Yashoday and Jesus, oil on canvas

August 9, 2012

 

 Yashoda and Jesus

Creating Something that has Never Been Seen Before

A Picture Totally New to the World

Painting Process Documentation

May, 2012.  My muse has been leading me down a golden path of visual exploration and discovery. For many years, I dallied with graven images of ancient gods and goddesses. I began to see that celebrities inhabit the Hollywood pantheon of early twenty first century chaos. So, I wrestled with the features of celebrities. Following Queen Muse, step by step, I came to the place were celebrity faces inhabit the bodies of deified concepts. Celebrities were matched and mated with ancient deities and pictures created.  Belushi Bacchus,  Angelina Medusa,  Oprah Cleopatra, (Cleopatra not technically a goddess, but close enough).  

I thought, who is the biggest celebrity of all times?  Mary Madonna became my muse.  I gave her a modern day makeover.  Her look was sooo unfashionable. 

In May this year, I discovered that Jesus and Krishna had been switched at birth in an alternate reality. I visualized the two pictures and started working them with Photo Shop. 

August 9, 2012.  I start the Yoshoda and Jesus painting on canvas on a quiet, overcast day. The creation of this image began earlier when I made the digital version.  I print out the digital version and use it  as a draft, a reference, a study.   The first marks on the 36"x48" canvas are conte chalk,  to map out the primary lines.   I do measurements on the study,  to translate the proportions to the canvas. I have dyslexia for the measurements, finally I guesstimate placement.  I have a nice studio where I can work, mostly undisturbed, in a beautiful setting.  An estimate of the hours that I work in the studio is 30-40 hours per week.  I do Photoshop almost daily.

August 12.  After the third day,  I have the main areas of color blocked in.  The dogs,  Harpo and Princess Fou Fou, hang out with me.  When it rains, almost everyday, the weather cools slightly, and I open the two sets of double doors of the studio, the north side looks onto a small scraggly lawn and trees, and the west side looks into the Louisiana jungle.

 I work all over the canvas.  I use large brushes first and work my way down to tiny red sable brushes for detail. Brush techniques include lines, scrubbing with the ragged bristles of old brushes, scrumbling (which was a favorite of  Monet),  dancing brush, and lots of glazing.  I want the style to be painterly, but often that desire is overruled by the wish for fine detail in some places. The small brush is annoying, I consider changing my style.  I wont change, I like this style. It is pop art influenced.

There are many Yin/Yang decisions to be made.  Painterly vs detail.  Realistic vs expressive design.  Saturated exciting color vs elegant muted tones.  For the past few years I have exploded with saturated colors.

 August 16.  Continuing to paint all over the canvas, I refine and define.  I think that my current style looks like vintage illustration for children's books.  My Mother read to me when I was a child and I read to my children. I give my grandchildren books.  This is one of the best things that a mother can do for a child. "The Color Kittens", was a preschool favorite of mine. It taught me the color wheel early. I was tuned into color as a baby, I remember.

I just gave you advice on child care.  That correlates with the interest in mother and child icons.  This image is a visual metaphor for the human longing for joyful, comforting, totally accepting, supportive, heavenly, motherly love.   The use of figures from different cultures emphasizes that this longing is global, a desire of all humans. The image comforts us because it portrays ideal compassion.

Even excellent mothers sometimes let their children down.  It is the most challenging job in the world. The care of children gives us a second chance, to attempt the creation of perfect love.

Here is a vast generalization;  Mother love is accepting, father love challenges us to be better. We need both the Yin and the Yang. 

 August 17.  The digital version of this image has a camellia flower for an aura.  Aura's allow lots of  room for play.  I used to see aura's in time past, when I was doing a lot of meditation, fasting and yoga. When in an altered state, I saw lights around people.  Somehow, I have moved away from those spiritual practices.  I always plan to get back to it.  But, I would rather paint and garden.  Maybe next week.

I think that you might call me an explorer of inner consciousness.  This is part of my artistic practice. 

