Frustrating!

I tried to add two pictures to the last post to show what they look like with the oil pastels. Couldn't do it, they just wouldn't go where I wanted them to so try again on a new post. What a mission!

                                                    Just paint                         Paint & oil pastels

Not the best day

Well, there have to be some. I have been trying to get the backing sorted so that I can get the letters for the Affirmation Art cut out easily. Stu showed me how to do it. It looked really easy. I found it difficult and I gave up on it quite quickly. Also the system isn't going to be cheap. Then I decided to paint the four bits of rice paper I prepared yesterday. I should have gone and read my book. Given that they are going to be cut up into tiny letters it doesn't matter but I would love to have enjoyed painting them more. I also foolishly tried a rice papered canvas. Scraped the paint off and tired to tear the rice paper off while it was still wet is was so awful. Might have to have a day or two off and regroup myself. Maybe go into town tomorrow. The paintings are still wet - I really shouldn't put them up wet as they look much better than dry, but I haven't blogged for a few days.  I'm putting the two best ones up and will put them up dry tomorrow to see the difference .
WOW, they look great here! A clever bit of turning around and hey presto.

Finger painting again

One day finger painting will also work. I will get it. In the meanwhile I will continue to just enjoy it. I did it yesterday again after creating a major drama over nothing, and giving myself a 'bad' day. I think my life is too calm and content and as an old drama queen I need a little more positive drama in my life. An adventure. A trip. Something. Anyway I dealt with yesterday differently as I decided to end the afternoon doing fun things that I like doing. One being finger painting the other making a fairy. I do think the finger paintings look a bit like "My Cat Could Do That"!

They both have glitter but it doesn't show.

Great day

Didn't really get started till late but - I have been experimenting and playing all afternoon after yesterday's fun. Pictures and explanations below.

The top one is called crappy sunset! Then I did the over paint and have something fun and mysterious. It looks better in real life. but I sense I am on to something here. It seems to work better on canvas than paper. I have also discovered that if I make the canvas really wet with paint, I mean flooded, I can, if I don't like what is happening with the mixing colours (like this)

wipe if off with the ever handy paper towel and start again. So I have been doing a lot of joyful flooding!
At the moment this canvas is now in its fourth incarmation and looks like this:

It will look different tomorrow when its dry.  I love this shape canvas. I'm cleaning off  a big one I did a terrible collage on. Thus endeth today's post.

Tinglement

Interesting afternoon. I had a Byron Katie session this morning about my early childhood teachers. Not going to go into it here. I haven't painted for four days. Did a long thin one this afternoon and then mooched around not doing more because I was full of "I should paint I haven't for four days." I decided not to, cos I know that when I paint with a should or am trying to make something it almost always doesn't work. It was 4.30 and I thought OK I'll read a book. Then I looked at the long thin one I painted earlier - I want to paint on top of it like the first one below and thought what if it doesn't work? Could I put dark colours on top? I grabbed another orangey paper trial I had done a few days ago and splashed dark paint all over it. It's kinda crappy but oozes potential.

 So then, all fired up, I launched into a really bad one that I've been experimenting with  (I was trying to reproduce something I did with oil pastels  three years ago)  I painted over the top of it. Pictures of before and after below. The thing is, there was such a stunning change in my energy, even though they aren't great my energy and connection just soared. I felt that wonderful tingle of creative excitement & wanted to document it.

This isn't great art! But it's great creative tinglement! Let's hear it for tinglement. I like that word!

Playing with rice paper

I've done four more 'nebulae'. Unfortunately I think the first one was just a wonderful fluke ~ but its got me playing with rice paper again and seeing what I can do with it.  No pictures yet, but I will put some up in the next few days. One thing I tried was sticking another piece of rice  on top of a painted piece then painted that. This particular one looks like a very light filled Easter Egg. Oh all right, I'll put that one up here, it's so appropriate for the season.  I've just set up five more play sheets to fiddle around with over the Easter weekend.

Clocks

Here are my two clocks for the Red Shed Exhibition.

My best work to date!

There it is ~  24" x 24 " and I really like it. It looked like a nebulae or galaxy before I oil pasteled it and now it really looks like a galaxy. I'm off again on the rice paper. I love it.  The one on top was taken without flash.

Exhibition

Hmm - I haven't got loading pictures and words together sorted. These pictures are on 10" x 10" canvas and are for the the "Small Things" exhibition at our local art gallery. I'm very excited that I kept my promise to myself. Next venture is something in the member exhibit which is in a couple of months. In terms of the art below, the blue one looks much better in real life.  I was going to put something else on it, but my yesterday's visitors persuaded me that it looked better as a stand alone. I agree and have bought three much bigger canvases to do large stand alone Rice Paper paintings.

