Deep Day

Deep Day
Watercolor, 8 x 9 inches
Nunjabi Book I

I pulled out my archives for a buyer over the weekend. As she was looking through paintings, I did, too. I was drawn to the paintings with happy, cloudy blue skies like Roll, Landscape 2, Landscape 4, and Landscape 5. I decided that it's high time to bring that theme back around.

At first glance, my first thought was "Pretty!"

It's good to get away from certain conventions when they begin to feel habitual. However, it's great to learn that some conventions feel like home and that you can go home again.

I predict more happy skies ahead.
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Signals

Signals
Watercolor, 8 x 9 inches
Nunjabi Book I

My first title for this painting was Puff. That was until I stepped away from it and came back. (Always a good idea.) Looking at the painting again with fresh eyes, I immediately recognized smoke signals.

Just like these posts with my paintings, smoke signals are a form of visual communication transmitted over long distances. The difference is that smoke signals are one of the earliest forms of communication in recorded history.

Smoke signals have been used in war time along the Great Wall of China, by Australian Aborigines to indicate their presence in foreign territory, for marine timekeeping in South Africa, as community information by the Yaghan people at the bottom of South America, by the Vatican (still) to indicate the election of a new pope, and by the North American Native Americans.

Each Native American tribe had a particular system of signals and meanings.

In 150 BC, the Greek historian, Polybius developed a cryptographic system of alphabetical smoke signals later adapted by the Japanese and Germans during World War I.

Now that this painting is finished, I can meditate on what it's trying to tell me. Can you read these signals?

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Wave

Wave
Watercolor, 8 x 9 inches
Nunjabi Book I

So, here's what I think we should do:

Put on some Antonio Carlos Jobim.
Pour a tall glass of lemonade with a sprig of mint.
Climb into a hammock under a shady tree
by a crystal flowing stream,
where birds are sweetly twittering,
and the breeze is fresh and clear.

Where is this place?

If you know, please tell me. I need to move some place with fresh air!

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Jemez Foray

Jemez Foray
Watercolor, 8 x 9 inches
Nunjabi Book I

It's hot as hell here and the air is sulphurous, toxic, disgusting. I'm dreaming of clean air and open skies.

Although I'm continuing with this Nunjabi book project right through till the last page, I'm discovering that the quality and surface of each page varies considerably. Which affects my painted entries considerably. This one is crude but relatively acceptable.

Ah, well... if it ain't one thing it's another!

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As above, so below

As above, so below
Watercolor, 8 x 9 inches
Nunjabi Book I

As I worked on the field of sky in this painting, my mind kept chanting, "As above, so below. As above, so below." Well, I thought, there's the title!

I can't remember when I used to regularly hear this phrase... was it my mother? My husband? Whoever it was that repeated it, whenever that was, it was often and during a formative phase. The phrase has stuck with me. And I'm glad. Cause it's true.

As above, so below

"The quote is one of the seven principles of Hermeticism. Briefly, it tells us that things which appear to be very different have attributes that are actually quite similar. It also tells us that by studying one thing we can learn about something else. That, for example, is exactly what statistical samples are all about. By examining a small portion of a population, a determination can be made as to what those same attributes are for the entire population." —John V

I cannot speak to statistics (thank god), but having worked in a number of different fields and expressive forms, I can say with absolute certainty that by studying one thing, I have learned about something else.

This is the beauty of breadth in education. The non-specialized mind becomes able to draw unusual analogies and build bridges to new solutions that are truly "outside the box."
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Blue Falls

Blue Falls
Watercolor, 12 x 12 inches

I've decided that I'd be out of my mind to work on a watercolor while finishing up last minute business for the maiden voyage of my Basic Drawing + Watercolor Online Course.

I'm working away to make it a sea worthy journey and am very pleased with the results! I hope the students will thing the same thing! This first course is sold out and I have 6 people on the waiting list for September! I am so excited! Also have two full crews coming into the studio on Saturday for a four week session, so...

I'm posting this demo that I made at an expo in mid-May. Too large to scan, the colors are a bit cooler than in real life but hell if I'm going to start fiddling with color on the computer!

I'm going to pop a pizza in the oven and watch Masterpiece Theater.

Good night!

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