Homework Assignment #2 - Tucson Artist Colony

Tonight the homework for my painting class with Brenda Semanick was to render a kitten. She provided the photo reference and it was up to me to make sense of the paint. I have a confession....this is getting addictive. I was just going to paint for a bit and then make dinner. Eight o'clock rolled around, I was still painting and Greg made dinner :-)

I am sharing my kitten with you. And let me tell you, if I can do this - you can too! You just relax and study the reference and then go for it with the paint. I love the way the oil paint feels. It is positively lushous. Add oil painting to the list of things everyone should try atleast once in their lives. It feels a bit like gardening. The soil and the smell of the soil and the feel of the soil and the sun on your face....all those sensuous tactile pleasures....And then I could draw insipid parallels between germinating a seed and developing a painting....but that would just be soppy.

Homework assignments for Brenda Semanick's Class

I'm not asking for critiques - I live with "The Critic" and I am an extremely harsh critic also. I know, I got the drawing wrong and it fell apart there. But I want to share anyway because the thing I'm really proud of in this picture is that I did it. My first 3 attempts turned into little temper tantrums and I told Greg I wasn't going back to class and that this was "stupid". He settled me down with a glass of wine - what a good husband he is....and I started again. Ironically, I think the drawings of the first 3 attempts were more accurate but the paint was a muddy mess. I also highly recommend the book Brushwork Essentials by Weber. As I read it I realized he was repeating almost verbatim ideas that Brenda had stressed in class. It was good to hear it again. Today I am working on a kitten. I am slow and so I won't have much to show for class, but I am learning. And I think our family is bonding with us all having this oil paint bug together. I still smile everytime I see the palettes in the freezer.

Palettes in the freezer - Oil painting classes at the Tucson Artist Colony

Do you know what it means when your're trying to make dinner and you have to take 4 palettes out of the freezer to get to the peas??
Well, I've found it is the secret to happiness :-)
Recently, Maggie Maye and I have started art classes at the Tucson Artist Colony. Our first session was beginning drawing with Brenda Semanick and now we are taking Beginning Oil Painting, also with Brenda. The homework assignment is challenging enough to require me to paint daily. Just what I need. At the same time Greg is taking a painting class with Robert Goldman and he is obsessively painting every morning - in breaks during the day - and late into the night. And William seems to have caught the bug. Two days in a row he has come home from school, opened his paint box and worked on a desert scene he is painting. It must be quite a picture to outsiders. ...our dining area lost in easels, paint boxes and reference pictures. But to me it is a scene fit for Better Homes and Gardens.
Downside - I can't spell anymore - Brenda said that might happen when the right brain really starts to work and the left brain has to be quiet. I think I've gotten most of the blatant spelling errors corrected in this ditty - forgive the rest - I have a kitten to block in.

Becoming a Family of Artists

How many paint palettes can you get in a freezer??? So far we can put 4 in ours!! How do we know this and why?
Recently I find my mind with a little "time on its hands". This is a result of selling the tattoo business (don't forget - I'm still tattooing - but independently - I don't manage a shop anymore). And so I am enrolled in a beginning oil painting class. Maggie Maye and I attend painting classes on Saturdays at the Tucson Artist Colony. Brenda Semanick is a wonderful instructor with enough patience for difficult students like me. Greg already was painting every day and now Maggie and I are also. So the freezer is stacking up in paint pallets so we don't have to scrape our pallet every night and waste so much paint.
Our beginning exercises are fairly simple mono chromatic studies. The challenge for me at this point is picking up the paint in the right amounts and consistency and being able to lay wet onto wet. I've sat at my hubby's side and watched him paint for years. It's been exciting to watch him grow as an artist. And he tells me those problems never go away - oh boy - something to look forward to! lol!
Tonight I will attempt the eye study yet one more time. So far I've made mud. But I'm trying to keep my chin up and remember that my best times in life have included mud. Make whatever you want out of that statement - but I've always loved playing in mud. Now the challenge is to NOT PLAY in mud. So I will struggle for clarity with the paint just as I do with words and we'll see what happens.

