on NPR about a research that shows the female mosquito's tone is a surprisingly perfect 400-Hz note -'G'.  The male's buzz is 'D' and together they bring about near perfect duet to create an overtone -a third fainter overtone of 1200-Hz - only then will they mate. Check out the link to read and hear the mosquito love song.  Poquoson, where we live, whose name means 'the great marsh' is also home for lots of mosquitos in summer. From now on, I will remember to listen mindfully to the perfect 'G' before brushing those pesky insects away. 

Hot Shadows

Yesterday I read a review in New York Times about a photography exhibit: Eudora Welty in New York: Photographs of the early 1930s, Portraits Taken by a Writer as a Young Woman (in Hard Times.) There is a slide show that goes along with the article that highlights the exquisite black and white photos taken in early 193os. They tell wonderful stories and focus on beautiful shadows, expressive faces of the people enduring difficult times, and taken from some unique angles. The show will be up until feb 6 at the Museum of The City of New York. I am so grateful for the internet that I am able to read about it and get a taste of the the photographs in the slide show right here from the comfort of my living room.

Hot Shadows is a miniature painting (3"x3") done in color pencils on watercolor paper. I wanted to show the texture of the gravel on the road and the watercolor paper did the trick. I also discovered that coloring and then erasing with an electric eraser left enough color on the paper because of its texture. This technique gave me the desired look of the gravel along with some depth. I was happy to leave a few jewels of color embedded in the shadows. I took the photographs of my bicycle and its shadows one saturday morning in September a few years ago waiting along the road side to cheer my daughter as she ran her first 5k. I played around a lot with the composition and finally settled on just the shadows.

Temple Elephants

Many temples in South India have elephants that are part of religious festivities and ceremonies held at the temple. They carry the images of the deities in procession and at other times will receive offerings and give blessings. Its pretty thrilling to be blessed by the elephants. The elephants are loved and especially revered and inturn form deep bonds with the Mahuts who care for them. The Mahuts practice most days taking the elephants around the procession path.

Temple Elephants are painted in watercolor. (8 1/2 x 11") I have several photographs taken over the years and many happy memories of seeing the elephants in the temples. I had been thinking of painting them for several years now and finally got to it in the past couple of days. I used parts of at least three pictures and sketches from my collection to get this image and hope to paint a bigger one with a temple background soon.

I cannot end this blog without posting a link to a heart warming story of elephant friendship that was the topic of a story on CBS evening news just a few days ago. Enjoy

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"