wordless wednesday

A baby bird and it's parents have been doing trial flights from our rain gutters...

the baby bird chirps the whole time to let mom and dad know where it is...

Theo is quite confused.

 Xander is unfazed.

Wordless Wednesday

Get The Horns-Soapboxing

In light of this barbaric and horrible festival

Daniel Ochoa de Olza- photographer

After being bullied, tormented, scared and stabbed this would
seem like the natural reaction for the bull.
My patience has run out and that tormentor needs to be thrown out of my way.

Sadly, the bull died anyways

the bulls always die

I have never understood why this seems like an expression of manhood(traditionally)
tormenting and taunting an animal to death is a thing of beauty?!

I have a painting of a bull goring a matador...it is one of my cherished items.

I will forever cheer for the bulls, and hope, that one day,
 they win
and
all this 

absolute craziness ends.

Cattle Call

I got an email about an Open Call for a big gallery in LA, it seemed crazy to go as I was imagining it was going to be like an American Id*l tryout or something...

I sat and thought about it, ok OPEN call means anyone can submit...ANYTHING as long as it fell under these requirements:

" No unfinished, multi-panel work, incomplete work, wet paintings, live animals, or anything considered unsafe.
No smaller then 12"x12"x12" no larger then 8'x8'x58"
~

At the very least it could be like an American Id*l tryouts...you know the ones we all watch and cringe at as people sing their hearts out only to have bubbles popped.

but...

It seemed strait forward and if I timed it right I could get in line and hope to be one of the first people there....and maybe get something in.
~

I didn't make up my flip-flop mind until the night before, after a lemondrop and some guacamole.

Hubby said it would be a great mini-adventure, so...

 I matted and framed the work and when I went to go kiss hubby goodnight it was 2am!!

I planned on getting up at 5am to get there two hours before they opened.

Setting the alarm was painful and as soon as I put my head on the pillow the alarm was going off,

 I turned to hubby and said

" boy my three hours just flew by, how about yours?"

We got into the car and he drove us down there arriving in no time flat, we planned on getting breakfast after the intake. I was number 6 in line!!

I knew I at least had a chance to get my stuff looked at, and then possibly accepted into the show.

As time ran by, all the stereotypes of artists showed up, it was great fun to guess which was which.

I chatted in line with the man behind me and we passed the time sharing resources.

Then the staff and tables started to arrive.

The staff put out hanging wire, extra eye screws, etc...I thought that was a nice touch.

An additional piece of paper was handed to all in line (that number was growing rapidly, I would guess there were about 200 people behind me, that I could see)

Cash only and then juror table.

White gloved curators greeted me and asked,

"what process is this"

took measurements of the art,

 and filled out a checklist of the work

After I answered the questions, the work was assessed I was told

"OK, have a beautiful day"

and I was in.

Then I turned to see the SEA of people in line; they seemed to be looking at my face for answers,

was it safe, were mean words said, will they like my art?

image via superstock.com

As we left to find food, we passed thru Little Thailand

There was an open farmers market and then I saw them, the line of saffron robed monks

with alms bowl in hand.

it was quiet and humbling

and

it reminded me of the uncertainty that surges thru your mind

how as artists, we are placing our work into the hands of another

and

asking for them to like it

to connect with it

to validate it

For many of us, we depend on it

Like the monks depend on the kindness of others for food/money

We didn't plan this part of the adventure well and we were both quite hungry and with that comes the fact that we are easily irritated. We drove, strait...direction unknown...food sought.
We passed right by the walk of fame, then the Kodak theatre, then Grauman's we saw Superman in the street and tour buses and the famous Fredrick's of Hollywood store.
then took Laurel Canyon up and over to Studio City and landed at the deli we all went to after my Uncles funeral a couple of years ago...
it was a mistake.
Bad food, both in choices and taste.
Breakfast was sad and afterwards I took the helm and drove us home.
It had only taken 60 minutes to drive in, but the drive home took over 2hours!

Despite the texting crazy drivers that were causing my blood to boil.

I kept thinking of my little prints against a wall, that kept a smile on my face
A nap and some digestive enzymes made it all into a wonderful dream.

I can't wait for the scene at the reception!

Freehand Friday

It's Freehand Friday!!

I sat and did a few blind contour self portraits today.

I was forever avoiding the head in my figure drawing classes; the idea of trying to capture the essence of a person was daunting and unattractive to me.

Instead, I was seduced by the lines and shadows of the body, the way it all magically turned into connecting lines and shapes and then when the session was over I had transported myself back and it was a full drawing.

Always a complete surprise to me...and almost always without a head.

The compositions never seemed to allow for them.

They were always the lower jaw or the back of the head or just not the focus of the drawing.

Today I sat in front of a mirror and simply looked at my own face.

Daunting as well, but by making blind contour drawings out of them, I never really felt the pressure of capturing the likeness and ironically it appears.

Thankful Thursday

Today I am thankful that there is still magic in this world.

Another Muffin day

view from my kitchen this morning

I had to get up extra early today as hubby needed to get to work even earlier then normal.

It was quiet and I got to watch the sun rise and change the skies colors.

it was a treat...

the recipe called for orange zest...

but I could not bare the idea of dried zest so I opened my eyes wide when handling the mandolin and paid close attention.

I mean making muffins usually doesn't have an element of danger; stir and fold seems to be common place ...but zesting is a whole new level and packs the possibility of shedding blood and or skin.

Needless to say, I paid attention to my actions at this early hour.

The muffins needed to bake a little longer then I expected and the end result is a little dry. 

I am pretty sure I know what needs to be changed. Once again I took one of my trusty loaf recipes and made them into muffins. 

Another yummy hit with tea or milk...but you do need to drink something with them.

Today's muffin:

 Orange Cranberry Walnut

no fingers were harmed during the making of these muffins

Muffin of the day

(this is not me, just a drawing )

When I work at the machine shop I tend to make muffins for breakfast.

I work with all men, and to date, none have turned down the chance to try a homemade muffin.

I get the dry part of the recipe together the night before... 

I don't trust myself to measure things at 5:30 in the morning

Making muffins allows me to wake up early, 

bake the muffins while showering and 

then have a homemade breakfast at work with tea.

The muffins are available to anyone who walks into the office...I have the UPS driver hooked

sometimes I will sway and make cookies, but recently I have been on a muffin kick.

I am trying all sorts of muffin recipes, I mostly lean towards ones that don't have high levels of sugar.

I am going to try and post pictures of them each week

Here is today's:

Carrot-Zucchini Walnut muffins

I have a lot of zucchinis coming from the garden so it was only natural to make these this morning.

I normally make this as a loaf, so I thought I'd try them as muffins instead...they turned out alright.

If fact one of the machine operators said 

"I don't like vegetables and this doesn't taste anything like vegetables, they are really good!"

I'll take that as a thumbs up

Eye of the beholder

This is how I think I look when I work in the studio

This is what I really look like, usually with an inkspudge on my nose to boot!