August 18. Auras appear as ethereal, transparent, colored light; with flow, movement.  Here I made large halos with floating flowers.  The digital study has a tree, here I put the figures in heavenly clouds.

The baby face really does not please me.  I change the features many times.  But, still trying to get it right.  I wish that I could paint better. 

Weather remains hot,  but if I dress lightly, I like the doors open.  Love bugs land on the canvas, while doing a flying fuggle.  The love bug season comes every year to Louisiana.  They can be annoying, their gism gets tragically splattered all over our cars.  They come in swarms.  But, what an inspiring reminder that this creature on this amazing Earth, exists simply to do the Flying Fruggle.

 Adjusting placement of features, and detailing take a lot of time.  Pleasurable time.  I like the clouds, they get better everyday.

To be continued

MARY AND KRISHNA

MARY AND KRISHNA

Oil on canvas,  36"x48", July, 2012

This continues the themes of  "The Persistence of Worship", "Luminous Femme", and religious mash-up.  Previously I published the digital version of this px, which I used as a study for this painting on canvas.  In the digital version I used a cosmic Hubble image for the background.  When I started painting I blocked in the Hubble image, but as I painted I saw this fiery aura developing.  So, I went with the biker tatoo inspired aura.   As I work, I often see unexpected things happening with the paint.  These surprises are one of the things that keep me making art, year after year.  

So, this fiery aura appeared,  woven by the paintbrush in my hand.  This is no soft ethereal aura, it is a blast of strength.  It is an explosion of fire. This is a visual metaphor for a spiritually strong Goddess.

Paring the Christian Mary with the Hindu baby Krishna continues the religious mash-up vein that I have been mining.  The companion piece, "Yoshoda and Jesus",  indicates that Jesus and Krishna may have been switched at birth.  A harassed nurse switched the little bead name bracelets on the babies.  It seems that someone in the hospital nursery would have noticed that the pink complected baby belonged to the pink complected mother and the blue complected baby belonged to the blue complected mother. Oh well, glitches worse than this have occurred in hospitals.

Anyway, these two paintings are companions.  I am currently painting the Yashoda on canvas.  One might wish that companion paintings look similar.  One can wish all one wants, but the brush has a mind of its own.  The Yoshoda painting is coming out all ethereal, light and airy, it is developing heavenly clouds.  While the Mary px is fiery and earthy.  Maybe that is the point?? Yin and yang, the interweaving of opposites.

I am taking photographs of the Yoshoda as I work.  Will try to document the step by step, creation of the painting.

Keep those cards and letters coming, folks. (Dean Martin).

Yoshada and Jesus

Yashoda and Jesus

 

According to  Hindu myth,  Krishna was born to Devaki. He was conceived without sexual union, by "divine mental transmission" from the mind of  his father Vasudeva and into the womb of Devaki.  The couple's first six children were killed by Devaki's brother King Kansa because prophecy foretold that one of the children would kill him. Before the birth of Krishna,  Kansa locked Devaki and Vasudeva in prison. Krishna was born in prison and secretely taken to foster mother Yashoda for protection. Yashoda is often portrayed as his mother.

Lets look at this.  Krishna was born without sexual union.  A King wanted to kill him.  These are parallels with the story of Jesus.  Even the unusual birth places, a prison and a manger have similarity.  Hinduism is older than Christianity.

Joseph Campbell studied and wrote about comparative mythology.  He found similarities between creation and salvation myths all over the world, in many different cultures with different religions.

Here is what Wikipedia says about Campbell:

As a strong believer in the unity of human consciousness and its poetic expression through mythology, through the monomyth concept, Campbell expressed the idea that the whole of the human race could be seen as reciting a single story of great spiritual importance

 

Its ultimate meaning relates to humanity's search for the same basic, unknown force from which everything came, within which everything currently exists, and into which everything will return and is considered to be "unknowable" because it existed before words and knowledge. 

