Wanderings, Home Again, Sunday Meditations

Wheels on my feet, wandering for 2 months, it's good to be home...

 I have been on 3 different trips, each so different and so full of inspirations... a painting retreat on one of our NW islands, a family visit in Texas, and then a road trip through 7 states.  This posting is a little about the road trip.

We had to stop and take the picture above as we entered Nebraska for the first time.  A crossroads, wide open spaces, flatland, nothing there at all, except a few lonely man-made wire structures.  The sign proudly says "the good life."  And it makes you think, what do you really need, after all?  Maybe less is more.

Along the way I sketch and paint in the car when it's not my turn to drive.  I've mastered balancing my tiny palette, bumps in the road, and moving scenery, but it's always challenging.

I liked this rest stop along the way in Wyoming.  The rock structures were so unusual, it was called the Holy City.  There are many places and times when I am lost in nature that I feel I'm worshipping in the Holy City, there is something so restorative to the soul, so wholesome, fresh and raw. 

We spent several days in the Badlands areas in North Dakota and South Dakota (Montana had some too).  Awesome colors, textures, shapes, my painter's heart was so filled with inspiration.  I learned that there are even black veins of lignite (coal) that catch fire from lightning, burn for very long periods, baking the clay soils, turning them into red veins called scoria or red topped hills called "red clinkers".

Fall colors were stunning, aspen, birch, and more, especially along the rivers. Golden yellows, beiges, siennas, umbers, rust, reds, sage greens, a lush parade.

Yellowstone, one of my favorite places.  All misty, smoking geothermal, volcanic wonderland.  I was privileged, shortly after entering the east gate from Cody, Wyoming to spot a bunch of cars.  Yes, look for cars, and you find the wildlife.  I saw my first wolf in the wild, such a treat.  And many bison, and elk.

This last is Opal Pool, lovely carribean colored turquoise water, there were several like this one.

I'm so refreshed (though tired) from all this traveling, new ideas for painting are percolating, canvases are waiting.  I'm thankful for our beautiful world out there "in nature".  It's good to remember we aren't just observers or "consumers" of nature, but we are part of it...   Life is good.  

Summertime, Friends and Sketch Paintings

A little bit of heaven with balmy Northwest days, friends and artmaking...

Summertime
I have been savoring our beautiful Northwest, so balmy, just ideal weather.  We may get a day or two of really hot days but so mild compared to other parts of the country.  And even then, we have the cool breezes coming off the waters.  Ideal.

Friends and Artmaking
And also ideal time to get together with special friends and play with art.  My long time friend Lisa (in the photo above) and I reconnected last week, playing, sharing the day, we have seen many Artfests together, that's where we met.  I love the gorgeous colors in her large painting in the background - and her shirt, apron and new Goddess pieces she was working on.  Go see her stunning spirit-filled art here.

Here is one of the sketch paintings I finished that inspired day, from a pot of flowers in her artist's garden:

"Red Flowers", 5"x7"  watercolor & ink

Copyright Delorse Lovelady

And lucky me, I got to go to this lovely place for our Painting Critique group's annual day out retreat a couple of days ago.  Beverly so graciously hosted us at her Hansville cottage.  There were eight of us, decked out in our sunglasses and big floppy hats, walking the beach, enjoying the view. 

We had fun celebrating the 80th birthday of one of our members, Pam.  We each painted a small piece for her from the same photo.  It was SO amazing to see the different art styles, each so unique, like the women.

 "Pam the Magician", 5"x7"   Acrylic

Copyright Delorse Lovelady

On the way home on the ferry, I sketch painted this scene.

Here's another Northwest day - out with the Plein Air group at Matthews Beach.  There were five of us enjoying the day. 

I combined a couple of areas in the park to come up with this scene.

"Painting at Matthews Beach", 5"x7" watercolor

Copyright Delorse Lovelady

So you see I have been having a lovely summer, with these few samplings of my comings and goings...  and tomorrow I depart for a week long painting retreat with my painting club.  I have big plans for painting projects, canvases are prepped, supplies are at hand, now on to packing...

Museum Day, More Plein Air and Watercolors

Taking a break, playing with color and pen...
SAM and BAM
That's Seattle Art Museum and Bellevue Art Museum, for non-locals reading this... my spouse and I have a museum date once a month. Last month it was SAM where we viewed the Nick Cave, "Meet Me at the Center of Earth" exhibit of "soundsuits". There were rooms full of stunning life-size manikins artfully and completely covered with a colorful array of everything that could be found in a thrift store. Some of them could and have been actually worn and that is the sketch above.

