The power of snow

It's very early in the morning and too dark to take outside photos but oh the power that a heavy snowfall invokes! The household is still asleep with the exception of Troop, the Corgi who felt it necessary to go outside at 5 am. Imagine his surprise as he hopped into the 6 plus inches of snow, not quite realizing the bottom step was now invisible, covered by the snow-quite an event for a short legged dog!

There is power in a snow event anywhere I have lived-whether it is 6" or 34", Foremost is the stillness it creates. There is a hush that we don't realize silences our daily lives until we experience the softness that comes with snow-quiet, muffled, still.
A snowfall, first thing in the morning  brings a peace-for me at least and memories of snows gone by - pf my childhood, my children's childhood-fabulous memories that bring back a warm fuzzy feeling of having experienced the power of snow and what it can evoke in the senses, experiences and memory.

Just starting

With hot coffee in hand, a fire in the fireplace, I am waiting for the sunrise to experience the complete visual effect of the snow. The artist in me loves the transformation of the familiar trees, buildings and landscape.  I enjoy the tang in my senses when I step into the cold and t satisfaction that comes as mentally I check all the boxes in my brain in regards to my animals-inside and out-food, water, shelter-check. Not even the chickens are stirring or the wild birds that have congregated in recent weeks at my feeders as the winter ramps up. By the end of February, people have wearied of the cold and snow....but this year winter is not over and only teases us with sunny warm days tossed at random between winter storms and temperatures.

The power of  snow is in the senses, the memories and the seed catalogs that promise and remind us that spring is just around the corner. Be patient and enjoy the stillness today brings.

Silk Play Date

So what happens when you get three women together who like to silk paint? We had a Silk Play Date!  We met recently on a freezing day at one friend's house planning to work with some screen transparencies. But our initial plan of letting the sun do the work was quickly forgotten in the 36 degree outside temperatures. But our friend, a long time silk artist, had a clever, homemade light "box" set up for processing transparencies to print onto our silk :-)

The collage below says it all! The long scarf is one where I had already dyed the background a variety of colors...the closeup shows the screening of the vine design I added as another layer to it. I could get used to play dates!

Colors of Inspiration

Why do we use certain colors? What attracts us to yellows or blues or pinks? Why do we react well with some colors and not with others?
I opened the doors to my studio this morning and walked out with coffee in one hand and a recently completed silk painting in the other.  I paused to revel in the unusually cool morning and admire the colors of dawn. Reds, oranges, yellows and cerulean blue against a backdrop of greens in every hue. The cooler summer has kept the shades of greens vivid this year rather than showing the browns that come by the end of the hot days. 
And then I realized that the silk scarf I was holding in my hands encompassed the colors of all that I was seeing. And I knew then where much of my inspiration was coming from. From within my subconscious came my color palette because it was not until I stepped out of the studio did I realize how the colors around me had influenced my paintings on silk. And that's a good place to be :-)

The colors of morning

the colors of Inspiration

Ageless art

SO June 8 was our ART RETREAT and oh my, what a great time we had! And yes, one of our participants was a vibrant 79 years old and jumped right into the art zone with us!

Journaling is all about the journaler and what she wants to include on her various pages. So using  basic art supplies available to everyone, and incorporating some stress relieving tips and techniques, each participant spent the afternoon learning to become "one with her art."

Yep-it ain't that easy initially because we ALL want to be told what to do and especially in art-expectations are always based on one's previous art experiences and teachers! So step by step the ladies all learned to loosen up, let go and then-walla! They created.....and marveled at how easy it was after all!

Check it out! below:

See the woman in blue standing to the left and sitting and raising her hands in the air to the right? Patricia was our 79 years young student who, along with the others, reveled in the freedom of "no holds barred" art.

Each person took home the enthusiasm and techniques necessary to continue their art journey-there are a lot of pages to cover!


Our next art retreat is scheduled for Saturday July 27! Visit me on facebook to stay up to date on what's happening! www.facebook.com/MTheresaBrown or www.facebook.com/artstudentacademy 

The disruption of routine as we know it and what to do...

Quirks of nature are nothing new to weather patterns but I don't think anyone expected Halloween storm Sandy to rise up from the Caribbean and wreak such destruction on the northeast US coastline.
There is a certain twinge of survivor's guilt in thinking "Wow that could have been me". 
But the undeniable truth in such circumstances, is that the world does not end.  Your life may have been forever disrupted or altered but elsewhere, people still get up in the morning and go about their daily tasks.
On such a large scale of news coverage of an event,(weather related or not) it is hard to be unaware of others' misfortunes.Unaffected? Well, the US is a big country. If a personal misfortune happens on a small or individual scale, people usually are simply unaware.

Time has a way of moving on-with or without us. Often..... well, it's all about what begins to bring your world back into focus. Art is one of those areas that encompasses so many arenas of healing...music, dance, painting, sewing....all of it good and all of it necessary in some format. And when the pull begins to happen, even just a little, you know you are on the emotional road to recovery. Art in any format, is good.

Blue Corgi  (sold)

Flash in the Grass 11 x 14

Miniature art journal

Moonstruck 16 x 20 (sold)

Artsy Journeys tends to be more about what I personally explore  in the arts-away from the discipline of portrait painting which has paid my family's bills for many years.














I love to create portraits-every face is different. Every clients wants are different. But there is NO denying the energy and release and total absorption that comes with exploring random areas of art-experienced in it or not. No holds, no boundaries, no rules. But the main value of creating art in all its various forms?  The temporary experience of being in the ART ZONE.  It's a good place to be. Whether your art project takes 30 minutes, 2 hours or a day, the Art Zone is a private area in which everything else fades away and your mind, regardless of what has transpired around you, is absorbed in the creation of art. It's a very good place to be.

May you be there soon!