Meta-painting...

Someone once told me that bloggers who blog about blogging are meta-blogging. I'm borrowing that term to describe my process of re-painting The Poplar Line in an alternate style. So to me, it's a painting about painting.

Poplar Jazz, 24 x 24, acrylic on deep cradle panel

Though this version (below) eventually grew on me, I needed a more expressionistic version - more about color and movement - and, well, - paint.

The Classical Poplar Line

And because the gallery was organizing a show themed Music, Music, Music, I titled them to suit: The Classical Poplar Line and Poplar Jazz.
This is how they are hung in the show - with Changes Coming above. I like how the placement of Changes Coming above and "behind" the others works with its view of the poplars off in the distance. Kinda surreal.

Sometimes I feel so close to something I make or paint, that I don't want to part with it. That was true of this painted chair harp. This actually was the first one I did a few months ago. I needed something to trade at an artists' gift exchange so I did this quickly the day of the event, wrapped it and watched it go to someone who clearly was less than thrilled. I was miffed as I'd like to have kept it. I later learned the recipient thought the imagery disturbing to her fundamentalist beliefs. (!!!???) Another artist (unbeknownst to me at the time) -

loved it so much that she proposed to custom-make and trade one of her fabulous stained glass pieces for this one. I recently attended an all-girl poker party at her house and voila! - there was Crow Madam hanging on the wall! I apologize for the quality of the photos - after all, it was a party!

It meant a great deal to me for someone to appreciate and want something I made enough to go to so much trouble. It means even more that a piece I feel so connected to resides with someone I like and admire - and who appreciates the work.

Clouds - and Appreciation...

I sent a few images to The Cloud Appreciation Society yesterday. Imagine my surprise when I received an email this morning that they were already posted!

They do such a wonderful job there of featuring artists' works that are based upon - or related to - clouds and cloud formations. They also post the most amazing photographs of weather as well as the most up to date information about the weather on our blue planet . Weather isn't the least bit droll or boring when one is talking to someone wise in the ways of meteorology.

Due to my fascination with storms, cloud formations, tornadoes and atmosphere, this has been a favorite - and inspiring -site for me to visit. Take a look!

And a work in progress...

The Poplar Line... 24x 24 . acrylic on deep cradle panel

This is the painting Elvis was so critical of in a recent post. After much agonizing and looking and looking and looking, I decided to finish it - and go right on to repaint the image on another panel. A sort of before and after critique, if you will - and if there is such a thing as a series about "meta-painting" (painting about painting), I guess that's what I'm doing. I need to do this again, less "real" and more true. I like the asymmetry of the trees and the hint of the winds that have shaped them, and I want to emphasize this in the next version.











As for Elvis... He passed out on the printer from exhaustion after all his efforts to have me paint this one out failed. I mean really; he hasn't any credentials, he's all about instinct - and his are quite primitive.

I think he's trying to send me another message - when he grows tired of my surfing, typing and emailing - and of his attempts to edit same, perhaps it's time to retire !

A Midwestern Icon: The Lombardy Poplar

Changes Coming, 24 x 24, acrylic on deep cradle panel

I've been photographing, drawing and painting these stately trees for some time now. I finally had to look them up as I couldn't remember the name of these familiar windbreaks of the Midwest. I love their shapes and the way they bear the scars of storms past, while retaining a solemn dignity.

Detail of Changes Coming showing the Lombardy Poplars...

Poplars in Italy... Someone at the gallery asked if I was painting a Tuscan landscape. Apparently only those who have traveled through the Midwest know how many of these were planted in the 1940's and 50's to slow the howling winds.

Russian Poplars depicted in the 19th century...

An early textbook illustration...

These wonderful trees just beg to be painted - so much personality, great lines, and the ability to bend and yet endure. Would that I could be more like a Lombardy Poplar.