The BAM has an exhibit of ceramic sculptures by Wanxin Zhang which we saw this week. This is a fabulous exhibit of larger than life size figures inspired by the tradition of the buried terracotta warriors that were uncovered in China. However, they are somewhat modernized, mysterious and seem so lifelike. So if you want a treat, do go see this exhibit. BAM also has two other interesting exhibits showing which are worth a visit: unique South American jewelry which weaves in some cultural stories, and an exhibit on "Softness" featuring various fiber and stitching pieces.
Plein Air
I plan to get outdoors more often this summer as nature is so inspiring. Above is a quick sketch from our deck. Below is another watercolor painting from the recent day over by Lake Washington on a plein air date. Both were gorgeous sunny days and it felt good seeing the sun again after it's absence so many months here in our rainy cloud covered heaven.
Note to myself: Definitely get outdoors more often this summer, alone or with art buddies! Feel the sun, the cool breezes, smell the flowers, soak in the colors and the music of this season of the year.

Death Valley Desert, Wildfires & Gratitude, Sunday Meditation

“Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans”.... John Lennon
Time has moved by at warp speed and I'm realizing I haven't posted for over six weeks. So I suppose I've been taking a breath, or two, away from the little screen that captures my words and images and sends them to who knows where or to whom....

The Desert, Death Valley
I finally got my taste of "Southwest" kind of terrain. We set off on a two and a half week road trip (love them) which included the desert. Death Valley, always wanted to go, finally made it. And added this to my list of National Parks visited, I want to experience them all. How to describe something so vast and so diverse... let me see, did you know Death Valley has very high undulating sand dunes? And a 150 mile long valley floor, called Badwater Basin that has white salt flats on it? Yellow canyons colored like mustard. A canyon named "Artist's Palette" because of the colors - red, ochre, sienna, brown, black, turquoise, all mixed up, just like a palette against the cliffs. Volcanic craters. Mountains, with very high points to look down at the valley on several sides. Flowers. Lots of raucous ravens. An actual Spanish castle in the cliffs of a canyon. Slickrock, narrow canyon passages. And more.
It was very warm (for me) in March, mid-80's, I wouldn't dare wait any later to go. I have to say it was stunningly beautiful in it's starkness and harsh terrain. I love the wide open space, seeing forever, big skies, and all the other cliche sayings about that kind of landscape...... nature undressed, getting down to the bare bones of what's essential, and letting my artist's eye relish the colors, shapes, lines and dancing mirages..... I had fun with my sketchbook and paints. And I left reluctantly, but filled with inspiration.

Sunday Meditations - Wildfires and Gratitude
One day you are peacefully going about your life immersed into your world, your routines. And the next, nature throws some sparks your way, maybe sets a blaze into your world. And it wakes you up (again) to the enormity of our universe, of what a small piece of it you are, of the greater forces always present.

This past week nature stirred some massive storms in the Texas panhandle. Hot dry dusty wind, severe drought conditions with no rain in months, so conditions were ripe for the huge fires that raged across the plains, pushed by 60 mile an hour winds, no mountains or anything to stop them from advancing. There were many homes burned down and lives turned upside down.
Among the lucky, were my two brothers. They both live in the rural areas surrounded by pastureland and both had huge walls of fire raging nearby - one up to the back of the house (see photo's, courtesy of Jonathan Clubb) after it had eaten nearby houses, and the other, across the road from his house. Evacuations, road blocks. Lots of firemen. Very scary.
Foremost, I am so thankful none of my family was hurt. Or suffered the loss of their houses. It's a bit calmer today, but it will be a long hot nervous summer, if the drought doesn't get relieved. I imagine sending them some of our Seattle rain to ease the pain. Water is such a life giving fluid. So today, Sunday, it's a good day to be grateful for family, for rain and water, and the abundance of life and home sweet home.
Namaste

