Seasons: Art & Life

Back from New Mexico, Art Trek open studio weekend over, (although the gallery exhibit continues through mid-month), I'm home working on new paintings, one a commissioned piece. Other than the hot water heater flooding the basement, life continues around the old Art House. River was glad to get me back, and lies on the front porch, easels spread around as we paint. More like he basks in the sun and I do the work. Dogs really are smarter than we give 'em credit for! Butterflies flit, hummingbird stragglers sip at feeders--they'd better head off to warmer climes soon. I'd like to myself! New Mexico swirls through my mind: blues, terra cotta, sap green, dusky purple, gold. You'll see a few pictures from the visit, along with Patricia Carlisle Fine Art on Canyon Road--it was a pleasure to visit Chip, Patty and crew, and see my work hanging in such a beautiful space. There's also a picture of a painting I'm working on. New Mexico is bound to seep through the layers!

“Still, what I want in my life
is to be willing
to be dazzled—
to cast aside the weight of facts

and maybe even
to float a little
above this difficult world.” ~ Mary Oliver

Late Summer Art & Magic

( Photos: Love people who buy art and support living artists! New paintings from the outside summertime studio)

It's August. And it's H-O-T. Mornings, (after coffee on the porch swing) I paint outside on the front porch, my 'studio' surrounded with wisteria vines dripping, butterflies, hummingbirds, and life. And mosquitoes. I just can't paint inside when the sun's out, flowers are blooming, and life is full and green. Sweat rolls off my face, into the paint. Mercy, I think. It's HOT! It is. Such is life of an artist: paint when and where you can.

There's not always air-conditioned comfort or lunch prepared for noon. Uh uh. Not happenin'. Oh yes, there are days when I wish, wish, wish that lunch would just magically appear in front of me, ready to enjoy. Uh uh. Usually on a muggy summer day, by that time, I'm ready to head inside with River dog leading the way. We stand at the refrigerator, door open: wishing for that Magic Lunch to appear. Still, I'm grateful, here I've had a morning of good work with brushes, fingers, sponges dipped in color. Things happen. It's always magical, and part of the journey. In a few months, I'll be whining about freezing to death in this old house of mine. Still I'll be at it inside, at the kitchen easel, out in afternoon sunshine when brief respite warms the day up enough, and flinging paint. Working on sculpture. There's a long-time pattern to this, one that says keep going, keep going, keep going. Make art while you're here.

So far, this has been one of my best art years: I still haven't had to go get a side job as bag-boy at the grocery store. Or beg friends to save me from the abyss: artists don't tend to own a lot (if any) stock, live rich, or think like bankers do. I don't. I have no stock, retirement, or silver spoon. No one's ever left me a trust or legacy. I'm it. So far, the dog gets fed, I try to get fed, buy a few plants for the garden and pay my bills. The mortgage payment looms monthly, but there we go, keepin' on. Thank you, universe. Gratitude never fades.

December Painting & Musings

"I am the product of long corridors, empty sunlit rooms, upstairs indoor silences, attics explored in solitude, distant noises of gurgling cisterns and pipes, and the noise of wind under the tiles. Also, of endless books." ~ C.S. Lewis

This is a new painting I started last week when outside on an unseasonably warm (over 50 degrees) Saturday afternoon here in the mountains. Yes, I completely missed our small town's local holiday tailgate market. Sometimes the life of an artist diverts and darts down narrow side paths: good intentions turn into other kinds of good intentions. While I'm sure the tailgate market did just fine without me, I missed the socializing and stocking up on cold weather vegetables and goodies. Perhaps when the muse is upon us, we just have to go with it. I keep going, muse or not. Sometimes art itself is the muse, perhaps! Sometimes it's those empty sunlit rooms, solitude, wind under the tiles. And endless books. O, muse, you have many faces.

This month, I'll have informal open studio Saturdays, weather permitting, from 1-3 p.m.; although it's always a wise idea to call ahead. Just in case the muse has called me to the tailgate market. Happy Holidays from River dog and me to you.

November Painting & Thought

Landscape painting (10" x 20"), Bonnie Joy Bardos, 2015

“There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening, that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and will be lost.” ~ Martha Graham

This is the week of Thanksgiving, when families and friends gather and count blessings. November has, like all this year, flown by on feathers of a whisper, all too fast. Cold weather has arrived, but I find a tease of warmth outside in afternoon sun. Here's one of my latest paintings I've worked out on the back deck on. Influenced by Mother Nature herself: colors, breeze, feel, the heart and brush work peacefully together. River dog lies under my feet as we both move with the all-too-quickly moving sun, as she sinks lower and lower daily over the tree line. We watch these things, the lengthening purple of shadows. I don't tend to paint actual scenes like many do, but choose to filter all the places and thoughts into something more metaphysical. It is. It isn't. It is! Inhaling views, trees flashing by on winding back roads, sun flitting down through evening light...I just try to catch the moment, the feel. Then put it to the canvas with all my heart.

