Vicarious pleasures

I've just finished reading a book. A very long and thorouglhy enjoyable and very popular book - "The pillars of the earth" by Ken Follet- about the building of a cathedral in the twelfth century in England, and the people involved with creating it, their lives and loves, passions and hatreds.

And it struck me as I reached the end of it, and was so involved with the tale and where it was heading, that although a book is a physically small thing - a collection of words on paper in a particular order, in effect, that it's like diving into a new world, a dimension beyond normal life. The words on the paper bring the previously unknown world to life, so we can feel the pain, the ecstacy, the passions and emotions of the story and make it part of ourselves and feel fulfilled within ourselves, and better people for the reading of it, the digestion of it, that makes us more rounded within our characters for the knowledge of it.....

And that in turn made me think of movies - that they are a step into another new world, particularly if it's a science-fiction film, of course- a different dimension when we empathise with the characters and their various  predicaments and the mesage within the tale....

And then I thought that music has the same effect - the words of the song reminds us of our experiences in life, particularly love and its endless joys and sorrows....

And then I considered that music is poetry but with a harmony added, and that made me consider that poems are beautiful beyond belief sometimes with their lyrical understanding of the use of langage and the heartaches and passions that poetry evokes....

Which of course, led me on to visual pleasures after the written ones. And that made me think of my art. And that's what I'm trying to capture within my pictures - that happy feeling of being part of what is portrayed within the medium, that makes you feel happy and sad, gives you the empathy and ecstacy of being part of the subject matter. That you too feel the pain and loss, the love and joy, the passions and understandings of what is being portrayed within...................... that the medium of creativity evokes such joys within us................ music for the soul..................

Decluttering the dust

Its been an extremely productive day, art wise, extremely! And yet...... I haven't once picked up a paintbrush to paint or drawn anything or produced any artwork at all today. The nearest I've come to any artwork was a pastel drawing of a topless woman that I framed for the Erotic Guild of Artists gallery, the next time I go there.

No, the reason I say I've had a productive art day is because I've had a tidy up in my studio - how exciting you yawn, and yet it has been! I've thrown virtually nothing away except odd scraps of paper with scrawled notes long since written (and acted upon) but what I have done is put all my reference art books together on book shelves, I've loads of them on subjects as diverse as figure drawing, fantasy art, big cats, sex, erotic art, favourite artists, women in art, more sex, photography, sex positions, Australia, New Zealand, how to capture light in paintings, and more sex positions (well, it IS art, honest!!!!). As well as those I have a whole load of art magazines, gallery catalogues, and photo albums for reference subjects. I have files for various useful papers, and more notes on scraps of paper to be acted upon. And that's all before I get to the paints (watercolours, acrylics, oils, gouache), water pots, brushes (for watercolour and also oils/acrylics), palettes, and other collected accoutrement's of the active artist. And at the end of moving most of the things to slightly new positions, I have a whole load of something wonderful ........ Sigh! Yes, I have S P A C E !!!!! Loads and loads of it, to spread out in, to work in, to have freedom to fill with art and NOT CLUTTER! And I expect that when I get to use that space I'll produce better artwork because I'm not having to work around piles of papers and pots and brushes that I'm not currently using! So, yeh, its been a productive time!!

Yesterday the woman who commissioned the freebee Christmas card design back in June came to collect it. It was the first time she'd been to my house and we'd not met before. We got on well enough and as we chatted I showed her the Three kings design I'd done for her, which she was delighted with. So I was happy too! I had a few paintings stacked up in my studio, ready to go for exhibitions, and showed her a few of them so she could see what else I did, she knew I did pen and ink drawings but didn't know what else I do - and she said what most people say when they see my work - she commented on how diverse I was , and I agreed, I am! I only showed her the sexy large lips kissing I've just finished, a French village landscape, a Venetian night scape, a dramatic English Gothic landscape, some tigers in a snowstorm, a family of swans back lit under a tree, an old Cornish fishermans hut, a pair of fantasy unicorns in a woodland glade and an oil painting of an old country cottage with faces hidden within the flower garden (and that's only a SMALL amount of what I do, because I kept off the erotic stuff!). She was impressed with me and my artwork, and asked me how much I'd charge to paint her two children' s portraits. She said she'd discuss it with her husband and come back to me. So that was a good productive visit too! Yay!

Now.. where did I put my favourite paintbrush... and should I categorise all the art books alphabetically into fantasy/cats and SEX - nah, I haven't got one complete shelf long enough for the sex stuff!!! :)