Whimsical Paintings

The nice thing about Twitter is the ease of following links put up by the people you follow, a kind of free-and-easy process that doesn't have any strings attached or demand more time than you have to give. The artist Justin Vining is one of those young, high-energy Twitterers who posts links to art-related things with a frequency I find amazing. I seldom have enough time to investigate them.

This morning, however, I got up at 5 a.m. in anticipation of an early morning meeting with customers in the cookery. Had time for my usual coffee and browsing the news on the laptop, but very little news was posted that early. So I went to Twitter and looked at all the recent links posted by the people I follow, and came across Justin's link to Whimsical Paintings . This site is very new, and so far consists of a partial page of thumbnail images which link to the artists' websites. Yet I recognized some kindred spirits there, and immediately made arrangements to list with it, the first time I have ever felt compelled to do this sort of thing. The organizer only asks for reciprocal linking or mention in a blog, which is what I am doing in this post.

But it is not the only purpose of this post. Something is happening in my artist-head over the past few weeks, which is the realization that my art is gaining its own identity. This is quite different than having one's own identity as an artist. I am experiencing a sort of wonderment at how different and yet natural it is. Looking forward to exploring more genre sites and seeing where it all leads....

Bird Watching

This is a painting I'd started a year ago, then stopped because I wasn't quite sure what to do next with it. It remained in it's tentative, watercolory state. Lately I have been painting with stronger, surer intent, yet having more fun with composition, and decided treat this painting as if it were just the first layers of something I'd do now.

The original had the same odd perspective, but the pedestrians were originally a shadowy couple rendered in blues. I recalled the composition was actually something from a dream, so ran with it, and let color-play feed the painting process. The blues were intensified, the shapes simplified; I discovered a bird-like quality to the shapes, which I then emphasized. This painting got more fun to do as I worked.