the beginning

reserved for h. malcolm & t. farrell

this morning, i awoke inspired by last night's reading on edward hopper. Awestruck by the simple technical elegance of his watercolor landscape paintings, i decided to venture out to my front bench for today's muse. there, i sought to paint little downtown edison, in all of its sopped in, fog laden glory. i bundled up, donning my trusty old stocking cap and hot cup of earl grey, and brought my setup outside to work. honestly, i've never had much of an affinity for plein air painting, yellow-jackets curiously buzzing 'round, wind blown hair in my eyes and in my mouth,the light changing moment by moment in an attempt to confuse the eyes: it has a tendency to test my patience. i was determined to try anyways, seeking an epiphany of sorts, in an attempt to conjure the "spirit" of hopper's painting style. as i plugged away at my sketch, big daddy treetops stopped his car to say hello and offer words of encouragement, driving away with a cryptic "you are the artist and the art." the sun began to peek through, eventually burning off the cottony blanket of fog, and i reveled in the sun's warmth on my face.

finishing the book on wayne thiebaud the other night, i couldn't help but feel like i'd just graduated. the last pages served me up with some much needed insight. I saw myself heading off on another distracted tangent, and i needed someone like thiebaud to tell me to wake up and focus. "The artist...has to be as disciplined as a mathematician. Discipline is not a restriction but an aid to freedom...an artist needs the best studio instruction, the most rigorous demands, and the toughest criticism in order to tune up his sensibilities." and further... "If you stare at an object, as you do when you paint, there is no point at which you can stop learning about things. You can just look and look and look." I love the idea that learning can be a continuous pursuit, and so can growth. "I think of myself as a beginner," he says. "Sometimes that's the whole joy. If you could just do it, there'd be no point in doing it."

to glean

collection of n. bouscher

i don't really know what to say about today. it was off in the way that some days are. the only reprieve was hanging out with my delightfully pregnant friend annalee. there is something about being around her that makes me feel so at ease. maybe it's the magic of being in the company of that third sensitive creature living in her belly, my new friend just waiting to emerge. or maybe it's just sweet annalee, and how long i've known her, and how being in her presence feels effortless. it's funny: meeting someone over the line and cooking cheek to cheek with someone at a breakfast diner, with the heat and the sweat and the broken yolks and the crispy bacon, the pressure and demands of the ravenous customers out there, well, it's so strangely intimate. we've been close ever since. and somehow, today as we were picking apples off of the dewy grass, i wished we could just be there forever, peacefully gleaning what the wind blew down from a forgotten orchard that some hopeful homesteader planted for food. oh how i live for precious moments such as these.

tested

for a long time now, i've worked towards the specific goal of recognition for my work. maybe it was the idea of fame that struck me as so fantastic: the idea that i could really stand out in a sea of people, that i could become a household name, and that i could mix, mingle and commiserate with the most brilliant minds of our time. maybe it was the idea that i wouldn't have to worry about money anymore. or maybe it was really just my mom, saying to me with a sparkly kind of pride in her eyes, "you're gonna be famous someday." deep in my heart, there's something in me that won't ever let myself let that woman down, and so i tried and tried, running myself ragged in an attempt to become someone i knew nothing about.

well, somewhere along the freeway north, driving that uhaul full of my belongings towards exit 231, my lofty aspirations got left behind at a rest stop near marysville. here and now, away from the city that churns with ambition, i've re-prioritized. i'm now concerned more with my health, and a routine that feels safe and constant as the northern star. i'm concerned with the seasons, and the cycles of the moon, and fresh organic food grown by the hands of my neighbors. i'm concerned with my community, my new family, which is seemingly growing larger by the day. this new kind of recognition, it's salty like the earth, and tastes like home. and now i know, that's what i was looking for all along

Most people would succeed in small things, if they were not troubled with great ambitions.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Table-Talk (1857).