Fiber Art, Snow Geese, and Sketches

Enjoying nature, shapes, lines and colors.....Snow Geese
We headed north to LaConner on Friday to the Skagit Valley farming area to see if we could spot some snow geese or eagles. There were thousands of snow geese! And I counted 12 eagles. As always, I carry my sketchbook, and captured a quick sense of the shapes. Lately I am paying more attention to shapes in my paintings and perhaps these will end up more refined in paintings to come.
As far as the eye could see, white covered the farmer's fields. They did look like snow, and up close, lovely swan shapes with black tipped wings, honking madly. We were lucky to see this entire flock raise up as one, flooding the sky with beating wings, turning on a dime altogether, like one massive organism changing directions, here, then there, and turning back around and landing again.Fiber Art
I have been focusing on birds the last year. Two weeks ago I worked on a fiber/paper stitching project. Here is a close-up portion of it. It incorporates fabric, my sketch of a heron transferred to fabric, embroidery stitching, tea bag paper, beading and more. I'm not done with it yet, it's an experiment but I'm liking the mix of textures and the pale muted colors, different for me.We visited the La Conner Quilt Museum again. There's a wonderful exhibit of contemporary hand stitched items which I would post pictures of, but they weren't allowed. However, there were also some outstanding examples of crazy quilts from the 1800's, with their amazing quantity of handstitching on every one.
And a final quick sketch - from the turret window of the museum looking across the street.
Taking time for nature, art, sketching, stitching with good company, what could be more satisfying...

Canada Trip Sketches, Salmon & Snow

I gazed out the window at the lovely huge soft snowflakes falling from heaven...
Our first snow of the season fell today, their slow glide like a white moving lacy curtain outside our windows. But, they did not stay long as our temperatures were not quite cold enough.

I have been playing this past couple of weeks with fanciful things. I made a "fascinator" which is a frufru cocktail hat (good for parties I suppose or just fun), I dyed and stamped fabric, stitched fabric crows, created small cards with a favorite photo, painted, sketched and mixed here and there. Today I made a couple of minor changes on this blog and am thinking to change the design soon. And worked on which paintings will go into 2 upcoming shows in the next week or so. And we just returned from a trip to the Washington coast late Thursday which I will share about in a later post.

A Canada Trip
Meanwhile, here's a few quick sketches from our anniversary trip to British Columbia in October... It was stunningly beautiful. We took a side trip to a creek that was running with many many bright orange spawning salmon, as you may have heard Canada was having a record return of the salmon this year, it is a fantastic sight and great to hear good news like this.
We took a scenic boat ride up the Harrison River, great sunny crispy cool weather, and the fall skies and light with shadows, perfect for lots of photography with my new camera and relaxing with the sketchbook....
Fishermen were everywhere, on the shore, in the water with hip waders on, standing up in boats...
We had dinner one night in a Chinese restaurant... always fun to save those good fortunes..
People lined up for Tea Time in the hotel after their pool time, dressed in their white robes and bathing suits...
What could be better than a hot cup of lemon black tea with cookies on a cool fall day?

Sketches, Sketchbook Project and More Sketches

Sketching is a lot of fun, just relax and don't tell your hand what to do and it'll be fine...!
A Walk, A Sketch, Some Rain
Today my husband and I took a walk and enjoyed the crisp air in a nearby park along Lake Washington. The heavy gray clouds burst open as I was sketching in a non-permanent ink pen, and I caught some interesting rain drop effects on my quick sketch. Got it home later and filled in a bit of color and a few more pen strokes. This area of the lake is filled with water lily pads, old posts from a long gone ferry, and surrounded with some wetlands.

And this is what it really looked like today in our exquisite Northwest, but you do know I like color and always have to add some in my sketches and paintings...
On the way back, a stop at our favorite fruit and veggie market, the Yakima Market at 17321 Bothell Wy NE..... We loaded up with all that fresh goodness and nutrition and headed home and he started up his first big batch of fall tomato soup that he always makes. We freeze several containers of it to savor later when the really fresh tomatoes are gone. Mmmm, it's sooo good.
A Few More Sketches
From here and there, along the way, some places I have been...

