Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Art Inspiration

My friend, Jane, came to visit this week, with paint gear and sketch book as always. She is a great example to me of paying attention to the ordinary everyday scenes of beauty around us. She was the first one, years ago, who pointed out to me that art is about ordinary events.  She said, "Look at this famous painting: a little girl, sitting in a chair, with a handkerchief in her lap.  How ordinary is that?"  Jane showed me that great art is often not about the profound or miraculous, but about the common, the usual, even in the people around us.

 Though my tools as a writer are different from hers as an artist, we both enjoy looking for the moments of the day to capture with words, camera, or on canvas.  She is developing her skills as a plein-air painter - an artist who paints outdoors, capturing light and shadows, and being able to work quickly to capture a scene. The word comes from the French Impressionists style.  That is also what I attempt to distill into words: the impression of a scene or an event or a character.  She talks about composition, meaning to arrange the parts of a scene to create a unified, harmonious whole.  Not that much different from the compositions I write to form a picture in the reader's mind with words.

We talked and shared thoughts and inspiration and goals and motivation and where we are each headed with our skills, what we plan and hope to accomplish through our work. We spent a pleasant afternoon inspiring each other.
another one of Jane's paintings 
Her website and blog is  www.janethorpeart.com, if you want to peek at some more of her work.

2 comments:

  1. Well, milady! Good day to you! I'm Kathy,your newest follower and happy to be so! Your extraordinarily gifted daughter at Little Bitz of Art (don't know her name - yours either for that matter) visited me at The Writer's Reverie and suggested I visit you. Something about kindred spirits? I guess! Of course, you appear to have much more down time than I do. I just know that I need my blog for the creative and artistic connections I'm making. As a Christian, I want to surround myself with other like minded artistic Christian women - and I am so blessed to finally be at a place in my career where I can commit to blogging in earnest. I'm busy - but I'm no good to anyone if I'm not fed on the Word and the arts celebrating our Lord in all good things and beauty. Words - yes, they are my primary tool. As a dramatist, I have the pleasure of bringing the words I write to life on a stage. Would love to write that book I dream of - but my blog may suffice. Look forward to knowing you better and checking out your stories on your other site. Just now - report cards are beckoning. Come - follow me at www.thewritersreverie.blogspot.com
    Joy!
    Miss Kathy

    ReplyDelete
  2. Welcome! Glad you enjoy Bitzy's art, too. I love the kindred spirits in the blog world; connections that are fun and inspiring. Sounds like you are a teacher - we've homeschooled since 1982 - saw you have a Charlotte Mason blog reference, love The CM Companion by Karen Andreola. Good stuff! You have a beautiful blog, I will follow yours, too.
    Maureen (now you know our names)

    ReplyDelete