Painting the Life of an Artist

June arrives in a spill of roses, blue skies, sparkling daisies and birds flitting all around, plus late evening showers that paint green velvet throughout the landscape. I work steadily, sometimes working on sculpture in between bouts of painting. Mornings, I'm out front on the porch, listening to the fish pond fountain trickle peacefully while River dog lazes in the sunshine close by. Evenings, I often move to the back deck, paint awhile, then take time for a glass of wine and peaceful sunset. Today, I finished up a large black and white landscape to ship out to the gallery in Santa Fe. When the gallery 'wants it yesterday', I'm on it. Whether it's someone wanting a small piece or a large one, I don't hesitate or put it off. Serious artists do that: they're doing their best to earn a living, as meager as it may sometimes be. They don't wait until they feel like it. They pull out the paints, the canvas and set about a new beginning. As ever, no matter how exhausted I may be by the end of the day, how sore the feet are, the hands...how covered with paint, I'm just grateful to do what I was meant to do in this world. There's truly nothing I'd rather do more! For those who spend their lives wishing they were doing it, whatever it may be, I say: don't wait. Do it. Do it now, while you can. Make a difference. Give yourself the gift of time, even if 15 minutes a day to do what you love. Now.

Esto Perpetua: Solace Bonnie Joy Bardos, available at Patricia Carlisle Fine Art, 554 Canyon Road, Santa Fe New Mexico

The Unfurling of Spring

Painting outside on the front porch studio this day with River dog sprawled underfoot as shimmering goldfish swim lazily nearby under trickling water...all around, the essence of spring! Lilacs open, pink dogwood unfurls her blossoms. I borrow one of her branches to bring up to the porch as inspiration. In a magical moment, I look down at the work table and see a painting within the painting, so snap this picture of paints, flowers, canvas, brush, all making a beautiful composition of imperfect delight. Still working on this large canvas which is composed of many layers and textures, resembling a luscious silk remnant: poison oak (itch itch itch) on hands makes it a little tougher to work, but nothing stops spring. And painting.

'To create one's world in any of the arts takes courage.'
~ Georgia O'Keeffe

An almost-spring-is-here day blooms here in the mountains--a renewal of spirit and soul amid blue sky and a clear morning. The old front porch swing sways in the breeze, shimmering gold fish delight in splashing water, and River dog barks happily from his perch on weather-beaten front steps. There's a sense of pure joy, an eagerness to create. To do my work while here this brief time, this golden hour of life. Where does the creative well spring from? Outside, I've got new work in progress: there's an excitement in that. The colors of the paint I've mixed, juicy drips of warm pink from a turquoise brush, lovely veils of orchid floating in the rinse water. Bright drink can. Ordinary things that conspire to be magic on this almost-spring-is-here day. Life pushes up from the roots, through the ground. It was waiting there all winter, waiting to be found in an artist's heart this moment. Georgia O'Keeffe is right. It takes courage, and in that courage, one finds inexplicable dervishes of joy.

Thank you for reading this blog. I've been writing it for almost 8 years, posting each month with photos, thoughts, quotes. Please share it and become a follower. A couple years ago, I caved in and allowed a few ads on it, which someday, if enough people read it, I'll collect a small pittance from. Keep your artists going in whatever way you can! I, for one, am grateful.

New Journey: Paint What You Are

“Every good painter paints what he is.” Jackson Pollock

Spring is brushing the earth, promising an end to winter this month. As ever, on sunny days with blue sky, I'm outside with dog underfoot and brushes in hand, working on new paintings, going back to old ones and sending them on a new journey. Yesterday, I started two small figurative pieces, managing to get oil paint on my cheek and clothes at the same stroke. An artist just smiles and goes on. What's a little paint? In between that, I work just a bit more on a horse sculpture, getting a hoof 'just so', the piece is full of life and vibrancy. To me, whether art is a reflective quiet piece, or loud and bright, it should sing to the artist, the viewer, to radiate prisms, light, life. Jackson Pollock is right on: paint what you are. This painting of trees, sky, and moon is 10" x 10", oil, and one of those older pieces that got renewed and sent on a new journey. I do that to myself too: paint on cheek!

