musings from the studio and beyond ~
dawn chandler’s reflections on art and life. . . .
10.10.11 ~ cutting a path through autumn
Sometimes I just crave color — big, bold, juicy color.
And sometimes I guess I just crave a little bit of rebellion.
This painting started as a traditional landscape painting — a scene of horses grazing in a meadow in the Valle Vidal, with a line of voluminous cottonwoods behind them. You can see the cool greens of the original scene — fragments of the foliage and meadow — emerging throughout. A lone horse remains, grazing near the bottom of the picture.
Obviously I wasn’t too satisfied with the original landscape; the paint handling in the landscape felt cumbersome. The canvas kicked around my studio for a long while when finally it called to me in want of metamorphosis.
There’s nothing quite so liberating and joyfully defiant as taking a loaded palette knife and making the decision to attack a painting that I’ve been laboring over. But there’s also always a little bit of fear involved. The internal conversation in my head usually goes something like this:
“This painting sucks. I should just attack it.”
“Wait — it doesn’t suck *that* badly. Look at those nice passages through there.”
“No, it sucks. I’d rather start the whole thing all over again. This one isn’t going to get any better; it’s already too labored.”
“But if you attack it, you may really ruin it.”
“Yeah well, I think that’s a risk I’m willing to take. And more than likely It’s going to transform into something I can’t yet imagine, but that in the end I’m going to love.”
“Or not.”
“Yeah….maybe so….But so what? It’s just paint!”
“You sure you want to do this? It really isn’t that bad.”
“It’s too late: I’ve already thought to do it; now I have to. [heart beating a little faster] I need to let this one go!”
“You may be sorry.”
“I don’t care! I HAVE to do this! I’m going for it!”
And it’s always the right decision.
Cutting a Path Through Autumn is on view through October 21, 2011 at the Downey Gallery at 225 Canyon Road, Santa Fe.
10.09.2011 ~ thank you
Grateful to everyone who ventured out on a dark and stormy night Friday to come to my art show opening at the Downey Gallery. You are brave souls! I regret not keeping my camera handy during the party, but did get at least one pic of the gallery before the arrival of the water-logged masses.
Lovely to see my so many of my paintings displayed together on walls other than those of my studio. Even lovelier to see so many friends. Thank you all!
Recent Paintings by Dawn Chandler will be on display at the Downey Gallery at 225 Canyon Road, Santa Fe until 10/21/11.
01.20.2011 — santa fe winter, i
— santa fe winter, i
— 6 x 6 inches oil on panel — copyright dawn chandler 2011
Woke up to snow this morning. Barely a dusting, but even this meager amount is welcome. The end of January is approaching, and until this morning, we’ve had no snow this month. I’m not much of a fan of winter, yet even I am hoping the snows will return, at least for a little while. For now, drifts of two big storms in December still lie in the cold shadows of trees and arroyos. At least I was able to get some photographs of the earlier snow, while it lasted.
Early last week, a building sense of frustration and exasperation with my busy schedule finally caused me to exclaim “SCREW IT!!” and drop everything and just paint. Until that moment, I had barely been able to turn to my palette in weeks. That night, finally, that pressure cooker of frustration released itself in the flow and satisfaction of turpentine and oil paint…Ahh, bliss!
For inspiration, I turned to those photos of winter. Above, the first of two paintings I did that pressure-cooker night. The scene: just up my road on a winter’s late afternoon, looking east as the setting sunlight highlights a neighbor’s pinon and cedar wood.
To my surprise, my paintings that evening turned out quite well. The looseness and confidence of the brushwork, the accuracy of color and light…I’m delighted with how well and quickly these all came together. I guess I’m always expecting that after a time away from painting, I’ll be rusty and not very good at it. And yet, often quite the opposite proves true: that as frustrating as a hiatus from painting can be, it’s often useful. For, though the creative skills and vision are not apparently actively engaged, they continue to incubate. A bit like “sleep-thinking” — when you go to bed at night mulling over a question, and in the morning wake to find the answer. Or like a runner preparing for a race, taking off a few days before the event to rest and restore, and then run a great race. I guess in order to perform especially well, the creative muscles and synapses benefit from rest, too. Or at least they seem to have this time around, anyway….
