From the Inside These Days

Much has been dusted and rearranged for the indoor seasons this year. I wasn't going to look at everything the way it had been for so long. Some things went up to the attic, some things came down, much really stayed pretty much the same but dusted and polished.

Refinements and Updates Continue

"Buick Eight" has been refined with a photo collage and additional repetitive color work. The car image is the "bucktooth" grille of the 1950 Buick, a photo I shot in 1980 at a car show. The rest of the images were mostly shot by my father during the 1940s. If something is still hanging in my house, it's never really done.

"Grace of the Fallen" has evolved floral images and a counterpoint added to the right side. Additional pinstripes and gridwork will follow.

"Suddenly Last Season," has new layers of "needles" painted on it suggesting shadows, following in the series started by Nanny's Knitting Needles. Interestingly enough, the other morning this piece was covered in these striking early morning actual shadows.

"Out on a Limb," or "Up a Tree," I can never decide on the title of this piece, has had a layer of sepia-toned clearcoat removed—well, most of it. I left it in the low points of the textural layers. Its removal has restored some of the original brighter color paints and papers the sepia had dulled. "Dulling" was my intent at the time, but after looking at it for several years, I wanted to see the some of the original colors again. If anything, "brightening" this piece has "aged" it in an even more period-correct manner.

First Dusting of Snow—11-12-'13

Garden globe was perfectly covered in the light first snow this morning. I think it looks even more like Earth now, with those scattered clouds everywhere.

Nothing fluttering by June's Butterfly bush today! Leaves hold up perfectly for a while even in this cold. They're a great sage color now.

 

Barely noticeable, but the brief snow shower was more intense in a few minutes. Then it stopped. Now it's frigid!

The velvety leaves of the Foxgloves provide a perfectly non-skid surface to hold the wet snow.

Even the grass is able to turn a morning's snow into a clusters of pearls.

 

The watering "can" won't be seeing any duty until next spring.

My little laurel bush, named Charlie Brown (as in his Christmas tree, lol), has leaves which serve nicely as platters for the light, fresh snow.

The Chipmunk's eye view of a bed of downed oak leaves. They all look like Sugar-Frosted Flakes!

November Beauty

One of my cactuses is in full bloom right now. This year it's downstairs in the foyer along with my piano. The plant is sitting on a Victrola with art hanging all around it. I shot this photo with a camera setting, 1600ISO which adds grain to low light photos. And no, I still can't use "cacti" without feeling like Jane Hathoway, the secretary on The Beverly Hillbillies, so I don't!

This cactus, with rounded leaves, blooms later in the fall closer to Christmas. It's breaking out in tiny buds though, so I think it's going to have a good year, too. Right now it's also in the downstairs foyer. The front door is to the right, and it's sitting on a dresser I've painted for a friend; it's just waiting to be picked up. Everything with a horizontal surface is fully utilized in my apartment. I captured my bare feet in this shot, lol, in the mirror below the vintage hats.

Self Portrait Polaroid, 1996-97

Self portrait taken with a Polaroid camera in 1996-97. I had just moved back in with my mom who was beginning to need some help with things at age 78-79. After New York I had found some interesting work with publishers, both full time and freelance. I began to hone my Photoshop skills but by this time I found myself managing a Sir Speedy copy center in New Haven. It turned out to be one of the best times of my adult life. My mom would die in '99 and then things began to percolate, lol.

Flag-ish

This is a work in progress, "Flag-ish," approximately 25 x 15 inches on a new "cardboad quilt." Besides my wooden pieces, I have about a dozen of these sandwiched pieces started. I think this series of "quilts" may have a hard backing and glass fronts with small clamps and no visible frame. I've added several layers to this piece I began almost a year ago (I think...). I have perhaps 15 wooden pieces in various states of finish all around, too. These will be part of the "Needles," series begun with "Nanny's Knitting Needles." In this case the multicolored, thin "needles" are, in fact, meant to portray stitches sewing this piece together—Americans are the bright threads sewing this crumbling nation together.

Happy Day!

 

I need to work on the smile a bit more, lol, but today's a happy day. On Sunday mornings I always listen to the last 5 minutes of ABC's This Week for their tribute to our fallen soldiers. They list the names and their hometowns of those killed this week in our war(s) around the world. For the first time in a long time, no Americans were killed. I was making pancakes at the time, so I finished up the batter with this [almost] smiley face!