Listen

Listen
Oil on Canvas

Listen to this flesh.  It is far truer than poems.

-Marina Tsvetayeva

Put a Bird on It

Nesting
Gouache on Paper
23" x 15"
Print available on Fine Art America

I am pleased to announce that these two pieces
will be included in the "Put a Bird on It" exhibit at the Harrison Center for the Arts!

Join me for the opening reception:

This Friday
March 2nd, 2012, 6-10pm

"Nesting" illustrates both birds and a woman building nests for their young.  It represents the similarity of human nature to that of animals.  How we often view animals as savage beasts, yet there is a tender side.  There is a primal care and warmth. 

"The Fall of Icarus" depicts a Greek myth.  It is the story of a man who builds wings for his son and himself to fly off of an island where they are imprisoned.  The son's wings melt and he falls to the sea.  This illustration was featured in my book, "Art Stories, Folktales to Inspire Creativity."

The Fall of Icarus
Watercolor on Paper
11" x 14"

Give and Take

Give and Take
Oil on Canvas
18" x 24"
Prints available on Fine Art America

An oyster opens his mouth

to swallow one drop.

Now there is a pearl.

Let yourself be silently drawn by the pull of what you really love.

-Rumi

Strength and Courage

Strength and Courage
Oil on Canvas
9" x 12"
Original $275. available on Etsy
Prints available on Fine Art America

To love someone deeply gives you strength.

Being loved by someone gives you courage.

-Lao Tzu

Titania Triumphs?

Titania Triumphs
Acrylic on Paper
19" x 14"
Prints available on Fine Art America

What in the heck is going on in this picture? 

Is it a girl fight? 

Is there going to be a smackdown?

Well- this is a piece commissioned by one of my patrons, Aaron GrandeCorazon Clark.

(Do you hear that Aaron- you are officially a patron!)

This is the scene he requested...

Oberon lay limp against the cold stone throne, his long thin arms keeping his elongated head from touching it directly.  The ancient glyphs carved into the throne were empty and hollow as the fairy magic drained away from him. 
Maab and Titania stood tall, their backs straight as steel, as they gathered their wills in preparation to battle against the other.  Maab, gathering the powers of darkness and cold, focused on Titania with her burning blue eyes.  Titania, arching her head back, bright white wisps of fire flow from her eye sockets as she called forth light and summer.

So I asked Aaron, "Why are they fighting?" He said, "this is Light and Summer vs. Dark and Winter... some people say that Maab and Titania are one in the same."

hmmmm...

So this represents the two sides of ourselves, light and dark, dueling. Rather like Jung's "subjective" dream analysis, every person in the dream represents an aspect of the dreamer.

Therefore...

Titania = light

Maab = darkness

Oberon = the powerless victim to the whims of fate

T + M + O = the Collective Unconscious


Wait... is Oberon powerless?

The Harpist

The Harpist
Oil on Canvas
16" x 20"
Available on Fine Art America

Back in my abstract college painting days, I depicted the sound of music with color and shape often. 

I have always envisioned harp notes as golden. 

The piano is blue. 

Drums are green (well, sometimes black.) 

And my instrument, the fiddle, is red.

Time has laid his hand
Upon my heart gently, not smiting it,
But as a harper lays his open palm
Upon his harp, to deaden its vibrations.

-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Big Picture

I have been working on this painting for days and here is the problem.... 
this is only the lower half of the picture.  The top depicts a man who is looking down at our woman from a balcony above.  And blach!  I can't get his face right. 

I want him to look caring, intrigued and a bit hungry.  And what did my friend say about his face?

"He looks like he forgot to put in his dentures." 

Yeah, so I am going to let him dry and work on him again later.  For now she can float along waiting patiently for him to get his shit together.  For now you can have half of the story. 

And what should the title be?

hmmmm...

Winning a Rose...

A Rose for You by June Rollins

I am pleased to announce that on Valentine's day I won a painting by the artist June Rollins.  Thank you June!

On the back of the painting June wrote this...
"I'm a late bloomer.  I didn't begin working in watercolor until my mid-forties. I had the desire since high school, but not the confidence to pursue.  Remember the Y2K scare of 1999?  One day I woke up and thought if the world is going to end, I at least would like to take a watercolor class before it does.  I haven't stopped painting since."

