art

The Warrior – New Painting & Thoughts

August 6, 2015 By Michelle Hendry

Warrior, 16×20, acrylic

Disaster. That about sums up the third of Bert Seabourn’s summer classes for this artist. (not pictured here) Last night was our first foray into abstraction – the kind of abstraction that is done by intuitively placing colour and form around a canvas. Cue the horror film music.

I already suspected I had an issue with intuitive painting, but this experience confirmed that I’m not good at painting without some kind of idea in my head. Sitting down in front of an empty canvas and pushing colour around at random was a similar experience to listening to fingernails run down a chalkboard. I need to start with something. I ended up with a humiliating field of mud spread evenly across my canvas from scraping away multiple unsuccessful attempts. If dung beetles were art collectors, I’d be a star. I was completely psyched out. I left that class in frustration. Trying new things can teach you as much about yourself as about your skills.

It was made all the more difficult to swallow because I did accomplish a style busting portrait of the Warrior (above) for class just the week previous – a real step forward into something very different for me. We were given a small (5″), very pixelated photocopy of an Indian warrior. In spite of the terrible reproduction and a violet colour cast across the entire picture, he was haunting to look at. It turns out the image was of a highly realistic painting by Mark Rohrig. (See the photo of the reference below).

I had no idea of the source most of the time I was working on the Warrior. I just went off in my own direction using the image for the general features and began to do something I never do – break up brush strokes and not blend the shadows on the face. It was very exciting.

I’m not altogether comfortable with using art or photography that is not either my own(best) or in the public domain(ok for photo reference). Unless the new work ends up very different or is educational/non-profit (fair use) like this one, it isn’t a good idea to use copyrighted work. I believe that if you plan to sell that work later, it is best make sure there can be no confusing the reference and the painting. I may be too rigid in my interpretation, but better safe now than sorry later.

Some may say I did a totally different style of work here from the original, but I am not convinced that it is different enough. So, this one will never be for sale, however I did learn a lot from it. I will definitely try again, possibly with a historical image. Bert makes up his own faces. Apparently, so does Mark Rohrig. Perhaps, someday, I’ll be able to do the same, but I imagine that will come only after many, many faces.

Real learning is in trying on everything you can. I’m going to attempt another abstract, of course. In the meantime, I’d love to hear what you think.

School’s Out for Summer

June 3, 2015 By Michelle Hendry

I have been painting with Cherokee artist Bert Seabourn for a year now. I had not ever before attempted to paint a face. I did my first painted portrait last Fall. This is a sketch from my last class.

It was drawn from a historic photograph. We have done a few of these and the expressions varied widely. I cannot imagine the emotions these men must have felt as they watched their way of life disappear under plows and railway tracks.

Classes are done for a couple months and I’m back in the studio. Severe weather season is done and the Oklahoma Summer heat is moving in, making staying there easy. My Canadian blood just won’t thin past a certain point!

So there is more to come.

I’ve dragged some larger canvases into the studio. An expressionist friend of mine and I are doing paintings of the same photograph from her garden. It should be fun to see how different they are. She’ll keep me on track! So, we’ll see what happens. It might be time to finish that self portrait too…

Art Openings

Bert is having an opening this Friday at JRB at the Elms in the Paseo district this Friday, June 5th. He recently shared an old photo of himself and Bonnie (his wife) with Gerald and Betty Ford and a gorgeous painting. The painting is now in the President Ford Library collection in Ann Arbor, MI. Bert has work in collections all over the world.

A classmate of mine, Joan Frimberger, is a fine equine artist and she will be showing at Paseo this Friday as well.

“First Friday” is a big event in the Paseo Arts District every month and if you’re in the OKC area this Friday, do check it out.

Next weekend, June 12-13, is the opening of the “Prix de West“, one of the largest exhibitions of Western Art. For those outside Oklahoma, all of the paintings are viewable on the website.

Wondering about Wabi Sabi

February 16, 2015 By Michelle Hendry

So what about that project?

I spend a lot of time writing and I have rarely come across a topic that resists writing. Wabi Sabi has resisted writing. Anything with an ounce of Zen is all about experience and being in the moment. This takes a lot of practice. Someone I speak to regularly told me that trying to explain it is like trying to explain flight to a fish. And after struggling for a month, I must agree.

But that doesn’t mean the idea ends here – Far from it! It seems to want to become something else.

**What is Wabi Sabi?**

This might be the most difficult question to answer and a paragraph will always be inadequate. As soon as an answer seems imminent, it slips away into the indistinct and vague. Wabi Sabi is as much a state of mind or a feeling as it is something we can see in the concrete material world.

Wabi Sabi might loosely be described as impermanence, imperfection, ephemeral, simple, existing in the present moment – an aesthetic. It is deeply rooted in Nature and I have related it to a state of beautiful decay. It has no prejudice against the broken. It makes sense this aesthetic would evolve from a culture that reveres its elders.

Like art, Wabi Sabi is an experience.

The project itself was intended to explore and develop a way of thinking, or more accurately a way of being, through a greater awareness and drawn from looking at Asian cultural roots. Like art, Wabi Sabi is an experience. The experience of viewing art and art making can be enriched by this, a radically different approach from the predominating money culture surrounding the art world. This world is focused on two extremes; technique without soul or art where the explanation of the concept subverts the visual experience itself.

When the leaves rotted or blew away, they left their imprints in the red dust on the hood of a car.

Every day, I am inundated every day with art marketing advice on how I should create and what I should create. Making a connection should not depend on an explanation, nor should it be a trend. It is something that happens inside of us when we take the time to pay attention – to experience. There are a number of ways to learn to do this. Some can be simple. others a discipline. In either case, we can connect more deeply with ourselves and that opens the way for connection.

Perhaps taking a Wabi Sabi point of view, beauty can be more easily found all around us, all the time, in every moment.

So, where does the project go from here and what will it look like? Next post….

~~~~~

Update on the Update….

OK. So the site does look different.

The website update is complete (at least the parts everyone can see!). Many of the visual elements are altered and there are some new drop downs in the menu. The site is more mobile friendly and another domain has been added (mhendry.com). I hope you like it!

Critical Mass

February 26, 2011 By Michelle Hendry

I had the pleasure of spending a lovely evening with a group of artists at the home of artist Pat Fairhead (one of her paintings is above). Pat is one of my earliest mentors in art. I took classes with her and she fueled my love for painting. Some of my happiest moments were spent in a classroom with an artist more passionate about painting than any other I have met.

Pat shared her history and her path as an artist. Art has taken Pat all over the world and to the place that dominates her paintings, the Canadian Arctic. Pat talked about her time at the Ontario College of Art and her development as an artist. One of her mentors was Franklin Carmichael of the Group of Seven. She told us that his advice to her was always to be original.

I spend a lot of time on my own working in isolation and to have the opportunity to share ideas and discuss art with others is something I cherish. The conversation moved to other artists, what we were reading and how we worked. In trying to articulate a part of my process, I realized there was a pattern to the way I function creatively.

Creativity can be like waves on an ocean, rolling in and out, some waves are predictable – some less so. As the water moves toward shore and it surface begins to build – that moment of greatest potential lies just before it breaks – the critical mass.

Ideas and inspiration are always around, but, for me, an idea moves from a loose concept and flows through my mind until it needs to be expressed. That critical mass for an idea lasts for only so long and it must be expressed or it passes the the inspiration fades. An idea not yet developed is as difficult to execute well as an idea past its time. The best, most original, work happens during that peak of the wave, the critical mass of potential and must be answered or be lost.