Tuesday, February 15, 2022

learning to paint and to let go, not sure which is harder


My father loved art and the walls of our house were filled with paintings, many of which were by their friend Jack Cooley who was a painter in New Orleans. Jack had a little studio on Bourbon Street across from Pat O'Brians (a famous bar) in the French Quarter and the summer I was 14 I was sent to spend two weeks with Jack and Joanie and their three kids for him to give me painting lessons. Jack was not inclined to be an instructor of any kind so basically turned me loose to explore the French Quarter while he painted and drank. He was not very successful and so a couple of times my parents invited him to do a showing at our house, inviting friends and colleagues to view and hopefully buy some of Jack's paintings. We always ended up with several. He even painted a mural in our house in the family room. Anyway I've written more extensively about Jack before and you can read it here

When us kids were young our parents would take us to the Museum of Fine Art and other venues. I was pretty young and those memories are pretty vague now. As a teenager I would go with my father to art openings sometimes at a few galleries, particularly Meredith Long Gallery, because Mother would no longer go with him. I guess she found them boring but my father liked to hob nob.

My parents groomed me to be an artist. I was always taking art lessons of one kind or another, either in school or after school, but to my father being an artist meant being a painter, working with oils or acrylics. He even finagled a promised show at a gallery from one owner (which I'm sure the guy was just humoring my father) and somehow got me a gig ghost painting for another successful artist (copying his paintings doing the basic color blocks and then he would do the finishing work and sell them, sort of like making prints only they were paintings). I only did about three before he cut me loose because the problem was, painting didn't grab me, I wasn't good at it, and after a few years I gave it up altogether. I did like to draw though and it was the drawing that was the backbone of the carved and etched glass I ended up making a fairly successful career out of with Marc's help and participation even though we lived hand to mouth a lot of the time.

My father had a pretty bad stroke in the early '80s, no paralysis but he suffered from speech aphasia. At that time, he wrote letters to each of us three kids but we didn't get them until after he died from another major stroke in '96. What I remember most about my letter (I no longer have it as it was in a box that got submerged during the flood) was that he considered my fledgling etched glass studio as a temporary side distraction until I got back to the serious business of being an artist and painting. I have no idea if he finally accepted what I was doing as art, being an artist, but I'm pretty sure he was still disappointed that I never became a painter.

And now, here I am many decades later, finally exploring, learning to paint only with watercolors and not oils. Key word here...learning.

Today we finished our snowscapes though I may still work on mine here at home as I'm really dissatisfied with the big trees. Joy's parting words were 'don't overwork it. Gay, that ship has sailed.

The instructors finished demo painting.

And mine.



 

28 comments:

  1. Ooooo, you are an original and do paint outside the lines. Definitely an artist. I never knew any parent that wanted their child to be an artist!!!

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    1. Well, they did expect me to choose a fall back, something I never did.

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  2. Interesting bio there. I think either you're a painter or you're not. But art comes in so many forms, and so many materials.

    Learning to let go is so hard for certain temperaments, where the natural bent is to make things happen. But it's a great idea to try to be a bit more here goes nothing!

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    1. Watercolor does interest me but oils and acrylics never really did. I spent over 40 years drawing and doing work that was precise as is the cast glass I do now so letting go of that and just start painting on a blank piece of paper is hard for me to know where to begin. It's just a difference in style and approach. She never draws first what she is going to paint. I doubt I'll ever do that but perhaps I can incorporate a little looseness in the background of a precise painting.

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  3. No kidding. I like your watercolor painting better than the instructor's demo.

    Thank you for writing about your roots as an artist, your father's love of art, your early talent for drawing, and your father's continuing hopes for you as an artist -- hopes that were still in place in the early 1980s after his stroke. Even though he saw your etched glass work as something less than what he thought of as art, I sense that he firmly believed in you as an artist.

    My parents both encouraged me in my art work from an early age but there was no expectation that I would be an artist. They wanted me to be a teacher. When I went to college, their expectation was that I would become an art teacher or an English teacher. I didn't do particularly well in college art classes (or English classes, for that matter) and lost what little confidence I had in myself when it came to art and writing and could never picture myself as a teacher and dropped out of college after two years.

