Big white snowy world outside my door makes me even more hungry to see Emile Nolde's watercolors (suggested by my painting teacher), Sam Francis, and Paul Klee. It's cold and I'm onlyinviting old favorites into my head, maybe I ought to be a bit more receptive to new things but I do need bold reds right now.

Oh, and yesterday was town meeting day in Vermont. Maybe the most democratic and impressive thing I ever saw, my friends, was a genuine town meeting. Come to think of it, that too, was a flash of color in a black and white world, in the green state no less.

take care,
Rachael

Why not? The latest Utne Reader has a story about Creative America project which aims to train artists and cultural workers to run for local, state, and national office. It's a beautiful idea and the site has some good links and resources.
When not completely disillusioned or focused entirely on the microcosm that is my studio, I'm hungry for political, social and cultural leaders with passion, creativity, kindness, a committment to feeding, keeping healthy, and educating all Americans... Yep, still looking. But apparently I wasn't the only one who would have voted O.
Oh no, didn't go.
Goodnight, kids,
Rachael

The Hockney I like, well love, is not the pick-a-fight art writer but the watercolor painter who plays with color and pattern, mood and memory. I want to see this show but LA is far far away.
That's all.
Rachael

In this self portrait, Mabel Dwight , 1932, looks like she saw truth. Honest and real and committed to observing.

It's getting easier and easier to see the prints and she's once again getting some recognition, her story told, her wit, wonder, and composition seen, and those prints preserved and considered as more than just social record. Sure, there's some social record in there, but there's also a hell of a lot of the balance between carefully weighed lithographic decisions and the instinctual, the impulsive, the need to see. It's there too in Martin Lewis, the kind of looking that so carefully sees the real moment that seventy years later it still feels true.

Just wanted to share.

take care,
Rachael

My week has been a busy one (lots of work, lots of painting, lots to spur my thinking) and now I have so much to say (and so little time before I really should sleep). I'll breathe deep and then tell you...

I got a little email from Anna kindly telling me that Franklin is discussing Peter Steinhardt's book. That same day I spoke with someone who had just moved here from San Francisco and was looking for the $3 drop in figure drawing classes he used to have. Why doesn't Rochester have that? After some small talk about giving up sun and city living, I told him the truth, there are no $3 classes but we have 9 week classes, 3 hours each for $225 (less if you join the museum). I knew from the Steinhart book that the fellow from San Fran was trading in a vibrant figure drawing scene for a town built on photography, not drawing. There are dozens of drawing groups in the bay area, unionized models, and an established and well nutured culture of traditional drawing. Upstate New York has a lot of things I love, but I have yet to find these three things. I wasn't too quick on my feet to remind him of the amazing photo scene here (artists need not worry about getting good slides in this town) or the newspapers which are currently competing with each other to give artists attention, or the number of people I've met who are well read and have years of experience carefully looking. Truth be known I think he was coming to me not for a solution but for a chance to be heard. I bet he missed the variety of places to draw and I bet the longer he is here, the more he'll see. I was glad to have a transplant come in seeking out drawing. I see it a lot actually, there is a real hunger folks have to slow down and draw. The Undressed Art records of a real movement towards drawing, even if, some towns don't have models unions and practically free figure drawing classes yet. It's nice to know there are 'drawers' drawing, the story of why we do it being told, and some good talk goin' on about these things...

I have also been reading the Scarry book On Beauty and Being Just. And just find myself, staring and staring at things like the dying tulips on my table. Bold reds, crazy, passionate forms, these flowers are amazing.


And I think that everything I see is informing everything I paint is informing everything I teach is informing eveything I learn and on and on and on and on... That's why, maybe, somehow, right now, the new paintings feel right. A mix of this, a mix of that, and soon I've got more paintings spread out on the floor all more chaotic than I thought they'd be. There's a battle for control going on with some of the little troublemakers, but the thing is that I am learning to let each painting have it's own story, it's own statements, own confusions and own clarity. I can step away from these troublemakers for a good solid workday and then see them again.


Even in a week like this when there is a good amount of dayjob hectic-ness, of proposal sending (sent!), of less sleep than I'm used to and more worry about every little thing. I worry for naught, if I can just keep my balance with those brushes, those colors, those forms. So I will go on forming and reforming each little painting as if it was it's own little world.


OK, for real, now, I'm off to sleep.
Take care,
Rachael