Bringing Meaning to Life: Art

"That, perhaps, is the true gift of genius — to bring something meaningful to life despite how meaningless one’s own life may seem; to give some warmth to the world despite what the world may have coldly taken away."
~ Charles Schulz

Quote for the day, week, year, life. I'm no genius but always long to bring something meaningful to life, to give some warmth to the world. Having grown up with "Peanuts" and Charlie Brown, I appreciate Charles Schulz's gifts to us in the world. It was OK to be the weird kid, to walk a different path, to hear a different drummer. Artists do that, you know--walk a different path. We give to the world our music, dance, films, paintings, sculpture, literature, poetry and so much more. Every day, the evening news gets harder and harder to bear: yet art makes this life bearable. It's uplifting. One of the first things to go in school cut-backs, the arts need to be on the top of the list to stay. Just as important as any sport, the arts reaffirm, make us grow, inspire. I bet Charlie Brown's an artist at heart.

Painting from the Haloed Bird series, (detail) Bonnie Joy Bardos, sold

Floating Above: New Paintings

“Still, what I want in my life
is to be willing
to be dazzled—
to cast aside the weight of facts

and maybe even
to float a little
above this difficult world.” ~ Mary Oliver

Winter sun filters afternoon rainbows through old glass windows and lace curtains into my old house's kitchen. On the kitchen easel, near French doors, I work on a new painting "Alter Ego": she was just started today, outside on the back deck before I had to come in due to cold. At this time of day, rainbows, sunbeams and light dance radiant throughout the room, paintings catch the light, maybe wishing to float above this world. I can glimpse light through layers of paint, down to the original gold gesso. It's one of those magic transcendent moments...beautiful, magical, fleeting. Life's like that, isn't it? Some days, some years we get that magic. It serves to pull us along when the nights are dark. It's a reminder that spring does come.

Creating A New Painting: Songs of the Earth (a beginning)

"When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.” ~ Rumi

Yesterday a friend asked me how I can do the 'same thing' every day. Puzzled, I explained that (to me) it's never the same, always different...and I get so excited over working on ART. I really love wearing old painting clothes, hanging with River dog, throwing paint, weaving words, or hammering sculpture: creating something: I'm happy to be here in my old house/studio working away on the back deck or front porch, painting away: not trapped in a tiny cubicle or punching a time clock. There truly is a river of joy in my soul: no matter the odds, no matter how hard it is to make ends meet.

For example, here's a brand-new painting in progress: (this is the first layer, the birth, the beginning stages) which will be in the "Songs of the Earth" series...it's my largest "Songs" yet...at 48" x 72". Yes, my behavior is escalating. This is only the beginning: shown outside on the front porch studio. River dog's nearby supervising, listening to the fish pond trickle. In the painting, summer starts to bloom: Queen Anne's lace, seed pods, ferns, corals, yellow-golds, pink honeysuckle twining, cat tails rise, a lotus...of course, there's always my love of Jungian symbolism floating in those details.

It came to my mind as I was out there flinging paint, that maybe, just maybe I should work up a Kickstarter fund for this series, so I can work freely on them without worrying so much about marketing or materials, starvation or deprivation, which although I'm used to, can hamper an artist. Hmmmm...after all, these began with a song. An idea. A magic moment out in nature, listening. Tuning in to that hum of life, that metaphysical force. Feeling the river flowing in my soul. Thanks for listening to my on-going love of art, the making of art. We're all part of the circles...which are in the painting, I might add. More to come....

Songs To The Earth painting (48" x 72") in progress, Bonnie Joy Bardos

Art: From A Different Point of View

'A leaf fluttered in through the window this morning, as if supported by the rays of the sun, a bird settled on the fire escape, joy in the task of coffee, joy accompanied me as I walked.' ~ Anais Nin

September brings cooler nights here, blue-skied days growing shorter, and a sense of change in the crisp air. Sunny mornings find spider webs sparkling over the boxwoods out front. While sitting in the front porch swing, surrounded by late summer petunias, trailing geraniums, and lush ferns, I watch all of nature with my cup of hot fresh coffee in hand. No hurry, only the soft whisper of the swing, a sense of peace, of realizing that all things change: that this moment is beautiful, to be enjoyed in the present.

These days find me creating art from a different point of view, you could say. The eyes have been having issues, causing blurry vision (this will be fixed at the end of the month!) So, instead of feeling sorry for myself, I've found a chance to see things a bit differently. Hey, Matisse and Monet did the same when their vision worsened. Here is one of two new portraits of my neighbor, Joni. To make a long story short, she'd had a portrait done by someone who used a projector and painted her 'literally'. It was her, yet lifeless. Could I do something, she begged. So, I took her out on my front porch and snapped pictures...the wheels in my head turning (of course!). So here is one of the resulting paintings from that moment.

**If you're interested in having a "AS I SEE YOU" portrait: I'll fix you one up. I can work from your favorite photo OR take one of you if you're local. Just inquire...