Good Morning!

Good morning! I have 6 mins left to say that. It was a late night for me last night, but i had a list of goals and a lot of motivation. Wicked combo. We have a lot of shows right now and for me the trick is to continuously add creativity to the mix. When it becomes all business and busy work: setting up shows, moving and hanging paintings, organizing the studio, putting finishing touches on paintings, sending invitations and hosting or attending parties, I find sometimes that two weeks will have gone by and I haven't painted! I of course, start to implode and the once beautiful world, turns dark.

For me being creative is to be able to express myself. This is crucial. I take in so much. I almost inhale the energy around me, the people, the events the feelings. Moments have their blueprints and they tend to leave certain impressions on me and it is important for me to translate these out of my body. Basically, I will store emotions until I have a place to put them. I have this theory that the human body can house only a certain amount of experiences. When we reach our capacity nothing more can get in. That is why it is important to release old energy and experiences - to simply make room for new ones and to grow. For me, my ideal way to rid of these old experiences is to put them somewhere. That somewhere is my art. Which, for me, is so wonderful because sometimes an experience will occur and I am not even sure how it is being digested. When I paint out the emotional elements, i get to see it. i get to see what this event really meant to me. not just the way it appeared to be, but , but how i processed it. whether the experience is good or bad no longer matters, it is now healthy and transformed because it is out of me.

Anyway with all that being said, i have to remind myself of the importance of this. I can easily get caught up in the business side of the work and forget that familiar feeling of relief and satisfaction of creating, which brought me here in the first place. So last night..er um..5am this morning I had just finished adding pages and uploading my website and i looked over at this unfinished area of my canvas that was calling to me. My head was heavy and I could have crawled into bed, but i knew I had to finish that part. and i did. I knew that if I did, I would feel better. Feel. Better. Feel. Better. And i did. And then I realized I could have painted all morning...funny. Here is the section of the painting from this morning. Enjoy. x

2:22 perhaps?

how long is it going to be before i get my arse painting tonight. well, 2:19 am sounds like a fine time to really really really start thinking about it. oh, even the things we love to do sometimes take motivation. x

An Everyday Portal

Today, while joe ran errands, I waited for him outside of his various locations wanting to absorb as much sun as chicago could offer. At the first location I honestly stood there thinking, um ok, I am standing here now what? As if I needed some sort of activity to validate myself being standing there without purpose. Then I saw something. I saw a tiny garden, planted by the city. It was so simple, green leafy surroundings, red plants, yellow-green bushes, light green stalks with off white blooms still in their cocoons. One flower in all of this had bloomed. Fully. It was like the first solider surveying the area, making sure it was safe for the others to come out. And as I stood there, tiny details started appearing everywhere. The depth of the veins on the plants, the variations of the colors of the earth, the rainbow of greens, the sharp lines of the leaves, the soft wrinkles of that first bloom. I walk down this street all the time, how many times have i passed this garden of beauty and ignored its visual gifts. How often do I skim over the beauty which simple strolls have to offer? Often, I imagine. I actually had my sketchbook with me, which is quite rare, unfortunately, and i started to sketch this garden. The more I sketched, the more I saw. Honestly, it was so beautiful. I felt so blessed to have had to stop there. Suddenly I began to notice more things, the people who passed by (none really glancing at that garden, by the way), the sounds of their voices, the bells on the collars of dogs, the babies in the strollers, the cacophony of the traffic - all of a sudden everything became so vibrant. It was like a portal in a new universe, right there, and available to me every day. The more you see, the more you see. The more I saw the beauty of that corner, i started to see beauty and richness everywhere else we walked. Today was a gift. There is such a wealth to receive in the simple details of every moment. I hope to remember this more often, its' so easy to get caught up in the day to day walk in life, I can easily forget the beauty of each step.

prayers

Some people go to church every single day. That is amazing to me. Their sinless souls cleansed each day by a whisper in a darkened confession booth. Their faith, their connection so tightly knit, in the mind of this devoted disciple, is there any doubt that surely heaven, or or some peace like it, awaits their departure from this mortal coil?