Yes!  I love it.  We have got to embrace what we love.

No one says on their death bed, "gosh, I wish I spent more time watching TV."

Make your dreams reality.

The Heat of the Sun

The Heat of the Sun
Oil on Canvas
24" x 36"
Prints available on Fine Art America

You have the heat of the sun in you.

All of that energy beats down pushing life forward. 

Ever onward and upward.

There is nothing new under the sun.
-Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

An Open Cadaver

Mural in Downtown Indianapolis

Yesterday I was feeling wobbly and here is why...

When I share my more private art it is as though I am an open cadaver on an operating table. The viewers are all looking down at my guts with masks on their faces. I can't tell if they are thinking, "Ewww, her insides are really rotten," or what. Then I remind myself that if I switched places with them their insides would look the same.

And maybe the more uncomfortable I feel by exposing my thoughts and feelings, the closer I am to hitting at the core, at the truth. I WILL get over my wimpiness...

and then...

there will be a wonderful moment where the viewer and I will be united by our commonalities. We will grow. It will be an orgasm of pure empathy.

So I am going to keep on truckin' and more than anything I want you all to do the same.

Mural in downtown Indianapolis

Disclaimer

Roses
Acrylic on Paper
11" x 14"
Prints available on Fine Art America

Gravy- I am thankful to all of you who have written to support my vomit of hormones and sap as I explored the subject of love these past two weeks.

I know that "I'm as corny as Kansas in August." arggh and I want to kick myself for it sometimes. 

But I also know that I am "as normal as blueberry pie." 

And that's the thing, everything I think and feel is so extreme and so normal.... that I hope you all take comfort in it. 

Shish Kebab. 

(argggh!)

Saint Valentine

Self-portrait, 2001
Watercolor on Paper
5" x 7"

The story goes that Saint Valentine was sentenced to death.  His last request was to be given a sheet of paper to write a love letter.

And so I want for you all to imagine that you are about to be escorted to the hangman's noose. 

What message have you been holding inside? 

To whom would you write the letter?

It is hard to write the letter. The truth of it can whip you.  It is as though you have vomited, purged yourself. The person might not 'get' it, those chunks are acidic. Your message might be mixed up and garbled but you will feel better. I promise.

I urge you, my friends, to sit down and write it...
or sing it, paint it, whatever.

Say what it is that you have been aching to say.

Let's dump a load of pure cane sugar on this earth. No more of this wimpy saccharin shit, it is just so dissatisfying.  You want the real thing.

To Love Another

Mother and Child
Acrylic on Paper
Print available on Fine Art America

For one human being to love another;

that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks,

the ultimate, the last test and proof,

the work for which all other work is but preparation.

-Rilke

Kissing the Ground

The Flower
Collage and Acrylic on Paper

If you can love one person, you can love anyone.

If you can love yourself, you can love anyone.

If you can see the beauty in one spot on earth, you can see it anywhere.

Take down a musical instrument.
Let the beauty we love be what we do,

there are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.

-Rumi

The Romantic Story of Shakuntala

Shakuntala meets Dushyanta
Acrylic on Paper
Prints available on Fine Art America

Shakuntala is a story of epic cosmic dancing.

Click below to hear the story on my podcast. 

Also available on iTunes.

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Fish in the Sea

Fish in the Sea
Oil on Canvas
16" x 20"
Prints available on Fine Art America

Sir Robert Chiltern:  Anyway, what's that saying about there being plenty of fish in the sea?

Lord Arthur Goring:  Ah yes, but I couldn't possibly marry a fish. 
I'd be sure to land an old trout.

-Oscar Wilde

We Come from the Water

We Come From the Water
Oil on Canvas
16" x 20"
Prints available on Fine Art America

We come from the water

living in the water

go back to the water

turn the world around.

-Harry Belafonte

Let Me Sow Love

Sowing Seeds
Acrylic on Paper
Prints available at Fine Art America

Where there is hatred, let me sow love.

For it is in loving that we are loved.

 It is in giving that we receive.

It in pardoning that we are pardoned.