Pictures for the exhibition

Left is called Celebration, right Jubilation, below Meditation

Out of the closet

I decided today to make this blog a bit more "real". And then I listened to Scott Martineau talking about self disclosure so it feels like the right decision. So here goes.
I have just finished a Byron Katie workshop here on Waiheke Island. I think 'The Work' is fantastic.
I am on lesson 23 of  A Course In Miracles ( I got up to lesson 136 10 years ago, which was the last time I did it.)
I am an Abraham freak!
I am also a passionate fan of Julia Cameron and have been doing morning pages for almost three years.
So how do I put that all together?? In the end it's all about my thinking.
Jill Bolte-Taylor http://drjilltaylor.com/ says that the thoughts that rule our lives  come from an area in our brain the size of a peanut. All those thoughts come flooding through a peanut. Well not quite, but when my brain is going crazy with fearful or vengeful thoughts that idea helps me put it into perspective.  If you haven't read Jill's book 'My Stroke of Insight', do. It's a really remarkable book by and about an remarkable woman.
So there we are. I am out. Back to the art tomorrow.

My studio

What a wonderfully posh name for my two old from-the-kitchen-tables and my from-the-office-shelves. Had a fun afternoon. I am back playing with the beads. The thrown down not stuck down ones look fantastic how can I make them look as good stuck down. This is tomorrows task.

New Header

Now I am starting to get this blog to look the way I want it to. But I would like to make the header a little smaller but with my limited patience, can't seem to make it do that. Two days of not much happening with the art. I've been mucking around with words and seeing what they look like as an Affirmation Art painting. Not going too well. Spending money with the designer man and not progressing. But - that's my inner mean girl telling me that I'm not doing enough. The small things exhibition is coming up at the art gallery very soon. I promised myself I would have three things in it. I have one so need to pull finger on another two. I will tidy up soon and set the scene for two more 10"x 10" paintings.

All done

Hello Papa, I love you.
I have oil pastelled and varnished all the coloured pictures I put up below the fallopian dance picture. I now have  lots of funky bright paper to cut out the affirmation words for the affirmation art for children plan. I am getting it sorted slowly but it will all happen in a big rush soon enough. As soon as I have one done, it will be a small one and I think it will be for nephew Jonah's birthday, I will put it up.

The Fallopian Dance!

I did it

I have to admit it - I blew my nose. Thank God. I can stop talking about it. I painted again yesterday afternoon on rice paper, which is where I started. It was interesting as I haven't done rice paper painting for a while and it all came out differently. No splashing or pouring this time. Just my bright childlike pallet. The idea is that I will use this paper for making the affirmation art words. What I love about the affirmation art is that I really enjoy doing each process.

On a roll

And no, I still didn't blow my nose. (Though I must admit,when ever I write that I immediately want to!) After my post yesterday, I turned the picture around and did a bit more on it. I spent lots of time last night looking at it and saw a foxy face. Today I changed it just a bit again. Now it's about leaving well enough alone! New version above. I  have created a much bigger canvas to do another one on, plus a whole lot of other surfaces. Tomorrow I will put the numbers on the clock I am making and put then whole thing together. I'll put a picture up when it's finished. Great day today and tonight - soon - I am off to an international Women's day event on the Island.

2nd try

The colours look very sribbely in the picture but a bit less in real life. Looking at it I keep thinking how great it would be very very big, but then I wonder how I would get that effect with my cheap cheap paints. Going big needs a rethink cos I think I would have to get some Golden Open paints and they aint cheap.

Back home

I have decided to stop being shy about telling the world that maybe I blew my nose today. Hey, who ever has the time or inclination to read this must want to know something!! So  no, I haven't blown my nose today, but I am back from a week in Australia for my niece's 21st and to get myself going again I've scribbled - I can't really call it painting - with paint over two canvases with my rubber gloved right hand. You know what, I like this one. It looks a bit better on the wall. I need a lesson in how to get my pictures to go where I want.

Love Gratitude & Joy

L G & joy
Originally uploaded by Happy Art

Which I am full of today. Painting going badly - but the mistake was able to be peeled off the canvas and I now have something entirely new to work with. This post is so I can see if I have got the uploading from Flickr thing right. I see that my flickr name of Happy Art shows up too. Affirmation Art, Happpy Art. Notice a theme?