Merry Christmas!

Hydrangea, Window

Check in daily to Art Weekly for an iPad Advent Calendar! Each post will feature one or more of my artworks done on the iPad using the apps Brushes, Sketchbook Pro, Inspire Pro, Art Studio, or Type Drawing.

iPad Advent Calendar

Hand and Flower Petals

Check in daily to Art Weekly for an iPad Advent Calendar! Each post will feature one or more of my artworks done on the iPad using the apps Brushes, Sketchbook Pro, Inspire Pro, Art Studio, or Type Drawing.

Don't Be Afraid to Be Vibrant

oil on panel
20" x 16"

Vibrancy in this case, to me, means to be full of life. The painting is about being unafraid to be one's best; to be one's best self without worrying about how one measures up to someone else, nor to worry about outshining anyone. It is about existing outside of someones shadow. Sometimes being one's best means standing out, not conforming. Geoffrey Canada, director of the Harlem Children's Zone, said in an interview with Terry Gross (Fresh Air) that part of a students' success depends on cultural attitudes changing: for academic success to be seen as cool, not as joining the establishment.

The artist Ben Shahn said that conformity was a failure of hope, belief, and rebellion.

To be one's best for one's self-fulfillment, to really live and pursue what makes one truly happy is a calling. The journey and answers are different for each of us. The flowers are together in one vase, in one situation, but there are a variety, needing different amounts of space to flourish.

After painting this, the Unitarian Church I go to had a similar theme for the day. We were encouraged to strive and celebrate life, to do what I just described without being distracted by glitz or the many forms of escapism available. If we all have the courage, the hope needed to pursue our best selves, to encourage others in this pursuit, we will all be lifted up. Sunflowers filled the altar and at the end of the service we were all invited to pick one up, return to our seats and hold them up together.

For You, It's Love!

20" x 16"

oil on panel

If I could distill my childhood into one image it might be this one. My grandmother's favorite flower was lily of the valley. We had them in the backyard and after she died my grandfather would pick them for me, as well as other flowers from the garden. Her name was Lillian and his Mundy, a nickname, as he was born at 11:59 on a Monday night and his twin at 12:01 on a Tuesday. My grandparents called each other "Pest" and I remember him being scolded for tasting tomato sauce on the stove from the cooking spoon. Even though I was six when my grandmother died, her warning to him regarding other women was etched in my brain, "You can look, but don't touch." She died on their anniversary at fifty-five and he missed her ever after.

It is his hand in the painting, a construction worker's hand, so much bigger than mine and so familiar. We lived together and when I was a little girl I held it whenever we went places together, which was often. The hand is painted in a way that shows human suffering; its mass is in contrast to the delicate flower. There were thirteen children in his Italian first-generation family. His younger sister was run over by a trolley in front of their home at the age of five, and his twin brother died of a burst appendix at fifteen. My grandfather always said that his brother was the smarter one and neater, describing the way Bobby parted his hair just so with his comb. A picture of the two of them when they were about five shows them with their arms around each other, my grandfather easy to spot with his tongue sticking out. After those deaths, my grandfather was the youngest. I think he always missed the noise of living in such a full house and maybe tried to make up for it by being so loud himself. As the only grandchild, I was the apple of his eye and I have never heard anyone introduced with more pride than when he introduced me as his "little granddaughter". I can't remember even one time when he wanted me to leave him alone. As a parent, it strikes me as rather remarkable. The painting squeezes all this narration into one image with feeling, part memory, part personal icon. Without the back story, it is an allegory that small acts of tenderness matter.