There is no confession booth waiting to cleanse me. My sin rests in my own hands. My church is my canvas. My prayers are my brush strokes, my chosen colors outline my confessions and my tears are the drips on heavily stained alters. I confess that I have not been to church in many days and the weight of it is so heavy that it alters all types of normal activity. I feel closeted, chaotic, unavailable even to my own self. So far removed do I feel, that I wonder if my church will even remember my name, hear my confessions or allow me to pray? So, in a humble moment of genuflection i pick up the brush i left drying for too many days, stand in front of my canvas and try to find the place on the path where I stopped praying. There is a silent verse waiting to be recited and, if i allow it, a voice, maybe some prayer from a distant part of me, will be heard. and answered.

My doppelganger has left the building

My excuses, my doppelganger has left the building leaving me alone to paint in its stead. i write to you from the inside of the inside and as i found myself kneeling and bowing in front a my french press pressing to ease the pressure of the pm's release into am i am curious as to why i just wrote this as i danced between paint brush and pencil

"i write to you from inside a coup.
they can't fight forever.
neither can these words -
sudden warmth in winter.
a few war torn pebbles are all that remains of this memory and i find myself
a giggling.
ah, you think you're better than me.
well hopefully we'll remain to see what remains.
you are a sleeping memory"

it is only an ecstasy release. as is most of what i do. especially in these late hours in which i find myself so often. can i work more, possibly. possibly not. when am i not working. when am i not consumed by my art. when am i not so blessed. bleepin blessed. or blissed. who the hell cares.

i can't laugh anymore, my heart is full tonight. i am only yearning for yearning's sake. ok, i have to laugh because these words are ridiculously silly. can you ridicule yourself for being ridiculous...oh giggle giggle giggle glorious giggling. can anyone be so lucky as i am tonight to be so free to paint and be self employed by it. ah the madness of letting go! yahooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! how glorious! yahhooooo! what a leap to take. and in the middle of an economy downfall. why would i do such a thing? because i am ridiculously stubborn and i really got sick of not painting and being pissed off that anything took me away from doing what i enjoy most. in all my life actually. what the hell is the purpose of being on this planet if you can't succeed at being yourself. ha ha? ok, back to painting. and did i mention that this painting is at that point where i can either just let go and allow it to come forth or persistantly be stubborn and try to control it's birth. ha if you can find that answer, please do let me know. i know there is balance in there to be found somewhere. the balance between the letting go and the making of by cognition. mmm...is that really a thing to be found anyway. i await your response. most eagerly.
best wishes for a glorious holiday of lights.
kisses,
your friendly painter girl
lizzie

Oh Homey

I went to the Winslow Homer and Edward Hopper exhibit today at the Art Institute (of Chicago). It has left me feeling a little motionless in my steps. Homer's work specifically made me stop and re-examine myself as an artist. I looked at his use of sky, earth, water and LIGHT and I had to ask myself, what the hell have I been doing? Or rather what am I doing right now? I am pleased with my new pallet and the new explorations of colors I have found in and out of myself, but when I look at this great artist's work I asked myself, how seriously am i taking my own work? His work really spoke to me. I felt like I can not continue painting blindly as I am doing now. When I say, blindly, I refer to the madness of my spontaneity within my abstract work. Sure, it is expressionism and I am raw honesty; purely expressing myself to myself, but what of the conversation I could potentially have with myself if I sat down and deliberately choose the words, the language and the visual textual intonations? I have said it before, I often feel I am limited by my own visual vocabulary, but after witnessing the masterpieces of Homer, I realize that i have lazily shirked off my own responsibility to learn more. It is my responsibility to myself as an artist to realize more of myself within my work and what potential expressions can be born if i take the time to learn and explore and learn and explore.  Thank you Dear Mr. Homer.

The hide and seek of Me

I have a new series I am working on. well truth be told, i have a new part of myself that is quietly beckoning for me to realize itself. she is red, she is orange, she is purple, she is yellow, she teases green, she is bold, she is soft, she is quietly loudly laughing behind the scenes playing hide and seek with my heart until i find her and set her free. bare with me.