-Saint Francis of Assisi

The Story of Medusa

Medusa
Acrylic on Paper
14" x 17"

Once upon a time a beautiful young lady named Medusa was a devotee in the temple of Aphrodite.  Against her will she was raped in that sacred space.  Aphrodite became enraged, banished her and changed her hair to snakes.  Anyone who looked upon Medusa from that moment on was turned to stone.

Why did Aphrodite punish the victim? Was it because she, the goddess of love, didn't want to be associated with that selfish side of sexuality?

Poor Medusa, if you can see past her bitterness you find that she is still beautiful. 

She has forgotten how to love, how fun it can be.  

She is silent...

and silence is death.

The Skywoman's Basket

What?! 

There is a folktale about divorce?

Yes... there is.

Click below to hear the meaningful tale of the Skywoman's Basket.
Also available on iTunes.

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Who, being loved, is poor?
-Oscar Wilde

Cupid and Psyche

Cupid and Psyche
Oil on Canvas
16" x 20"
Prints available on Fine Art America

Cupid could only visit his love, Psyche at night.  She agreed not to view him even by the light of the moon.  They embraced only in the shadows of the night.  As if in dreams.

(hot! hot! hot!)

Eagerly savor each new day and the taste of its mouth-
Never lose sight of the thrill and the joy of living.
-Ewan MacColl

Pyramus and Thisbe

Pyramus and Thisbe
Oil on Canvas
9" x 12"
Original $275. available on Etsy
Prints available on Fine Art America

Pyramus and Thisbe,

Romeo and Juliet,

Abelard and Heloise...

This is the forbidden fruit of love. 

Tasty, tasty fruit sitting high up on the shelf just out of your reach.

The ache of it hurts so good. 

All you can think of is that one person.  

Everyone else pales in comparison. 

All you can think of is that one person. 

Perfection.

Yet the passion that with equal strength
inflamed their minds no parents could forbid.
No relatives had guessed their secret love,
for all their converse was by nods and signs;
and as a smoldering fire may gather heat,
the more 'tis smothered, so their love increased...

for what is hid from love?

-Ovid, Pyramus and Thisbe

Aloja, The Water Nymph

Aloja the Water Nymph
Oil on Canvas
9" x 12"
Original $150. available on Etsy
Print available on Fine Art America

Aloja, the water nymph can be found only around the fresh water springs of Majorca. 

She simmers red by the light of the moon.

The fountains mingle with the rivers,
and the rivers with the ocean

The winds of heaven mix forever with sweet emotion

For nothing in the world is single

All things by a law divine meet and mingle

Why not I with thine?

See the mountains kiss high heaven

and the waves clasp one another,

No sister flower would be forgiven

if she distained her brother.

And the sunlight clasps the earth

And the moonbeams kiss the sea

What are all these kissings worth

if you kiss not me?

-Love's Philosophy by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Can You Define Love?

Self Portrait "In Love" 1999
Watercolor on Paper
16" x 24"
Print available on Fine Art America

It is not ownership. It is not about marking someone as your territory with a ring or a photo.

Love is acceptance.

The purest love between parent and child has an openness, a bond that encompasses all.

And then there is romantic love....

The kind that fills you with longing. To comfort and be comforted.

Sometimes I feel that I SHOULD be able to love anyone because we all deserve love. Yet I have only felt passionate love for a handful of people. When I think of those individuals I looovvvvvve, it is like grabbing a unique lily white snowflake with my tongue and feeling this is it! My mojo flips backward and groans, hot damn, THIS is it.

How would you define it?

The Roses of Aphrodite

The Roses of Aphrodite
Oil on Canvas
16" x 20"
Prints available on Fine Art America

Aphrodite, the Goddess of Love, was running through the forest in hot pursuit of one of her many lovers.  She pricked her finger on a thorny bush.  As her blood spilt onto the vines a bud formed to create the first rose.  This beauty sprung from her pain.

Romeo: Is love a tender thing? it is too rough,

Too rude, too boisterous, and it pricks like thorn.

Mercutio: If love be rough with you, be rough with love;

Prick love for pricking, and you beat love down.
-Shakespeare

And yet...

Gardeners are good at nurturing,

and they have a great quality of patience,

they're tender.

They have to be persistent.

-Ralph Fiennes