The other day, I arrived at the studio, with several things in hand to unload. One of the casement windows had been open for a couple days, but the weather had turned a bit colder, so I thought, “I should shut that.” Then, in the corner of the room, I heard a small shuffling sound, and out popped a finch who promptly tried to make a run for one of the closed windows!
She could see there was an “outside”, but how to get to it? The golden leaves of the trees are just outside, since I am about 30 feet above the street level, and birds often perch on my wide stone windowsills. After trying to gently usher the poor confused thing in the general direction of the now two open windows, I decided to go down to the car for another load of stuff, leave the windows open as much as I could, and hope for the best.
When I returned a few minutes later, it seemed that nothing was skittering around behind the racks anymore, so fingers crossed, I assumed it had gone home, and cranked the windows closed again.
Well that explained the bird poop spots on my floor!
When not chasing wildlife around my work environment, I have started two new pieces, shown below. It’s interesting that I got comments about the blue one when it was in an even sketchier preliminary state, that it looked “finished.”
I’m not sure what that means to some casual viewers… perhaps that it is lively and fresh? they they can see a picture or image and that is sufficient? not sure – should have asked. My response was that it didn’t have nearly enough density or history yet to feel substantial, and that may or may not make sense to someone wandering around on a First Friday. The concept of “thin” has many connotations in painting, like the literal layers of paint, a prematurely short conversation with problems suggested by the painting…
I also keep lots of different drawings, worked over photocopies, and sometimes notes to myself on the walls to keep me on track about what intrigued me enough to begin something.
and now that it is getting cold – the city has turned off the water in the spitting fountains outside, and the squealing crowds have also left, which makes concentrating a tad easier.
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