    I never stopped drawing or creating things but my attempts were intermittent until I returned to college in my early 30s, majoring in English and taking drawing classes in which my chalk pastel drawings were highly praised by the professor. They were more like paintings than drawings. For the next 15 years, I took my art work seriously and then had a long depressing period of mostly lack of motivation to do any art work.

    It was because of my mother that I began painting in watercolor and gouache. She visited from California when I was in my early 30s and taking those college drawing classes. She brought her all her watercolor books and watercolor supplies and gave them to me, along with a single lesson. I'm mostly self-taught when it comes to watercolor and gouache. There were about 10 years that I painted regularly in gouache and watercolor and then that long period where I did very little art work at all.

    It was in 2014 that I began drawing mandalas using colored pencils and just this past month that I am excited about continuing the mandala series by drawing exclusively with my left hand. I gave away all my painting supplies to a local art store that takes art supplies to give to young artists.

    I did love painting. Who knows? Maybe I will paint again someday.

    Your art work has been a continuing inspiration for me. Just looking at your watercolor painting reminds me how much I enjoyed working with watercolors.



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    1. All my artwork, the etched glass, was devoid of color. It wasn't till I started to do the pate de verre cast glass that I started using color. And then a few years ago I started doing some color pencil drawings. I should do more of those. I have yet to start on a watercolor of my own outside of class. I took this class in 2020 and then covid shut everything down. So now I'm back trying to learn the medium.

      I took a variety of art classes in college but never did graduate. Probably have a little less than 3 years of credits. I was just done with school. Of course now I wish I had stuck with it, gone to different colleges but my life was pretty much a mess back then. And while my parents encouraged me to be an artist they also expected I would get educated in something I could make a living at though I never did. Nothing appealed to me and I graduated high school with no plan for the future.

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  4. Your painting is beautiful. I love that you create so much art in different ways. I'm sure your father is out there in the universe beaming a smile of gladness as bright as the sun.

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    1. Well, that's nice thought anyway. And maybe it's true. But he disapproved of much of my life and choices.

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  5. Your story is practically the opposite of so many who take up painting later in life. Most people who do that had always wanted to try their hand at it but never believed in themselves, never had the time, never...blah, blah, blah. We all know the story. But you are taking it up DESPITE your early experience with it and I love that. I have a very slight wonder that if your father hadn't pushed you so hard, you might have enjoyed it more. Still, you may come to love it and if not, you don't have to do it. Also? You already KNOW you're an artist and that has been proven beyond doubt. As Boud says, there are so many ways to create art.
    Frankly, I love your painting.

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    1. I think I'll enjoy it once I can apply the technique to my particular style. Well, I'm enjoying now though I'd like it better if I felt like I knew what I was doing. There was a time though when I didn't know if I wanted to be an artist because I wanted to or because that's what they wanted. I've never been one of those artists who are driven and didn't much like hanging around with those who felt that way, full of angst, trying to make a statement, and artspeak for cryin' out loud. Always thought that was pretentious. I do it because I enjoy the process of making whether it's a drawing or a cast glass sculpture or a garment or a garden.

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  6. The "encouragement" may have put a damper on it. You can paint( you just proved that one!), your drawings are fabulous and of course your glass work just blows my mind. Art, when I was living with family growing up in the dirt, was thought of as fluff- can't eat it, not good enough to become famous so get on with real business- be something that pays the bills because that is what life is all about- I was taught. Therefore I did neither.

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    1. Well, yes, there was a time that I wasn't sure if I wanted to do art because that's what I wanted or because I was expected to. But that's not why I quit trying to paint. Just didn't like it. Having grown up in a house full of art it always shocks me when I go in someone's house with no art. This country really has no appreciation for the arts or considers them essential. And art and music is the first thing that gets cut in schools, gotta fund the sports ya know.

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  7. Well, it's beautiful and I like it. I can name all the parts! That is high praise.

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    1. Sky, trees, and snow. At least it's recognizable.

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  8. Good god, watercolor is the hardest painting there is (IMHO). It seems you have the hang of it. I never could, as overworking is my middle name. Sounds like we had similar fathers, although, even after promoting art as the most wonderful aspect of human striving, my father was horrified when I wanted to go to art school.

