Friday, July 1, 2011

artistic endeavors: a freaking tree.

i painted this may 11 and 16.
crazy how behind i get.
this rather large canvas started out with a different vision of mine.
but you know what?
sometimes it happens that the first thing you thought . . . it's just not right.
it's stagnant.
not new enough.
it doesn't test you.
the first idea; so normal and expected. [i mean, what! the first idea was a coffee one with a twist.]
but when it tests your belief in your work, your experience, your talent, your abilities . . .
that's when you're breaking through to something good. something new.
something that, after you run the last brush stroke over canvas, you realize it was good for you.
[the bird canvas coming soon was another new thing for me.]

and . . .
i'm obsessed with jesus culture music tonight.
it just doesn't. get. old.
remember when i said i was reading this? [again, way back in may.]
well, i didn't get through more than a few chapters.
i need to buy cold tangerines, though, because i didn't get to finish it before it had to go back. and we renew as many times as we can. it was so good.
a picture i found on some blog . . . dangit, can't remember where.
and my version of it.
hmm. that tree was a test. super huge one. 
do you know how dang hard it is to draw/paint a tree?
if you do, and you like it, kudos.
i have my mind on someone to give this to. she lives in state. and . . . who knows? might read this sometime. i have no clue:)
 a stricken tree, a living thing, so beautiful, so dignified, so admirable in its potential longevity, is, next to man, perhaps the most touching of wounded objects.
[Edna Ferber]
so . . . are you reading anything? any books? any favorite books? 
i'm about to start the yada yada prayer group series by neta jackson.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

these are AMAZING.

and yeah, Jesus culture....also amazing.

seriously, your art is beyond words!!!

ladaisi said...

Beautiful work!

I agree about the difficulty of painting trees. Once I painted a floor-to-ceiling tree in my dining room, not unlike this only bigger - and it just about killed me. No really. I fell off the chair I was standing on and got a bruise on my leg the size of Michigan. Could barely move for days.

Your tree looks lovely.

charla beth said...

"sometimes it happens that the first thing you thought...it's just not right.
it's stagnant.
not new enough.
it doesn't test you.
the first idea; so normal and expected. but when it tests your belief in your work, your experience, your talent, your abilities . . .
that's when you're breaking through to something good. something new.
something that, after you run the last brush stroke over canvas, you realize it was good for you."

wow. that is so powerful, beka. soo true about life.

beautiful painting. :)