Category: Creativity

I cannot even write those words down without having emotion flood back.

We stayed in Brooklyn in a beautiful house that was in the nicest neighborhood. Looking out the window at the street below was like a page out of the New Yorker Magazine. It was like I was inside one of the stories in the magazine .  everything was painted white  in the house  white white white.

The floors were all distressed old growth wood and they were heated. It was like walking on art. The grooves and knots and grain of the old trees sung out when you slid your hand over them.

So many years went into growing so many things happened while this tree was growing.

white walls and high high ceilings  and windows looking down onto the New Yorker Magazine life throbbing down below.

I have a friend who is from the East Coast and he told me that Japan pays artists to just live because they consider them to be treasures. I agree with this idea. Artists should not have to do anything but travel and live and work and produce. Making art is the one job that lasts past your life so any society should value and protect that . Any artist given that opportunity would not squander it and waste time. I don’t know any lazy artists, They all are driven .

all the time in New York was totally devoted to seeing art with artists so we walked non stop for many hours a day looking and absorbing every drop of the city we could.

this was the first time I went to Brooklyn  which is itself a world of beauty  all its own, The Brooklyn Bridge is a lacy giant the takes you to Manhattan.

The Brooklyn Conservatory is acres of garden and glass  where you can meander in the warm tropics for hours while snow is covering the city outside.

We ate at a restaurant that was famous for jerk chicken. It was so tiny you had to climb a ladder steep staircase to get up to the teeny place to eat upstairs, the little rooms was jammed with art and flowers and lots of wonderful things to look at while  you waited for the food . When they handed the food to you , it came in steaming huge plates which was so funny as our table was tiny. It all added to the ambience of love which was radiating out of the walls,,, I love my job I love my job I love my job. Of course the food was fantastic . Everything is fantastic when you are soaked in culture. The chef was a lovely black man who looked so beautiful against the cobalt blue walls and bouquets of flowers spilling into the room,

every second we spent in New York was magical . Every second.

It has been months since last I wrote. Sometimes you just have to be quiet for a while. and stew in the juice of being for awhile. Sometimes the awhile is a long spell of quiet. Its ok.

But this morning I am not going to the qym and meeting with every body who is determined to fight the good fight. the words were calling me and I was afraid they would leave if I left the house.

I went to New York. I went to New York and saw saw saw some paintings that I still think about. I have to still think about them because they are in my skin now. I breathed them in and now they are a part of me.

New York was back in January when the snow was a couple of feet deep and the air was freezing cold but it was sunny in Manhattan and it was so sunny that it was magical. New York in winter is unbelievably beautiful. Shocking blue sky. Buildings so elegant they hurt to look at. People so swathed in fur and cashmere and wool , that you are warmed with them. The men in their perfectly tailored suits and long coats and glamorous  scarfs . New York is the most luscious city. The honk honk honking was like staccato violin adding to the energy of the city. The City.

that is why I couldn’t write for months. I went to the City.

a long time ago I had a side job of cleaning gorgeous houses for some extra cash. In one of the bathrooms there was a little silk sachet with a silver tie on it. For some reason it seems like the most beautiful color combination in the world and I ran home and got some paint that color of green and some silver metallic paint and repainted my front room.

Once when I was in France m the place I was staying served french eggs for breakfast and they tasted totally different from American eggs. It tasted like France. So I painted a painting all about it called French Egg.

I remember seeing  a piece of material on the sidewalk that was so wonderful and it make my stomach feel good just looking at it and it make me feel safe and true and I went home and did another painting with those colors

Reading a Womens Wear Daily magazine, I found a pull out scent of the new Chanel no. 5 perfume and did a painting about how that smelled.

so you might say I try and recreate the great feeling or tastes or smells that I happen upon wherever they may be and try and capture them  and put it in a painting. Painting is my communication map of good feeling.

Everything I paint is it is a process to reflect back she beautiful thing that is just crying out to be painted.

When you paint anything you have to look at it with both eyes. Your outside eyes and your inner eyes.

More on this tomorrow.

 

We all have soft sides that we either show or don’t ever show. Our soft side is where we are vulnerable  and tender and it is closest to our deep hearts. Showing your underbelly to anybody is risky because they might not like what you are and you might get rejected in an area that is really you.

that is why most people save showing that side to a few people that have proved safe.

Sometimes someone will expose themselves in this area without the usual safety guards up. They just say well here I am.

I love people that have the courage to do that. They are my favorites in all the world. It makes me love them for their courage alone. You can feel instantly close to someone like that as you don’t have to go through all the stages. You just go to their home and that is it.

To live like that is dangerous to a point if you are afraid of pain and suffering at possibly being rejected but it also is wildly alive and freeing to now guard yourself. Don’t put up your dukes.

the cost of being safe is being lonely.

 

Ideas are like butterflies that appear suddenly and are full of wonder and beauty. They flutter by your face for a second, breeze across your mind, light on a twig or a flower bud and then just as quickly they are gone. It is always a surprise when you catch a glimpse of one out of the corner of your eye and sort of chase it with first your eyes and then maybe your legs just for a chance to get a better look for a second.

Ideas are like that. In the middle of just living sometimes one comes that  is out of nowhere and seems to light on your head for a second. An idea that maybe be something brand new or something that is the solution to a problem.

You just have to catch them before they leave because just like a butterfly they are visiting you just for a moment.

I don’t know how  many great ideas have come and gone with me but there is one thing that always happens. I think I will remember to write it down when I get a chance. Then by the time I get to a convenient place to do just that, its gone. Now what was that thought and why can’t I remember it.

So it is pretty depressing to lose a gift like that.

If you think of ideas as butterflies you will know to stop write and file right away. Keep a notebook on your body all the time. It is more important than that pesky cell phone.or keep a pen on you and write it on your arm. At least you will know where it is.keep a post it pad on the dash of your car and scrawl out key words so you can remember if you are driving.

Do you ever get an idea that feels like someone punched you in the stomach . Those ideas are important and you should not let them go because they also are on butterfly rings and will leave in a fee moments.