.....an escape to Bandon, Oregon, one of my most favorite places, in March, fresh sea air, rocks, exquisite scenery there...
.....a plane trip to Texas to visit family in April, what else could I draw?...
.....a side trip to the Wichita Mountains, Oklahoma in May, a wildlife refuge for bison...
.....the Seattle Woodland Park Zoo in March, brisk weather, but another favorite place...
The Sketchbook Project
I just received confirmation a couple of days ago for The Sketchbook Project hosted by The Art House Coop. For this project, participants around the world are sent a moleskin cahier to fill with art however they wish, and a theme to focus on. These sketchbooks must be returned in January, and then become a permanent part of the Brooklyn Library of the Coop. But first, they digitize so everything is on line to be viewed. Then all these wonderful artful sketchbooks will go on tour to only 8 cities. Seattle is one of the lucky cities to host this exhibit at the Form/Space Atelier from June 10-11, 2011... so mark your calendars!
The focus for my sketchbook will be: a light in the distance, an intriguing theme that I selected and will enjoy... I notice this sketchbook has quite a lot of pages in it, and they are quite flimsy. I'm thinking of gutting it, and rebinding it with less pages, but nicer paper, like watercolor paper (they let us do that). And of course, arting up the plain brown covers.......

For those interested in this kind of project, the deadline to sign up ends October 31...

Sketching and Painting Boats

Moored momentarily, they had been on many journeys... and patiently waited for the next adventure.
Perhaps I am seeing a metaphor for myself, patiently waiting, for my next adventure. Perhaps it is the turning from summer to fall. As I drove down the street a couple of days ago I noticed a few leaves, turned a light tan, dancing on a breeze in front of me. It's cooler, rainy, and full of the seasons moving into change again...

This recent sketch/painting on a wonderful day out started out with a watersoluble pencil. That wasn't enough, so then I added some oil pastel. And that wasn't enough, so then I added pen work. And then heavy watercolors on top of that. And more pen work. Finally I felt satisfied with the saturated colors and look of it, I don't usually do boats. Sometimes you have to just keep experimenting.

And here is where I was doing this sketch painting with some art buddies:

Faces, Sketches, and Drawing Practice

Faces, faces everywhere, all so interesting, all carrying a story...
Here are a few sketches of faces from some drawing sessions earlier this year... I constantly am trying to improve and capture a moment in time....
And below, here is one that I painted on a small 5"x7" hard canvas... mixed media.

Peyote, Dreams and Breath of Life

"What orbit of the planets has put you and me in this place, at this moment? Where time takes a breath, and we dance on the edge of our dreams?" Anonmyous
Time seems to have flown by in a whirlwind this month. A trip to the sea, reconnecting with old friends, a couple of workshops, learning new stitchery things, sketching and painting, museums, walking,and now... resting, as the latest cold bug has gotten hold of me to slow me down. But not for long, as the gleam on the horizon is calling to me, and there are more trips to plan, and national parks to see and much to do...

Peyote
The picture above is of peyote stitch band bracelets I made this month. It doesn't do justice to the lovely shimmer and pattern of the beads. Thanks to my friend Wilma, in one of my sewing groups, who taught us how to do it. I started one in our meeting, went home and finished it, and loved the process so much, made three more. Now I am in process of making another, blue and white, I find it rather zen-like to sit and stitch slowly in the pattern. The first two thinner bands are a bit "wonky", they don't lay perfectly flat, as I was stitching too tightly, but I've learned to loosen up the threads making the whole piece more flexible. Hmm, there's a metaphor in there. And I wonder how the stitch got it's name...

Dreams
I spent a day in a Jungian dream analysis workshop with a long time friend. My formal education and studies included some former training in this subject, and I always found it so fascinating. I haven't tracked those nocturnal stories in the theatre of my mind for a long time, but I have been lately. Process work, it can be heady stuff, where do those strange little vignettes come from... that raw archetypal material that floats up, hidden in our own personal symbols. Pay attention, see if you can decipher them.

Breath of Life
And I spent a day taking an Adult 1st Aid/CPR class from the Red Cross too with my instructor husband. The class is well worth taking, and I urge you to do it and keep your skills up. Did you know that with every 1 minute of delay, there is a corresponding 10% less chance of survival. And if you are lucky it might take the 911 Aid response 5 minutes to arrive on the scene. Think about that. SO, your CPR efforts for a few minutes might save your loved one, or a friend, or even a stranger...

Here are the new CPR models we had to practice on. Red Cross replaced the pink "Resussa Annie's" with these blue models called "Actar" (interesting, I kept thinking of them as "avatars", by the way, we saw the movie this month too, it was terrific!). They are kind of strange looking. And I took a couple minutes to quick sketch one. They aren't too scary. Do check out the Red Cross and either donate for Haiti or consider taking a class (take your spouse or a friend too).Meanwhile, take some deep breathes and concentrate on them, in/out... the little miracles that sustain us in life, just breathing. What could be more important...