Fan on, back and fourth, made it work. Can’t stop. Problem. When begin working on series, project for new show get obsessed. Forced myself to eat two hard boiled eggs, drink one red stripe and drink two cups of water. This is what happens. I have a lot to sell for $150. And I have my series almost complete. It includes various sizes on canvas, paper, and board. A variety of prices, a variety of materials. As well as collabs between me and Carl and Carls selection of Solo New Works. It should make for quite a show. For Sure. I just want to keep on working but I only have an hour and a half. Panic. I need to walk the dog, take a shower, and get it together enough to take the babies to the grocery store and make dinner. Today the worlds collide. How can I rectify this? I don’t know, but I know I need to leave soon to take Billy for a walk. I made good progress in my studio today. At least there’s that. I was glad to get to this week, I actually have extra help this week, perfect timing for show prep. It does feel good, but I wish I had a little more time. That’s the thing, when you have kids. I can’t just disappear for fourty eight hours working non-stop in my studio. I have to leave, not knowing when I will be able to work again. Jack seemed like he wasn’t feeling well this morning. What if he gets sick and needs round the clock Mommy? Or the babysitter gets sick? Or her kids? So many things to get in the way of my studio time. I take a deep breath. This is the way it is. Must accept. Input. Acceptance. Flow with it. Sympatico.
Category: art
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I woke up early this morning, 6:30AM, I thought “Yea! I have some time to write and have my coffee”. Jack and Fiona went to sleep super late, 10:00PM, so I thought they would sleep in. “Mama, MOM, Mommy” I hear Jack as I walk up the stairs, experimenting in different ways to call me. I start to make my coffee and toast thinking he’ll fall back asleep, but I hear his calls, go get him, turn on Masha and The Bear, give him dry cereal, a banana, and an apple juice box. He’s content, I start to check my e-mails, Facebook, and here comes Fiona. I give her the same, put in her hearing aids, and they are both content. I haven’t read the news this morning, I didn’t sleep well last night. I started worrying, what if someone does the TRULY UNTHINKABLE, what if someone gets their hands on a nuclear weapon? I started worrying this is WW3. I didn’t sleep well. I escaped yesterday for a few hours, it felt GREAT! I finally had some time to work with Carl on some collaborations for our upcoming show at The Fourth Wall Gallery in Oakland. (www.fourthwallart.com ) We’ve been trying to get together for months it seems, but I haven’t been able to make it happen. Yesterday I did and we had a great session. Carl had several starts I responded to right away. My creativity automatically kicked in, mixing colors, making marks with paint, ink, brushes, palette knives. We both used frags from work we were done with, we hated, Carl cut the pieces up, giving overworked pieces’ new life, a new role to play. My own marks and messes that frustrated me before now inspired me in the new form and shape they took. Our last three or four pieces we created together really sung, we minimized our marks down to the bare minimum. Into pure line, movement, spontaneity, and stream of consciousness, two spirits merging. I responded to the news I heard on my way over, the world imploding, not with anger, but with marks inspired by the wind. I could hear the fresh, chilly, Sausalito foggy breeze outside, it permeated me and moved through my arm and hand. The good feeling, I held inside me, being out, getting a coffee, sitting in a coffee shop waiting for lunch to be ready, talking to fellow customers, being told I have a “Good attitude towards food”, he asked if I liked the coffee, “Yes, it’s the best Iced Coffee I’ve ever had” I say. At that moment it was, and during the moments I worked, painting, only words spoken between Carl and I about this mark or that, I am extremely grateful. To have the space and time to be creative. This is all I can do.
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Thank God for my notebook project. I would be lost without it. It gives me space to breath. Right now I’m working in one GAP collab and six personals.
My nose feels huge and sore today. My head aches and I think I have a sinus infection. I can’t tell if it’s hypochondria. It’s been hard to write. I feel I have to reflect deeply on everything I write, how it may sound, the tone it takes. I don’t want to give the impression I’m unhappy. I want to write about the ever growing pile of dishes and ants. I tried to keep the house clean. I failed to do so. I ended up exhausted with the same amount of mess. I spent hours cleaning on Sunday. It smells like rotting food, dirty diapers, and green snot rags. I don’t want to sound unhappy. I’m just reporting the situation, getting it out there, airing my dirty laundry. That makes me happy. I’m communicating, I’m talking about things. I don’t know why I spend more time writing about shit instead of flowers. All the good things, it’s the bit of misery of living that’s got it’s hook in me. What I see through my eyes, how I feel, maybe it’s my anxiety, my inherent craziness, being an artist is crazy.
It’s almost time for the babies to wake from their nap. I wanted to make “The Greens Early Spring Vegetable Soup”, Fresh Baked Bread, and Bittman’s “Salad Nicoise”. But there’s no way I can do all of that and take care of the babies and clean the house. I need to pare it down bigtime, I’ll make a simple list, the most important to-do’s: 1. clean the kitchen, 2. make snack, 3. dinner, the Salad. Then it will be bath time and bedtime. As for our afternoon activity, we’ll pick fresh plums off the tree to bring to school for snack tomorrow. (My car is so disgusting, maybe we should clean the car. No, that requires too much work.) Oh God, As I glance over to my left dozens and dozens of little crumbs peek at me and the smell of rotting food reminds me I have to take out the trash. And I think about how I might have a sinus infection again. One time someone asked me if I really thought I was a manic depressant after I had written about it here. “no” I laughed. “But my mom was, and I definitely suffer from the highs and lows”. That’s what I told my husband too, about my writing. “When I’m PMS’ing, I get depressed” I said. “I write anyhow, and it may sound sad.” The emotions come and go. What’s true one moment may not be the next. The other day I said to my brother, “It’s interesting how when writing people can make a judgement about what I write, they can make a comment about my emotional state, and how I think about something, even if they take what I’ve written in an unattended way, but when I paint there’s no way for someone to prove exactly what a painting is about. I think that both are art. Some people say it matters that people get your true meaning from your art, others have said it’s up to the viewer and as the maker it’s not your responsibility to make sure everyone gets it, what it means to the artist who made it .
I’m letting the babies take way too long of a nap today. I should wake them up or they’ll be up late again. And it’s time to attack those ants, dishes, garbage, dirty diapers, crumbs, to get up and do something.
Dirty Laundry Blog by Jennifer Hynes 