To Do List : Paintings

Friday night , nothing to do, nowhere to go, I started a painting. A burst of creative energy came over me and I painted for hours, upon hours. What luck that my sleeplessness leads to these "painting storms", sleep has eluded me for weeks. Normally this might cause me distress, but when inspiration strikes I don't argue. A self portrait I decided, because if I can't paint myself then I really don't have any business painting portraits. I found a new twist to an already familiar technique in a water color book I took out from the library. You begin with a wash of color and then build all of your tone and value using varying degrees of the same wash color. Gradually building the image and adding more color. I intended for the wash to be a skintone, it was.. and then somehow it became a lovely bubble gum pink. Once all was said and done I had a very nice bubble gum pink underpainting of myself. Now what..  Brown! Brown? Really Erin... bound to be a muddy mess. I was mistaken,brown gave it some warmth, then I got carried away and voila. My beautiful bubble gum pink underpainting became a muddled brown cartoon version of myself. In a moment of impatience I decided to paint in my lip and eye color and get a glimpse of how it might look later on. Sigh.... It's still not quite finished, and it's yet to be seen how I will feel about it in the end. If I'm feeling brave I'll post pictures tomorrow.

Experimenting

A month or so ago I came up with these, focused on the idea of chalkboards. Rather than beginning with a stark white canvas, I painted the entire canvas black and then used white paint to build an image. I really like the end product and I think I'll play with this idea again soon. The second in the set looks to be unfinished and at the time it was, I have since decided that perhaps it was meant to look that way. You tell me..

Untitled - Acrylic on Canvas 2010

                                                                      

Goodbyes

My Grandmother passed away three weeks ago. She was the last living grandparent we had,which leaves me feeling broken in a way I can't describe. She is the keeper of my fondest memories, and my tiniest.
My favorites are memories of nights spent cuddled in her bed, in a cocoon of blankets reading stories together. As a nurse she had an endless array of medical supplies, Laurel and I made use of them bandaging our teddy bears and dolls until they could no longer see. A rather scary looking cookie jar sat on the counter in her kitchen,a raccoon with a gun and cowboy hat,scary but always full of cookies. She crocheted and tried countless times to teach me how.She was always honest,and never hesitated to say exactly what was on her mind.
She was such a big part of my heart and our family. Life will not be the same without her.
I will not be the same without her.