From the Vault

My favorite color scheme should be pretty obvious by now. This 12x12 canvas came shortly after my father died. Seems fairly evident that the loss left me feeling like I was missing some parts of me; searching for those parts. Not sure that I have found them yet

Focused on red still? Or again? This is a 4x6 with the texture paste. The stencil is my own design, cut from thick mylar. I love it. But the next time I use it I will go with the blue stuff. It is thinner and I think will leave me with cleaner edges when using the paste. It needs another paste object in the bottom right corner for balance.

I really like this tree. It is a bit cartoony in this version. But the roots have that swirly curly character that was my almost "Signature" style in school. And obviously yellow is a bit of a departure from the norm.









The pictures are a bit washed out. That is due to the lack of proper photographic lighting and a small basement window by which to take pictures. Will remedy that soon. I wanted to get these up so that I could keep a discovery journal while unpacking the boxes downstairs.
 

Artifact Box 4

This was the last thing on the table when I was told to leave. I'd been playing with texture paste and my own hand cut stencils (I know. But you have to suck it up and cut your own when the commercial brands don't have what you want.) for a while. What with the intense focus on earthen vessels and jars of clay could be better than a material that could easily pass for actual clay? So why not? So I did.

It takes a long time for this stuff
to dry.I think that this particular
canvas spent four days curing
before I ever applied paint to it.
The tricky thing with this is to
remember to keep things in the
proper perspective. Which, looking
with a somewhat distant eye now,
I see I did not quite make muster.

There is the same left-side-right-side
issue with my perspective. And the
lip of the rim is not foreshortened
enough. That being said though...

I absolutely LOVE the texture and
color of the mid-section of the jar. It
looks like it has a well worn patina...
exactly what I was going for. And I
worked in come cool compliments
so that the whole color scheme didn't get bogged down or become boring.

Man I hope that color scheme isn't boring. Now I am not too sure how I am going to finish the background. That was a schmear of raw sienna and some other yellow and lifted with plastic wrap. Of course I need to lay in some shadow colors and punch up the background. And some kind of embellishment, handwriting and maybe some high gloss finish.

This is a close up shows the colors.
All the colors were dry brushed. The
first layers were matte base colors.
Next came several shades of Lumiere.

Four days of curing turned out to be
the key to getting good paint layers
down. I had to use a runny wash
to do the body of the vessel
so that it would streak and look
like the jar had been overfilled
frequently.

Not sure how to finish this. Like I
said it was on the table drying
when I was told to leave. I packed
up an got out like it was Volcano
Day in Pompeii.
Fortunately I had never completely
unpacked when I moved in.
Uncovering the canvas feels a lot like I've dug through the ashin that famed city and found the remnants of someone's last day.

And in the timeline of my life it was a last day for
me. I am the artist and I should be able to finish it. Yet there is something in me that says it belongs in the past and should be left as it is. A testimony to a time and place that does not exist.

More from Artifact Box 4 & 5

Box 4 yielded other treasures. A cache of unopened canvases with a few partial gems tucked in. But it was Box 5 that yielded the most treasure. I wish that I had time to upload everything. I have company coming and still have to run an errand before they come. And I don't know now if I am ready for company. I'd rather just sit and stare and indulge the feelings in my body right now.

My maternal Grandfather, Alfred and his wives. Gramma Ada, my mother's mother is in the green frame. And Gramma Olive is in silver. Gramma Olive is the one I knew. She and Grampa married when they were 71. I was a little more than 1. If anyone has to wonder where my Bohemian traits come from it is Grammas Ada & Olive. Gramma Ada died before I was born. From pictures I see that we have the same tastes in jewelry and color. Gramma Olive was a rebel. Grampa was the smartest person that I know and that seemed to trickle down to my cousins with a brief visit to me and my sister. Of course most all Gerbstadts in the world are PhDs and rocket scientists.... no kidding. I will grant you my sister an cousins did more to monetize their cranial gifts than I have. I rather like to be a curiosity. And Gramma Olive encouraged that.

The bloke on the right is my dad at graduation. Simple, hard working and a quiet thinker, Dad was one of those people who put one foot in front of the other and always came out okay.

Yep... my heart hurts a lot right now. I am rather terrified to go through life without them behind me. When it wasn't safe I could go to any one of them. If I couldn't see far enough down a chosen path, they stood a little taller with their experience and told me what was ahead. I need that right now. There are things that I need to do that some guidance and wisdom would make a bit less traumatizing. And I trust them implicitly. Other people... not so much. Someone is always looking to pull one over on each of us. And I don't want to go through that again. I can not stand not being able to trust.

But I don't. Burned too much, especially recently with people lying about me and purposefully trying to hurt me. And I haven't been allowed a defense. If I defend myself I risk my livelihood. I know the truth, straight from one conspirator's mouth. But no one wants to see the truth because the truth is hard and most people take the road that is well traveled and trampled.

I feel defenseless.
 
And I don't know where to find the protection or tools to defend myself and proceed.

Missing No More

I'd forgotten for a while that I had framed some of my work to put up in the last house I was in before dad died. Death does weird things to your brain. Anyway, I was looking for some things to sell to the antiques dealer when I found a box labled "DEC". I figured there would be good collectibles in there. Instead I found framed artwork.

Among my pieces I found a Muscha reproduction, courtesy of Matt. And this:

framed Freesia with reflection.