Thankful for Monet

So here we are, I have finally gotten around to writing about Monet. I still haven't finished the book, but I don't think I can put it off any longer. I'll never finish it if the planning of writing a post about remains stuck in my head. In fact, I might finish sooner because I'm looking at his paintings and remembering what I have learned about Claude Monet and how much I love the water lilies and the paintings of his Camille and his son, Jean. It really makes you feel as if you knew him. You can see his wife through his eyes, see the way he portrays his son and how he saw the world.

I really enjoy his paintings of the sea and the wooded setting of his Luncheon on the Grass. But the book Claude & Camille: A novel of Monet by Stephanie Cowell, really gets into the struggles of the artist in his artistic and his personal life. Anyone can relate to this, artistic or not. It's about doing what you love but no one appreciating it or knowing what to make of it. Monet struggles throughout the book financially and spends what little money he has, and the money his friends give him, buying painting supplies and (later on) lovely things for his wife and child.

Everyone knows that feeling, having almost no money to your name but what you do have you use to survive and continue your work and treat those you care for as much as you're able. It's a horribly, tragic life. Especially when looking back at those who are now house hold names, are being talked about in history books and have paintings being gazed at in museums. Monet and others works were once almost worthless or unappreciated, but now their priceless. It gives many artists hope for their own careers to take off, to become someone in the world. Not everyone can be published in books or be featured artists, but everyones art should be appreciated. I may never sell a painting in my life, but if someone just appreciated it and saw it for what it was then that is enough.

A professor at my university takes the viewpoint that art isn't about the product, it's about the process. It really is a transformation that you undergo when you creative something. Monet knew all about that. He developed through his paintings and then was able to let go of them whether to customers or to a gallery to be displayed. Granted, his financial situation also propelled that release of his work in some ways, but it was also his artistic maturity that allowed him to do so as well.

I don't believe I am that mature yet to just paint for the experience and that metamorphosis of mind and soul. There are others that feel the same, I'm sure. The feeling of attachment to their work holding them back or maybe a perfectionist attitude that their work is never finished and can never be sold if it isn't finished. Maybe some are like me where they have their favorites and don't want to let them go, but there are other pieces that have been experienced but the fear of rejection is holding them back.

Maybe we all need to be brave like Monet. He went out and asked customers and galleries if they were interested in what he had and he was rejected over and over again. He persisted and kept on painting without the knowledge that later it would pay off.

That is the best part I think. Even though he had so much hardship and faced so much rejection he never gave up. He always survived, whether is was in his work or his relationships, he prevailed. I don't know if his story is a happy ever after or not, but it's like that of painting: it's not the product, it's about the process. During this time of Thanksgiving, that's what I'm thankful for. The processes of life that build us no matter the end result and the hope to later understand those processes more.

TWLOHA- Love is the Movement

Away from all about me, me, and more me, yesterday (11/12/10) was To Write Love On Her Arms Day. If you don't know what it is, it's an organization that has made it their mission to help people that self mutilate or harm themselves, through cutting or otherwise. Their story is an amazing one, trully inspiring. I can't describe as well as the organization does, so here's their story.


"To Write Love on Her Arms is a non-profit movement dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide. TWLOHA exists to encourage, inform, inspire and also to invest directly into treatment and recovery.

To Write Love On Her Arms Day is a day where anyone can write the words love on their arms, to support those who are fighting against depression and those who are trying to recovering. On this day, just write love on your arms, and show it off, other people will ask why you have love written on your arms, and you tell them you are supporting to write love on her arms day, and how its benefiting a non profit organization helping stop depression, and make love the movement ♥"


Here's their website that tells even more about their vision and story:
http://www.twloha.com/vision/

Update

Here are some updated pictures of the pieces I've been working on, including a crooked test print from my intaglio print. They're a bit blurry because I dropped my camera and haven't gotten it fixed or another camera, so this is with my web cam.

So I've been getting out of my artist funk lately by doing a series of Native American/Western style pieces. I'm in a printmaking class currently so it has been occupying all my time, but I'm using this theme with my work in there. Nevertheless, I do have canvases that will be painted! Also, I have finished the orange and red piece (which now needs a title) and the acrylic under painting for the mountain piece. I know it sounds like I'm not doing much, but if you could see my printmaking stuff and look in my sketchbooks then you would see that's where my work and planning is dwelling for the moment.

I do have a commission from a friend of mine from high school that's getting married in the spring, so I am planning that out as well. It will be a watercolor of the interior of a very old, grandiose stairway inside a somewhat medieval looking mansion/castle/building. I'm so excited because it's my first commission!

Still no Monet, maybe over Thanksgiving? Yes. Thanksgiving I will finally post about Monet.
See you all then, if not before.

Some Days are Tougher than Others

If you've ever read, or are familiar with, Anne Rice's "The Vampire Lestat," there is a part where Lestat and Marius discuss the importance of burying oneself in the earth for periods of time. Apparently, sometimes vampires need to "go down into the earth" as if they die, and then later they rise again, like an escape from the world leading to being reborn. I won't go into the details of the book, it just popped into my mind today. Because I thought I understood this conversation they had when I first read it a few months ago, but now I'm living it. Artists must return to the earth in a sense from time to time to survive, as vampires do. This comparison is not to say that all artists, myself, or vampires are depressing or "goth" or whatever. Nor do they have to be misunderstood or morbid or anything of that nature. It's just that there are periods an artist goes through where times get tough and they need to/want to break away, return to the earth.
Sometimes you feel discouraged, that's true for any passion or career I think. But art is different. You can't quit art. Despite school systems that cut art and music programs and recessions that leave artists hopeless, it prevails. This is why I propose the idea of going back to the earth when I am discouraged. I continue to draw and paint and go to my art classes, but inside I'm under the soil. I'm renewing and regaining the courage to keep on keeping on. It's rough out there, so sometimes you just need to step back and put some things on hold.
When Lestat went into the earth for the first time, he didn't stop being a vampire. Even though he didn't give in to his thirst, he stepped away, went on a holiday of sorts. And when he came back, he was indeed back. That's what I think artists need to do to survive, get away. You won't stop being an artist, but you'll come back refreshed, possibly better. It's natural to do this I think. It may even go against nature to not do so. Hopefully I'm not the only one that's felt like going back to the earth, otherwise my discouragement might be more serious than originally thought.

