Walk A Mile In My Shoes

8″x5 3/8″ watercolor on 140/lb Arches handmade paper

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“I believe entertainment can aspire to be art, and can become art, but if you set out to make art you’re an idiot.”  -Steve Martin, 1945-

Okay, so I’m having way too much fun working in a watercolor style I devised for some of my newspaper illustration way back in the early nineties. So sue me. Just like many of our readers back then, I have many friends and family who don’t understand why I want to paint in such an abstract/expressionistic style. Frankly, I don’t know, other than the shear joy of layering paint into geometric shapes as I watch an image sort of construct itself. At times, it seems I am simply an observer watching my brush move about the paper, choosing where it wants to go without any input from me. I had no idea I was going to paint a person walking, or why. I guess that’s why they call it art… poetry.

I started this piece yesterday evening right after the last remnants of Ida rolled out of our valley. It was cool, gray and windy, about 5 o’clock. Suddenly, the power went out. All the light I had to work with for about 20 minutes was the gray light coming through the window. It was very dull, but I was on such a roll I refused to quit. I was painting virtually by memory. I would load my brush knowing where to go on my palette, but the finer points of the piece were really blurred in the low light. It was a little like trying to paint with a thin gauze over your eyes. When the power came back on, I discovered there were several places where the edges were sloppy, but amazingly, my choice of colors was fine. Guess that comes with experience. Hmmm… But then, when I do a piece like this I really don’t fuss over what colors I use. I just keep putting in layers of paint until I get an image that pleases me. Not unlike those days as a child in kindergarten when I did this simply for the sake of joy and expression, regardless of what anyone thought about it.  Enjoy!