manifesto monday : art, homesick, & music

over the weekend ceej and i headed into the city to see a special exhibit at the de Young...they had paintings on loan from the musee d'orsay: renoir, van gogh, cezanne, gauguin, seurat, sargent, and so many more. unfortunately for this exhibit there was no photography {or even sketching!} allowed. so we tried to soak every stroke into our brains while elbowing our way through crowds wearing earphones. some of those paintings really pull you in, and pull on your heart in a way you've never known.

once we felt we saw every painting sufficiently we moved through the rest of the museum. i love going to museums i've never been to before. i get excited to find paintings that weren't in my art history books that stop my heart in its beating tracks. we slowly walked from room to room, most of them quite empty as most people were only interested in the special exhibit. so nice to be able to really see the paintings without everyone else discussing paintings you want to experience for yourself upon a first face-to-face meeting.

into this room we came, and there was this wonderful painting : irving ramsay wiles' "the sonata." i was immediately swept off my feet...a combination of excited giddiness and a longing homesickness. i wanted to be in this painting wearing a whispy gown, anticipating the next song i would be playing with a sister. i felt like this scene was my scene...yet it has never happened to me before...but it was all happening in my mind and in my heart. after gazing at it, every second claiming more and more ownership to this moment, i asked {well, more like told} cj to paint a replica for me. i don't want a print. i want the paint strokes to be alive...and it will sit over our piano for me to gaze at and feel a wonderful yearning for something that never happened to me, though my soul is quite convinced it did indeed happen to me.

i am loving my new-found dedication to music...and in turn this is reigniting my passion for art. one of my brother's pointed out that once we start following the path we were meant to follow it is like riding a bike...it takes effort, but it is smooth and natural. this is how i feel about following music...it's wonderful to exert all my energy to something so rewarding and uplifting.

and i want to add that i disagree with mr. howe on one point...someday i will be playing good music in a beautiful gown with one of my sisters or perhaps my own mother, this is not just homesickness for something i will never have...it has made me homesick for something i will make happen...it has inspired me to create such wonderful memories.

this i believe.

doing my homework...

so remember how i was signing up for some classes?
writing and drawing?
well, i went to my first day of school on monday...
and after a quick visit to campus
i decided to drop those classes...
the students there didn't seem very interested in, well, school.

so i've created my own writing course.
i do my homework every day.
cj is my drawing teacher.
and i do my homework every day.

hip, hip for home school!

photos of my homework by me. august 2009.

many of you know that i like theme nights...it saves us from surfing the internet aimlessly, wasting away a perfectly good evening

tuesday & thursday nights are art nights at our house.

art can be:

painting, photography, music, etc.

oh, how we love art night!

cj painted last night.

i took a few photos...

mostly just to document art night

but i thought these photos were neat-o.

i spent most of art night

with my guitar, eleanor, learning how to play and sing new songs

my goal is to write two of my own songs next week.

i've only written three songs that i'm really proud of.

time to get some more!

we hung up some art last night too.

this is our friend's, mo's, art.

she is a fine, fine artist

and a fine, fine friend too.

mo is the kind of friend who laughs at your jokes, not because she's simply humoring you, but because she really enjoys good and bad jokes. mo's entire life is artistic. she's the most beautiful woman i know. dark hair and lovely features. she loves a good thrift store and wears cowboy shirts like a pro. she rides around on a yellow Honda 110. oh yes, and she definitely rocks...you should hear this girl sing. probably my most favorite song-writer too. it was her birthday yesterday. happy birthday, mo!

anyway, perhaps if you want to get away from your TV or internet at night you should try some theme nights. they make life interesting and productive. you always feel relaxed and good about yourself afterward.

hooray for art night!

i like art, of course, but who thought i'd ever enjoy a pop country concert?

saturday we had a birthday extravaganza for my mother-in-law.

i truly enjoyed visiting this art exhibit.

the painting above was one of my very favorites.

do you think someday i'll paint something this beautiful?

we shall see.

practice. practice. practice.

another favorite.

zina's mom is always a favorite.

never met her.

do you think you could arrange something, zina?

i mean, we are related.

after lots of art and lots of food

we headed up to deer valley.

it was oh so nice to get out of the heat and

into some clean mountain air.

now,

whenever someone asks me if i like country music

i make sure to say that i like "old" country music like:

johnny cash, john prine, nanci griffith, etc.

i do not like:

garth brooks, tim mcgraw, faith hill, etc.

so i was pleasantly surprised that i enjoyed

the night with

leann rimes.

she can rock...and i like that.


thanks, whittakers, for a good time!