Back to School

It's been awhile since I've posted anything, but there's really not much going on unfortunately. Still haven't finished the book, but I have started a new painting! I've been getting ready for my classes to start back up again. You know how it is. Textbooks, clothes, scholarships and financial things. I'm also the president of the Art Club so there's meetings and list making for upcoming events. I promise I'll get around to posting about Monet! but in the meantime, here is the painting I worked on. It's only the background and I think I'm going to put a silhouette of a tree on it. A weeping willow or a tree in the fall without it's leaves. Let me know what you think and hopefully I'll have an updated picture of this one and the other one up soon, maybe even a new one too!

Monet to Come

I haven't posted so far this week because I have yet to finish the book I'm reading about Monet. Since I posted the preface last time I wanted this post to be about an artist, so I'll hold off until I get around to it.
Besides that, I haven't been too creative lately. I have done a few little things, just not what I should be working on. So I'll be finishing that and work more on painting this next week so I'll actually have something to talk about in the next post.

Words to Ponder

Originally, I was going to talk about an artist that I look to for inspiration or that I admire, but I just started reading The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde so I feel the need to post something about it. I've only read the preface and a few pages, but the preface really stuck with me. And it's rare that I genuinely enjoy a preface, especially one whose words actually hit you with a deeper meaning, so I thought I'd share it and talk about an artist another time. Enjoy.

"The artist is the creator of beautiful things.
To reveal art and conceal the artist is art's aim.
The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.
The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography.
Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.
Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope.
They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only beauty.
There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book.
Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.
The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.
The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass.
The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true can be proved.
No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style.
No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything.
Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art.
Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art.
From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor's craft is the type.
All art is at once surface and symbol.
Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril.
Those who read the symbol do so at their peril.
It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital.
When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself.
We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.
All art is quite useless." -Oscar Wilde

Struggling

So I had planned on blogging once a week but since the first post was an introduction of sorts I’m going to “officially” blog for this week.

Before I jump right into what I really what to talk about, I thought I’d explain a little about the way I paint and a bit about the thought put into it so that you get a general idea of what’s going on. I usually like to paint landscapes, I do draw figures but they’re usually stylized (non-realistic), and my subject is more about imagining and displaying my own little world and attaching an emotion to it. My work is usually kind of flat so I use layers and overlapping to create depth and I like outlining everything in black to represent shadows and using white to help model the shapes. I also have some free form, organic shapes hanging or floating in the skies of a few pieces. The idea behind that is from when you’re a little kid and you lie on your back and make shapes out of the clouds. I just take shapes and create a puzzle type set up in the sky. It’s something I’m experimenting with and that I like in some of the paintings.

That being said, I’ve been working on ideas for pieces to submit to a scholarship, maybe even my senior exhibition when the time comes, and I’m struggling a little with the piece I’m working on now. It’s not that I don’t like it, but it’s not exactly what I envisioned. Granted, none of my pieces have ever worked out exactly how I imagine them to and I love them because of it. But this time I don’t have other people in the studio or my professor to give me feedback and tell me why it’s more “eh…” than “ah!” I’m hoping it’s just in the ugly phase of the process but I’m also worried that it may just be better to start over while I still can. It is on a smaller canvas than I would like because I’m trying to save money and work with what I have for now. I have canvas and gesso so I just need to buy some stretcher bars, I’m just concerned that if I try and stretch the canvas myself it will be too much for me and it’ll buckle or snap or be too loose, yadda yadda. The canvas isn’t too bothersome though so long as the finished product comes out looking like what I’m thinking it will. Also, I’m just laying out color blocks in acrylic and will use oil paint on top of that later, but it still seems a bit off to me. So here’s a picture of what I have so far and please tell me what you think is going on with this piece.

Trying Something New

Do you like art? Do you maybe not understand art? Do you really not get art? Are you an aspiring artist like me? Do you sometimes feel as lost as I do? Well, hopefully you gave some kind of answer to these because this is why I'm here. My name is Valerie Mills and I'm a young, aspiring artist hoping to find support and feedback in this world of blogs, maybe even use this as a means to network. This space I intend to use for talking about what I experience in my artwork, talk about artists that have or will inspire me, and maybe help out some people that don't really see what the big deal is about paint on a canvas. I plan on updating once a week with something about an artist, my work, any art related events that comes to my attention, or just being an art nerd and going on and on about my favorite color to paint with. As for comments and feedback, I highly encourage them and would love to read anything you have to say, whether you love it or hate it -especially if it's about my pieces (which I hope to post at some point in the future) or about an artist that deserves some attention. I'm pretty new at this, so as time goes on if I get a following of people that want more than a weekly post, then I might make a Facebook page specifically for this purpose. Maybe even a Q&A type thing using twitter to ask me question and me to ask you. Until then, feel free to email me and let me know what you think about what I have going on and the ideas, etc.