Myth fulfills basic human needs, the needs based on the human condition of not knowing. In the words of Gauguin, the not knowing, the source of deep insecurity, are derived from these mysterious questions,  "Where do we come from?  What are we?  Where are we going?"

In my recent art work I have been mashing up, mixing up, different religious stories.  I have switched the characters around.  Mary is holding Krishna and Yashoda is holding Jesus. 

Here is Reggae musician Bob Marleys take on this subject:

One Love, One Heart
Let's get together and feel all right
As it was in the beginning (One Love)
So shall it be in the end (One Heart)
Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right   

Gauguin's oil painting,  "Where Do We Come From?  What Are We?  Where Are We Going?"

Peace, Love and Art,

 Janet

Babee Hapee

Babee Hapee

Here is a smile for your day.  Put it in your pocket to keep it handy.

Audrey Ascending

 

Audrey Ascending

What is Inspiration?

This is a px of Audrey Hepburn in clothes and a setting similar to traditional Christian Mary pictures .  I am wondering if people find this px inspiring?  Are the clouds and halo inspiring?   Mary has been a subject of art for close to two centuries. By substituting Audrey's face for Mary's face, the legend of Mary is removed.  If the legend of Mary is divorced from the gilding, the clothes and environment of her traditional paintings, does the px still inspire?  Is it the visual effects that inspire, or is the inspiration derived from the belief thoughts assigned to Mary?

Celebrities are our current idols.  We have a vast pantheon of revolving deities.  A few like Audrey have survived for over fifty years. Mary has been worshiped 40 times longer than Audrey.  Still, maybe Audrey inspires you.  She inspires me to work at being classy.  But, I still reserve the right to be tacky,  if the mood hits me. 

 Speaking of tacky and celebrities, please, Dear Goddess, deliver me from the Kardashians and Paris Hilton.

Humans have a need to be inspired, because, as you may have noticed, life on Earth can be tough.  When the going gets rough, you want to believe in something.  

In a documentary about George Lucas a fan told him, "Thanks for giving me something to believe in."  That surprised me.  I thought,  "This guy's belief system came from a science fiction film??? Oh wait, he was talking about The Force.  Of course, I believe in The Force."  This fan illustrates the human need for a belief system to explain the phenomena of life on Earth.

The comedian W.C. Fields said,  "Everyone should believe in something, I believe that I will have another drink."  Hey wait,  I also, believe I'll have another drink.  

Classy, inspiration, and another drink,  maybe I will survive life on Earth for a few more years.  Put that in your survival pack.

So, we have three references in this px:  1)  The legend of Mary.  2) The clothes and environment that Mary's stylists, many stylists, thousands, over the centuries, have developed, and 3) Audrey Hepburn.   Which of the three elements makes it inspiring?

 I would like to hear what people think about this px.  I am aware that some people will find this picture sacrilegious.  I would especially like to hear from my Christian friends and relatives.

If you have been following me you may have noticed that I am confused.  And, I want to know if that is a problem?  

I have more questions than answers.

Two other facts about me that may account for my current artistic subject matter. 1)  My muse compels me to do things that my rational mind understands to be, perhaps, counterproductive. And, no, I do not think that I am hallucinating.  Well, that all depends on your definition of hallucinations.    2)  I was raised by fanatical Christians who beat the hell out of me.  Oh wait,  here I am a grandmother, and I still want to raise hell. I thought that they beat the hell out of me.  But, I still get notions to raise Hell.   It is stressful to be so confused.  I thought that God told my parents to lay onto me with belts and other instruments of red ass because I was so bad. This experience alone may explain a lot about me.

 Next fact about ME;  I now have a good supporting peeps.  Maybe, I am doing something right.  I dont know what.  Maybe, LOVE.

I am still trying to decide what..."I believe IN....."

Here is one thing that I believe:

If anyone ever tells you that you should not ask questions,  you should  turn around and walk away quietly, and with dignity, and a swan neck, and do not go back.  

QUESTION EVERYTHING!

