More on Concrete

This piece, (still in progress), "I bring you red roses because they were your favorite" is 48x48 concrete, acrylic, prisma pencil, graph paper, graphite on board. The above images are sections of the painting in detail. I thinned the concrete out to a thick soupy texture, and painted it on a damp surface.

I've learned a lot in the past few weeks about concrete products, sealants, and bonders. What I've found most effective for my work is, epoxy! I love epoxy. After the painting is complete I coat, or paint epoxy in areas of interest and concern. What I dig the most, is you can draw into the epoxy, subtract it, ad it, build it, it's totally interesting and it's become part of the media.

I included the photo above of the silk rose, because this rose is from my grandpa's grave. I take him red roses every week, because they were his favorite. I replace the sun-faded roses with a new batch, which I stock up on from the "Dollar Tree", and keep in my car. My grandpa ran a concrete construction business, thus my determination and obsession with the material. I know many of us are close to our grandparents, but mine played major parental rolls in my life, and they have a most special place in my heart.

Concrete Details

For my next series, I'm experimenting with concrete on canvas, as a major element in the painting. I haven't been able to find any examples of this, I'm finding that the concrete doesn't like to adhere to gesso. Guess I should've known...

On the subject of media, I've had several suggestions from my piers, to use other elements in place of concrete, i.e. plaster, calking, wax... While I try to always welcome input and suggestions, I feel like I have to conquer this concrete "thing". I specifically chose this media for it's personal, sentimental value to me. In addition to my memory and story, I'm interested in the color, the grey, the cold, the stone-hard qualities, and the cracking, crumbling, expanding, organic qualities of concrete. I think of squares and rectangles, I see lines, I see basic geometric elements and space studies, (and Dolese trucks).

DNA Longboard Show!

Oct. twenty-third 7-11 pm GO SEE awesome artwork and check out a unique gallery/shop. All works are done on longboard decks, offering a fresh and unique take on "surface"!

Above is an image of my deck design, blueprints are adhered and geometric shapes are cut into the surface to create tid bits of negative space. A graphite drawing of the interior of the Florence Cathedral is highlighted in areas of architectural interest in the transparent red/orange. I wanted it to be transparent so that you can still experience and follow the line-work on the deck, lines that extend and wrap around the pre-existing lines in the blue prints. Also attached are two photographs, playing on industrial vs nature, and the beauty of opposites.

every day you save my life

Every day you save my life: 30x60 mixed media on wood

A present for my husband on his birthday: oil on wood, photographs of my husband and I, and one of our wedding day. Also incorporated, a letter from my husband on our wedding day, a feather from the vineyard where we wed, and image transfers for textural surfaces. We are celebrating our 1st anniversary this weekend!

Kaboom

I was only looking for the good apples: 30x30 mixed media on wood

Kaboom: 30x30 mixed media on wood

For me, beautiful represents a time. A simpler place and time when ignorance means peace, and family means protection and normalcy. I am taken back to a time where normal meant all things familiar and consistent, like the smell of freshly hung sheets on a clothesline, and the taste of fresh tortillas with butter, finding the good apples, and exploring the ally behind our green house.

Beautiful, was a time of ignorance and oblivion… no concern for money, addiction, liability, divorce, or health.

By contrast, KaBoom. A time of angst, panic, and frustration. Both of these pieces are dealing with time and cycles, and the changes that occur, for me, some have come and gone far too early.

poor bird

36'' x 36'' mixed media on wood: acrylic, pencil, blueprints, paper, found objects

I found this bird nest under a tree in my yard one day after a storm. I was sad because I thought that the babies must have fallen in the storm too, but I did not see any dead baby birds in the yard, and I felt better. Then, I when I picked up the nest, I examined it, and became absolutely engaged in it’s structure. It was really intricate, durable, and was completely intact after falling 20 or so feet in the storm. At that moment my compassion for little dead birds, and sad momma birds turned into wonder and amazement and respect for this tiny cradle.

Somehow a small bird knew how to gather the myriad materials for this structure. Somehow this bird arranged scores of small pieces of twig and grass and weed and bark, weaving them together with such precision that the nest is still sturdy and secure after the storm. Considered in this light, this little bundle of dried vegetation is really a small miracle.

Dates To Remember...

36x36 mixed media on canvas

Finished a new painting called, "dates to remember":

Still inspired by the drive East on 66, the colors and textures are very much the same as "east-bound", a painting I finished just days before beginning this one. So, I think I was still in this earth-tone/dirt/grass/wind/ kind of mode... But during the time I was working on this piece, I was feeling a little sad about the kind of life changes that take place naturally over time, and the effects of loss, divorce, marriage, birth, etc. - and the way these things take a toll and can make our lives better and worse. The way a baby can make our lives mean something, the way the loss of our loved one can leave us responsibility like we've never known... and divorce makes everything complicated and destructs an entire family- but my recent marriage gave me reason to have faith in love. So included in this piece, are the dates on which life-changing events occurred in my life.