New Year's Resolutions - Huge Changes at Maggie Maye's Tucson Tattoo

I have finally started my New Year's Resolutions. It just didn't seem like the new year until January 20th. Having Barack Obama as the president is giving me hope to make the resolutions. But on a more personal level Greg and I made some seismic changes in our life that same day.
Some would say that we've owned Maggie Maye's Tucson Tattoo since 1998. But the truth is Maggie Maye's has owned us. Everything we did on a business and a personal level was dictated by the needs of the shop. If you haven't owned your own business before - start one. I think everyone should have at least a taste of it (as I think everyone should do some form of community service in life). When you own your own business you are NEVER off. The closest we came was when we took that wonderfully adventurous vacation in the big green bus on highway 1. That's a whole other blog I might get to write soon.....But there was about a week when I did not have cell phone service and the pay phone was quite a hike from where we had set up camp in the bus (a blissful week in Nirvana).
Don't get me wrong - we have loved owning Maggie Maye's. But it is time for Greg and I to include other things in our life.
So with great excitement we welcome Theresa Barksdale as the new owner of Maggie Maye's Tucson Tattoo Studio. Theresa has been with us in lots of ways since we opened. Some of you have seen the tattoo work Greg has done on her back. She has a full back memorial to Stevie Ray Vaughn. Her son Jesse will be tattooing with her at Maggie Maye's.

You'll still find Steve Gray at Maggie Maye's.
SO ARE WE! Greg and I are still in our same booth. We are still tattooing and piercing. We have just closed up the shop in the middle and we have a private entrance through the courtyard behind Maggie Maye's. We're easy to find - but you must CALL FIRST. We work by appointment only now 520-270-6351.

So now this weekend I can write my New Year's Resolutions. And this year they can include personal improvement goals like learning to play the guitar and becoming a plein air painter. Huge smile. And this leaves a lot more time for us to dedicate ourselves to the Tucson Artist Colony and to working on the grounds of Placita de la Luna (the complex that houses all this good stuff).
This weekend we will finally pop the cork on the champagne - CHEERS!

Inauguration

Well, today is the day we've been waiting for. I feel like I've been holding my breath. Just waiting for the new President. New Hope. New Beginnings. I sat and stared at my T.V. this afternoon just as people all over the country - all over the world did. If nothing else we were all united in watching this ceremony together. And I am resolved to let myself be vulnerable enough to BELIEVE. Maybe it will all end in disappointment but I am willing to risk it. We all need a dose of BELIEF. "Yes we can". And so we will.
God Bless Barack Obama. Keep him safe and give him guidance.

New Beginings

What an exciting week. Tomorrow we will have a new President. Not just any new President. I got tingles today when I read Tucson Cowgirl's blog about this inauguration. Last night we had a little family party to celebrate and even though Greg and I have decided to lose weight as one of our New Year's resolutions (how stereotypical can we be?) I made a cake for the party.
I wanted to write "YES WE CAN!" But I'm really not very talented with cake writing icing so I thought I'd stick to the simple "Go Bama".
That says it all anyway.
I salute this new President of ours. Hail to the Chief.

Going too fast or too slow??

I look at the date of my last entry and realize I've lost a couple of months. With the holidays and guests and shopping and cooking and cleaning and of course continuing to work...the Artist Colony and the Grand Opening....I'm not sure if time has gone on without me or if I've just been caught up along in it.
I have met absolutely fascinating people. Among them Monica Surfaro Spigelman and her husband Leigh (check out her blog - it's the Tucson Cowgirl listed in my blogs to the right). Greg and I attended their Exhibit downtown and purchased some wonderful photographs.
Then at the Grand Opening of the Tucson Artist Colony there were so many interesting visitors to our little classroom. We were honored to have George Strickland and his lovely wife, Carolita, attend.

Greg and I foundered ourselves at Thanksgiving. It was just us two and our beautiful 2 children William and Maggie and of course the dog, Cookie, and the 2 cats, Strawberry and Bagheera. But I cooked as if the whole family from Texas was arriving at any moment (secretly wishing they would).

My mother and step dad came for Christmas which really made it a special holiday. I think they stayed longer than they have before and we were able to enjoy them more. No rushing about. Fun times shopping and eating and movie going.

Maggie and I started Beginning Drawing Classes at the Colony with Brenda Semanick (her blog is also to the right). And I have homework for the first time in years!! I've loved every minute of it. Not only have my drawing skills improved, but the time I've had doing this along side Maggie Maye has been priceless. I know this memory of art class together is one we will share always. I hope it sustains us through the rocky teenage years soon to be here.

And now it's time for New Year's Resolutions - but by the time I get mine done it might be the Chinese New Year. So either it's all moving too fast or I'm moving too slowly.