Sunday, April 25, 2010

Reading

Susan Rothenberg, in an interview, says that she spends 90% of her time in the studio reading. Back when I was neck-deep in my thesis project, a friend recommended the P.J. O'Brien series of 20-some novels, which carried me through that process.

So I'm curious. Are there other Blackfishers who read as part of your art-making project - either for relaxation/escape or as part of your source material? And what do you read?

I'm drawn to long novels or series that I can get totally immersed in. I've read the O'Brien series twice and will probably do it again in a couple of years. Dickens is good, and Austen too. Lately I've begun the Your Face Tomorrow trilogy, but it is much slower-going.

Sometimes poetry is like a welcome blast of cold air clearing out the cobwebs, as effective as a run around the block - Christian Wiman, William Stafford, William Meredith, Mary Oliver. Lately I've started Wiman's book, Ambition and Survival - On Becoming a Poet. Reading about someone else's creative process is usually pretty instructive, and writers are better at describing it than visual artists are.

If you have favorite books and authors, please - share!

Saturday, April 24, 2010

Blog

Blog test!! After much e-angst in getting set up (thank you, Mario, for your patience and perseverance), perhaps I'm blogging at Blackfish?

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Welcome JoEllyn to the Blackfish Blog

I hope the two of us can start an art dialog that others at the gallery will join. We as out of town members miss the impromptu visits to the gallery. Because of this I think we miss the chance to interact with other artists other than at the monthly meetings.

Perhaps the blog can be used as a platform of what's going on in our studios, what we are thinking about as we work, and what goals we set for ourselves. I'm not sure how we could handle a studio critique, but maybe we could post an image and invite comments.

These past couple of weeks, I who am a oil/brush purist, discovered the small rollers at the hardware store. I have been rolling on layers upon layers of color on about 8 canvases. I'm not sure where this will lead, but the Colorfield experience has, so far, been quite satisfying.