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    1. And so did you? Go to art school? I never graduated and didn't even have a clear direction. I have a small skill but don't have the hang of it by any means and those big trees are so overworked. And I knew it while I was doing it.

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  9. Your art training still shows in your paintings. That's much better than most of us could do, I'm sure! (Certainly better than I could do.) It's interesting that your father was so focused on helping you become an artist. Most parents of artists want their kids to do something more "practical."

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    1. Well, he did expect me to have something more practical to fall back on but nothing ever interested me as a career. I just had one little retail job after another until I stumbled on the etched glass.

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  10. I love your painting! Excellent job on the snow - the whole scene really, but the snow is excellent. I always say that I don't have an artistic bone in my body. I can follow a crochet pattern, but that's almost more a math thing than an art thing (as is evidenced by my tendency to make color choices that I end up hating).

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    1. Maybe you don't consider it artistic but you definitely have a talent. And color is hard. 40 + years of etched glass had no color. It wasn't until I started doing the pate de verre that I started using color and I still make bad choices.

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  11. The snow scene looks good. I have always wanted to learn to do abstract painting, big ones. I think that ship has sailed.

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    1. The ship is still at the dock waiting for you. Just have to start. Find a class and play.

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  12. I love your watercolors. I suppose you had to choose painting on your own, and using your own medium. But how wonderful to grow up steeped in art the way you did, and then to find your own way into it, through your beautiful etched glass works, and now painting. Your snowscape doesn't look overworked to me.

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    1. Etched glass, the big architectural work we did, was physically demanding, which I guess a lot of art is, sculpture. And the cast glass is an expensive medium to work in. Now all my equipment that I use for finishing is old as am I so watercolor is more accessible at this point. Plus, it's something new. A new challenge, something new to learn. And isn't that the key to staying 'young', alert? Learning new stuff.

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  13. It seems your dad was about painting the way my mom was about knitting and needle arts. She was a consummate knitter, knocking off fancy knitted dresses and Icelandic sweaters the way I make a peanut butter sandwich. She tried and tried to interest me, but the interest and skill just wasn't there. I could cast on, putting the first row on a needle, but after that I couldn't visualize what should come next, and I finally was smart enough to walk away. On the other hand, when I got a computer and then began writing, she always asked why I insisted on "playing with that thing." I had wanted to be an English major in college, but I didn't want to teach, and everyone in my life convinced me that English (and, by extension, writing) wasn't "practical." So, social work it was.

    Now, I spend my days doing manual labor and my nights writing or processing photos, and I'm perfectly content with that -- although I have to be on the lookout for my own over-working tendencies.

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    1. Yes, I was supposed to develop an interest in 'something practical' as a backup but I never did. We were supposed to have a plan for further education and job/career development when we graduated high school. Remember school guidance counselors who were supposed to help us identify and develop an interest? When I graduated, I had no plan, no interest, no freaking idea what I was going to do. And then I stumbled on etched glass.

      I love manual labor. Totally opposite from my father who was fond of saying they didn't make tools to fit his hand.

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  14. You take your art work seriously, while for your parents and maybe even that friend of your parents it may have been something flimsier, a hobby, a form of socialising, certainly not related to earning hard cash. This watercolour has come out well, it looks like winter, it has that silent landscape atmosphere.

    My daughter found herself with a choice of being accepted into art school and university doing sociology, political science and English and she hovered back and forth for a couple of weeks between becoming "an artist with a strong sense of political history and language" and "a bilingual sociologist who can draw really well" and she opted for the latter mainly because to her it seemed less time consuming at the time.

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    1. It's a shame that people are discouraged from pursuing art as a career as if it's somehow less worthy. (And for my parent's friend Jack, that was his career, all he ever did and he did finally get some recognition after he died but isn't that the way for most artists?). It's not an easy career. You don't just make it, you have to market it and promote yourself, something I wasn't that great at doing. And as an artist, at least in my experience, you never know from month to month how much money you're going to have. Most people can't live like that so they give it up for a steady job or else they have a spouse with a good steady job. I foolishly convinced my husband to quit his job at the steel factory and come be an artist with me. But we made it work. We didn't mind the uncertainty.

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I opened my big mouth, now it's your turn.