Salt of the Earth

I finished my butterfly print today. i think i like it- for the most part. I think that I may make the bottom butterfly a little darker- but I’m not sure yet. from the pictures I took today, you can’t tell the difference in color.

the name of the picture is The awakening. it is my self portrait. it is the explanation of my life in the last year. the rest is pretty self explanatory.

Talked to my teacher today- she’s so awesome. She gave me a lot of really good advice and guidance for my future. She also told me that i was a big source of energy for her- happy energy and that she really appreciated me and enjoyed my presence in her classes. She said a bunch of other stuff too that made me all teary eyed. I wanted to thank her for not only giving me my wings, but the ability to fly. i wanted to tell her that in my self portrait , she was the flames in my wings. but i just couldn’t. I knew i would cry if i said that out loud. it’s too deep for me. i feel my awakening so strongly now. I’ll tell her someday. but i kind of think she already knows.

T

this is from my journal from last fall…..

November 3rd, 2005
….. my art classes are still going well. I find that things are so beautiful to me now. The leaves. The fall leaves just move me. It’s like something I’ve never seen before-something I’ve never experienced. The colors almost look unreal to me-they are so magnificent. I collect them everyday because some how I want to capture their beauty- hold on to how they make me feel when I see them. I love the fall. I love this fall. I loving feeling the feeling that fall makes me feel right now. I don’t know how to even explain what I feel lately. I sit in my drawing class and everything just clicks for me. The human form, the music, drawing beauty-experiencing beauty like i never have before. There are moments when I am drawing and I have that deep feeling that I am getting it and i am almost drawn to tears. I don’t know why. I’m not sad. I’m moved. But i don’t know how to explain it. It’s not depression because I don’t feel down. I just feel deep……..

This is my favorite one-

Mick liked this one.

i will upload the rest into my photo some time soon. Paper remains undone. BUT i got a lot of baking done today.

T

So my teacher ‘reminded’ us today that midterms are on Thursday….. MIDTERMS??? How the heck did that sneak up on me??? I thought it was NEXT week. So tonight and tomorrow will be spent getting my portfolio ready for life drawing, writing a paper and pulling 4 completed prints. My portfolio needs to have 10 completed drawings from class- each fulfilling a certain criteria. PLUS I need to finish drawing the skeleton and muscle overlay… BLAH BLAH BLAH…. I can’t remember the topic for the paper, and I lost the paper telling what it was supposed to be about. I highly doubt I’ll do it because I hate writing papers, especially for an art class. I did all this stuff the first time around. This time, i just want to do art. I am considering writing a paper on a topic of my choice. Knowing my art teacher-she’ll be fine with it. We’ll see.

Printmaking was good today. My teacher gave me a one on one and it was awesome. She helped me mix the yellow ink for the tips of the flames. So I pulled 4 prints with just the yellow. Then tried to get my second color done before I had to go. Only got a couple done. tried to do the second color, green, done on my own. UGH!!! it turned out so so. Not nice like my yellow- but ok. I wasn’t as happy with it. The color was fabulous! The consistency was so so. It didn’t turn out the way I wanted to. BUT it’s my first one….. My teacher told me that I was a born printmaker-and by the end of the course I’ll be teacher HER and the class! ha ha ha I admit, i DO love printmaking and feel like it’s my ‘thang’ but I don’t know if I am anywhere near ‘teaching the teacher!”

I’m a bit frustrated with Life Drawing. I don’t feel like I’m making a lot of progress and I don’t really like anything I’ve done so far this term. The class is different- it’s the second in the series and it’s less drawing human form and more drawing freaking skeletons. I’m just in a drawing funk. My teacher reassure me that I’m doing really well- BAH! I don’t see it.

Oh yeah, the nosey lady was good today. Just have to keep it all in perspective.

Off to my easel
T

My tolerance for stupid people gets lower by the day. I always thought that as I moved into my later thirties I’d gain maturity and more tolerance. That has not happened. Just the opposite. I’m not talking about people that don’t have an education- I’m talking ignorant, stupid people. I find that rolling my eyes at them brings some satisfaction- but sometimes I find myself spewing out something rude to them or giving them a dirty look. I just can’t help it. A perfect example is the girl in my art class with her annoying pencil sharpener. The teacher was giving us directions today and she started sharpening her pencil for the 3rd time- totally drowning out the teacher with the obnoxious sound of grating wood. So i did an exaggerated head roll to her and lifted my arms up giving the physical gestures of “what the hell is wrong with you?” I was happy to see that I was NOT alone in my disgust as half the class turned and glared at her. Then in my printmaking class there is this girl who always sets her stuff down on in my space while she talks to her friend who sits next to me (usually happens when I get up to get a tool). Today she set her stuff on my wood block- causing me to go into full “what the hell” mode. ( the board is very expensive and can get damaged very easily. AND we are talking about my flaming butterflies here! ) So I sat back down and pushed her stuff off into the middle of the table and said ‘can you keep your crap off my wood block’? Then I did that cringe and silently said “D’OH I said that out loud”. She apologized and then 10 minutes later did the same thing to the girl on the other side of me. (bad move-cause that girl has a serious temper). See—pure stupidity. Other than that I had a really good day in art class. Good model in life drawing and started carving in printmaking. This weekend is full of homework- but it will all be good and I’m excited to do it. I can’t even say how fulfilled this art makes me feel because I’ve never felt this before. it’s awesome. Thinking of turning it into some kind of profession…

T

wow it’s already Saturday. I can’t believe it. This week flew by. Being back in school certainly makes time fly. I went in to do my studio lab time yesterday (4 hours required per class a week) and ran some ideas by my teacher for my butterfly composition. I racked my brain the whole night before and make several NEW drawings. I showed her my new ideas and she loved them. We worked out a composition using 3 butterflies changing in size and ascending from the grass into the sky. As we were discussing the composition of this piece I asked her why she was having me do something so complex for a first year. She flat out told me she isn’t treating me as a first year but as a more experienced artist to whom she is introducing a new medium to. She also said that she thought i had a lot of potential that hasn’t been discovered and that her plan was to tap into that. Exact words, ” …and I am going to tap REALLY hard….” So i laughed and said “oh, so that’s why i don’t get to do a tear drop umbrella or a star with my initials” and she laughed. As if my head wasn’t big enough she then told me that she had noticed that my figure drawings had GREATLY improved over the break- like it just ‘clicked’ with me. THAT news alone made me SO happy. There is so much satisfaction and joy in knowing that you are becoming good at something you love doing. Something you’ve always wanted to be good at. The other good news I got yesterday was that if I take Life Drawing and Printmaking for one more term then next year I can take independent studies in both- and only pay for 1 credit in each class. (paying for 6 now) THAT news is so good. My teacher said she doesn’t want me to stop doing either of these and that is why she is offering me this wonderful opportunity to continue without draining the bank account.

well, i have a baby shower to go to so i better get dressed.
T