monday manifesto: becoming like a child

i remember asking for art kits when i was very young...the nice rows of colored pencil, pastels, and chalk within a black book were oh so pretty to my 7-year-old eyes. those art kits were always on my birthday and christmas lists (along with a puppy and a pony, of course). i remember getting one. maybe i got more than one. but i would have liked to get even more than that, i'm sure.
my older sisters were artists. good ones too. they won awards, and i remember going to see them on display. i wanted more than anything to have them show me how to use color on a canvas...how to paint pretty things (probably a pony). but, they were soon busy with college and marriage. though i desparately wanted art lessons i tried to understand that my sisters were very busy women, carving out their futures and their own beautiful lives independent of family.
with my chance for free art lessons out of the house, i stopped drawing. i had forgotten all of this until yesterday.
yesterday cj gave me my first painting lesson. my first strokes like colors on a playground: blue, red, yellow, green. very simple. then i started mixing paint...not knowing what colors i would get. then i just started painting. why was i so shocked when i painted what i did?
it was a tree. with birds in the sky and grass on the ground. at first i thought i was drawing a tree because i love them more than anything. but as i continued painting and i realized exactly what i had done i was overcome with tears. i used to draw this scene all the time when i was young and hoping for art lessons: tree to the left side of the paper, m-shaped birds in the sky, blades of grass at the foot of the tree. i went right back to my 7-year-old self. i unkowingly picked up right where i had left off.
i cleaned out my brushes, watching the colors wash down the drain. cj showed me where everything goes when painting is over for the day. i stepped back into our "studio" and looked at my painting. i slowly walked over to ceej, gave him a hug, while still looking at my reddish tree against a greenish sky. its spirit brought my heart's tears through my eyes. i had to tell him. "i love my painting. i think it's really good." and i do. i am well aware that it is no great work of art, but i love it because i'm still painting my childhood beauty. trees. grass. birds. i'm going to frame it and hang it in my bedroom where i will awake each day to its simple beauty, and a reminder that i can do whatever my good dreams have shown me.
we often hear that we should become as little children because they are humble and meek. but i think that to become like a child also means to let go of fears, let go of judgement (especially of ourselves), and to put your heart out there. this i believe.

manifesto monday: artists

the first time i visited san francisco i was a senior in high school. our legendary art history teacher, cheryl hughes, arranged for a large group of students to travel there to see the art that that western city has to offer. i barely recall any of it...i was consumed with my first broken heart...unfortunately the heart-breaker was on the trip too. so, i was dealing with such heartache in the only way a high school girl knows how: i was acting tough, and went out of my way to pretend i was really enjoying myself. but a high-school relationship is not what i want to talk about. what i want to talk about is what little i do remember about the trip: a woman who was an artist...one that even non-art historians would recognize because she was that good.

georgia o'keefe. between my acting scenes on that trip nine years ago, we entered a museum with a greek-looking facade. white columns. measured to perfection. we were there to see her flowers (i had yet to learn to appreciate her deserts). have you ever noticed what happens to your heart and to your soul when you see great art in person? every emotion you didn't know was in you comes right to the surface. you become delicate. at the same time your eyes open, and i'm talking about that third eye especially. the one that brings visions of who you are, and what the world and the universe are.

the toughness had to melt. so i cried when i saw the colors of a phoenix in flower petals. i knew what it meant to be a woman when i saw the organic lines of stormy blues and grays surrounding the white pearl in the center of another flower (though i didn't know it fully at the time). this is the most vibrant of all my memories of that trip so many years ago.

this weekend cj and i visited that city together. his parents met us there for a short vacation. saturday afternoon we quickly headed to the MOMA, not knowing what we were to see.

georgia o'keefe. once again, there was a special exhibit of her work there. this time along side the photographs of ansel adams. we met again...me and that woman. this time it was much the same, but also there was much that had changed in my relationship with that woman. first of all, i have read and studied more these past nine years about women, gender issues, and art. second, i have fallen in love with the tortured, yet beautiful landscapes of the southwest.

interestingly, i tried, still, to be tough. as soon as i approached one of her paintings with the wings of a pelvis in the sky of a moon i got that lump in my throat. the last thing i needed was family asking if i was ok...how do you explain that for some reason these paintings are bringing up every emotion including awe, wonder, gratitude, regret (for not learning how to paint), rage (for a society that doesn't value art as much as it should), etc? it is not easy to tell everyone the range of feelings that a person has acquired over a lifetime (even if my lifetime has only lasted 27 years so far).

then i was oh so grateful for a husband who is an artist. when we retured home i could cry to him about how i wish i could paint...it truly seems like a release and a way to speak that would heal a person. artists truly are a gift to our hearts and souls. perhaps because they must struggle to get by in this world...they know how beautiful yet agonizing life can be. i will learn how to draw and to paint. this will be yet another way i can speak. this i believe.

obvious confession...

photo by me. march 2008. spiral jetty trip...again.

i want to be an artist...

but you already knew that.

that's why this confession is so obvious.

besides, who doesn't want to be an artist?

this morning for my yoga practice

i got back to my modern dancing roots...

i undulated, twirled, and writhed.

i sketched a little too...something that has been so intimidating.

i'll be dusting off the ol' banjo

and rediscovering more old photos i've taken.

here's to jumping in head-first!

i am an artist.

and so are you.

create something real today!

I Couldn't Ask For More...

Yesterday Ceej and I spent the entire day together. We went for a drive down south...through Spanish Fork Canyon, over through Fairview and Mount Pleasant...then through Spring City, and to the Birch Creek Ranch, a beautiful place that all of you should visit and support, where friends Zina and Chris are dreamily living...
Then C and I went to an amazing art exhibit of paintings of the southwest. Afterwards we met up with friends, Chris and Amanda, for a little birthday celebration over some authentic Italian. It was all oh so perfect.

enjoy the photos.

If I Could, I Would

If I could, I would buy art to give to family and friends for Christmas. My favorite artists happen to be Utah artists. This first painting is by Zachary Proctor, and the second by Aaron Lifferth. Double sigh. One day I'll buy up their entire stock.