Am I putting the apostrophes in the right place?  Hey,  I have questions,  talk back to me. 

I like to prune bushes.  That is easier than making art on canvas.  Thank you, Goddess, I have a lot of bushes. Thousands.  Pruning relaxes me after a hard day on Earth.

What do you like to do?

Rosie, Roller Girl

Rosie, Roller Girl

This is a new 24M Photoshop painting.  The inspiration came from an "orphan" vintage photo.  Called orphan, because the provenance has been lost.  The original photo amazes me.  It is a black and white recording of a euphoric girl. What is her story?  Where is she now? A bit of intense past tense has been preserved. The back ground looks like a bombed out city, with piles of masonry rubble.  

I imagined a story for her.  I think that the picture was taken in a European city just after WWII. Rosie was born in a bomb shelter. She came into a world where the air reeked with  fear and death.  The bombs fell everyday until almost everything was destroyed. Fire and grief rained from the sky.  Anyone could die at any minute.  For Rosie's first few years, she lived in hell.

Just when it seemed that the world would and should end, when every soul was bruised or broken, when  depression and dread were a daily diet,  then, D-Day dawned. The good guys won. The adults celebrated,  the horror was over. There was a rebirth of Hope. Mom found skates that fit her daughter.  The new skates were the best thing that ever happened to this precious child.  She could zoom.  So this is how pleasure feels.

 Original Photograph

In my picture of her, I put her in a rose bower, because she has been with the disaster rubble for long enough.

. 

I worked on this digital version over a period of a few weeks.  I would like to do an oil painting version.  It takes me varying periods of time to do a canvas painting.  I have been working on "Mary and Krishna", for six weeks, hope to finish next week. Then I will photograph the finished painting, tweak it again in photoshop, and publish it. The digital version is already in this blog.  I like the circularity of repeating favorite images in pixels and paint, paint and points of light.

  Several digital pictures are completed for every canvas painting that I have the time to do.  The digital px's serve as detailed plans for the oil paintings.  I have more images than time, they hover overhead, as numerous as copters over Louis Armstrong Airport after Katrina. It is nice to be able to choose the best image.

I have been practicing Photoshop for eleven years.  I have been painting all my life.  Photoshop is a medium that offers some versatility that does not happen with real paint. You can make new versions without destroying the old versions.  I  get excited when I print out a new pixel px. It is a better experience to see it on paper than on a monitor.  Oil on canvas is even more immediate and more intense than the prints.  

Oh, that business, my family apology, in my last blog. Not sure I want to air my dirty laundry publicly.  Can I erase it? And the apology?  The children say they do not read my blog.  Most likely they are wary of being embarrassed.  They should be concerned,  I am not finished paying them back for throwing raging baby tantrums in Walmart yet.

We had a wonderful 4th of July.  The food has been so good.  The place is looking wonderful.  The creek is cool for swimming.  

Elizabeth Taylor, Gazing

Elizabeth Taylor Gazing

 

Liz Taylor Eyes

 

I distorted her face, but I think that she is still recognizable.  I say that she is gazing, but that is too soft a word  to describe her penetrating  eyes.  She is sizing things up and holding her ground.  She says,  "Dont mess with Liz."  I think that she could vaporize you, just by turning  the electricity up one little  notch.  She was a real bitch in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof".  I would rewatch that film tonight if I had it. 

She is a Medusa, you can almost see the snakes!

I had trouble finding my inner shark.  People were running all over me, I had to learn to stand my ground. Maybe that search is why I made this picture.

An Event at the Ice Cream  Place

Recently Dave and I were waiting for our ice cream orders. The sun was too bright for comfort, but in the shade of the restaurant porch it was lovely.  Sitting at the next picnic table from us was an adorable family.  A young Mommy and Daddy and a beautiful girl, about 10 months old.  The child was sitting between the two parents on the table, playing with car keys.   She gurgled with happy.  She put the keys in her mouth and her father took them away.  Baby went from happy to throwing a hissy in less than ten seconds.  She cried a few minutes and Daddy gave the keys back. She put the keys in her mouth, and he took them away.  There were several repetitions of: playing with keys and happy, keys in mouth, keys taken away, loud screams.  Father was embarrassed by the crying and soon let her keep the keys just to avoid a scene.