(today's musical muse: sera cahoone)

beauty

sold

what is art if it doesn't communicate anything? it is design: a study in beauty, color, form and light, serving as an aesthetic embellishment to a room to make its inhabitants happy, or as an exercise in technique for the artist to better their skill. i see this aesthetic art is typically the kind that sells. that's all fine and good. i've done that, i can do that, i'm good at that, and i understand the need for that. but what i really love about art is the potential it has to tickle your synaptic mind, to challenge the cultural paradigms we all live within and to make the viewer really think. every artist has their own personal journey. they must ask themselves, before they pick up their brush: what function shall my art serve? what shall my art say? lately i've been asking myself just that.

since i was young, my mind has been a jumbled ball of yarn. imagine me, a girl of ten, falling in love with the beauty of the natural world and then watching it be systematically destroyed by its people. i saw too much. i was too aware. and it hurt. i started a save the earth club, enlisted members, and we walked around picking up garbage. it was the least i could do, and ironically, the most i could do. in a little autobiography i recently dug up from elementary school, entitled "jessica bonin, the story of my life", i aspire to "join greenpeace or become an artist". torn at the seams, between creating new forms of beauty and trying to save the remains of true natural beauty left. and today, reflecting back as a girl of thirty, it seems that little has changed. i've been working as an illustrator,doing the drawings that help children and adults across the world learn about water quality and how they can feel empowered, how they can make a difference. yet today, when my painting started to speak to me of the ocean, and the oil, and the plastic and garbage and gmo's and pharmaceuticals swimming around in there, i thought about this mighty mess we've gotten ourselves in and i started to cry. helpless, helpless, helpless all over again: this is my story.

I think having land and not ruining it is the most beautiful art that anybody could ever want to own. Andy Warhol

language

sold

this morning, i woke up nervous. it's the annual oyster run, the one day of the year our tiny town swarms with all the leather and chrome clad bikers you could possible squeeze into a quarter mile square. now don't get me wrong: i love bikers. i've always adored the culture, the "wind in your hair, let it all hang out" mentality. i come from a family of bikers, and i know what it means to really feel the open road and all the elements coming at you, playing chicken. it's a totally unique form of adrenaline, a oneness with the out of doors that you just can't get in any air-conditioned car. and for that reason, i celebrate bikers, for their bravery, and for their passion.

i suppose then, what was making me most nervous is the noise. that, plus the exhaust fumes. and maybe the alcohol consumption. all of it combined, well, it just grates on me after a while, drowning my peaceful rural refuge in rattling windows and the persistent wap wap wap!! of tailpipes, constant like heavy machinery. so when this morning began with a downpour, you'd think i'd be relieved by the lack of bikers. nope. i missed them like you miss having family reunions. i missed the bad with the good, and that festive feeling all around. instead, what we were left with were swarming police, checking the roads like a mother wipes her own baby's ass: until it's clean. now i'm biting my tongue, i've changed my mind. so here we all are, locals stupidly lookin at each other like "where is everyone?". call me crazy, but i'd choose bikers over cops, any day of the week.

oh, yeah, and a footnote: this is my fiftieth painting, and my second adventure into a new realm of work, mixing typography with image. if i'm right, and if it is true that animals are just as smart as humans, with completely unique personalities and languages all their own, then this image speaks to that notion.

neil young: unknown legend

visions

reserved for g. conklin

i'm okay with failure. i swear i am. i know it's inherent to the learning process. but, really, i'm just not willing to settle there. today, i tried something new, and it was a total train wreck. i ended up with the kind of result that is so embarrassing, i won't post it. i will tuck it away for good, and it shall never again see the light of day. when i showed it to james, he just said, "hmm." in that expressionless way that means "nope, not your best work". not good, not good at all. what it was: kind of like something you would paint on your trapper keeper in middle school if you were really into sci-fi novels or d&d. that's all i can say. so i did what i do best: i started over, and kept going. and here is the result.

rebel

collection of j. turic

today i realized: i've got to loosen up. lately i've been painting like there were nuns with rulers standing behind me, watching intently, waiting for me to rebel, or to fuck up. i've had this problem for a long time. this problem, this control freak in me, produces lovely tight illustrative results, but the rigidity is no good for any form of self expression. i came to this revelation while looking at the paintings of ben tour. i was admiring his take on controlled chaos, his use of drip and typography and the exaggerated caricatures of his subject. when i first saw his work in person, it hit me in a guttural way, and took my breath. today, revisiting the work, i thought: i used to paint like that....sloppy in the most lyrical way, for brief a moment in art school, usually when i was running out of time, in a hurry, in the days when i was so punk rock, before i had responsibilities, before i knew or cared that dripping solvent all over was toxic...before my art had to make me a living. but i had the illustrator somewhere deep in my core. (i inherited that from my mother). i slowly became more regimented, focusing on skill and technique, in an attempt at becoming a modern norman rockwell of sorts. it worked to some degree; it got me jobs, got me recognition, and got me here. but now i want to go back. so today, starting small...baby steps i say! i let this little toy car spin me out of a rut. tomorrow, maybe i'll be even more adventurous.