 Did she get bad germs from the keys and get sick?  Daddy was trying to protect her and teach her.  Or, maybe the germs on the keys stimulated her immune system. Children need to be exposed to some bacteria, this causes their body to create immunity that will be with them all their life. It is hard, sometimes impossible, to know what is right.

Driving back to our Dauphine Island Cabin, Dave and I talked and agreed that it was wrong to aggravate Baby with the keys. She was too young to learn to keep things out of her mouth.  Infants are hard wired to put everything in their mouth. If I remember right they are only ready to learn to keep things out of their mouth at three or four years old.

 If they had been really super doooper parents they would have brought a chew toy for her. They would have been acquainted with developmental stages.  They were loving, attentive parents, out for ice cream.
Their mistake was small, and may not have much effect on the growing human. But simple, innocent interactions like this, if repeated,  may have long lasting consequences for the child. 

This is a small incident, the parents were obviously doing the best they knew how.  Parents make mistake like this every day.  No one knows exactly the right way to raise a child.

Once, I remember thinking, perhaps when I was in my forties,  I thought, my parents made me neurotic, and I am making my children neurotic.  I mean, no one is qualified for such a serious job.

 I have many pleasurable and informing memories from my childhood.  My parents were loving and took their parenting responsibilities seriously.  They wanted me to turn out well so they raised me up according to strict Christian ethics.  Daddy had a good Air Force job.  We traveled and saw the world. We were part of the military, fighting for right.

I went to 13 schools before I graduated high school.  I never belonged,  in the north they called me a southern rebel. The war between the states was still in collective memory, that explains the rebel part.  In the south they called me a damn yankee.  Damned, because the north won the war. My accent was always wrong.  I was in fifth grade before I realized that the north won the civil war.  My father's family remembered the boys that fell in that war.  The boys were heroes.  Talking about the loosing part would have subtracted points from their hero status. Hell, they just did not want to admit that they were losers.

My mother was relatively attentive.  My father was gone away on Air Force assignments.  I was born about 1 month before the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Did I, on some level feel the screams of the victims?  Like Jung, I believe that we are all connected.

My mother and father were loving and relatively attentive.  They were sure that they knew the right way to raise a child.  The Bible told them what to do, people are born into sin and it must be whipped out. They were not confused, they had certainty.  They had hard and fast rules.

I was a relative attentive parent.  I made many mistakes that my children must try to sort out.   I really wanted to be a good Mom, but there was a lot of static. I was not sure what to do. I was confused. I just wanted to break all those damn righteous rules that I was raised with.

I made many stupid mistakes.  I am sorry.  This is my public apology to my children. I am sorry.

 I am still trying to get things right.

But back to the family on the porch.  They were loving and attentive, just uninformed.  If it is this easy to make a parental mistake, no wonder that we are all screwed up.

Excuse me!  You are not screwed up?  You are insulted that I would include you in with the confused masses of the world.  Your parents did everything right, or  you have overcome their stupidities?  Well, good for you dahlin' I hope that hasnt made you judgmental and superior. Arnt you the epitome of perfection.

We must examine and accept our own faults so that we can understand the faults of others.  Compassion for ourself and others is the basis of learning real love.

It is so disappointing to realize our human  condition of not knowing. We want to know,  "Where did we come from? Where are we going? Why are we here?".  This is a quote from Gauguin.  We ask questions and want them answered.  We NEED to know. This is the attraction of religion.  The preacher tells you exactly what is right.   Uncertainty is just feeling ignorant. But there are no concrete answers.  We are left with just the consolation of appreciating Mystery. 

Enough blathering.  I will sign off now.  I hope that you have a stellar day.