The Joys of Cough Syrup

I've been knocked out with the flu for about a week and a half and, thanks to the Joys of Cough Syrup, have a new series living in my head that's eeking it's way out. I have a bunch of new paintings sculpted and drying. One is the "Shared Joy" piece I've been building for months. It's very wet and heavy at the moment. Then there are four small pieces that are part of a series that began to sprout this past week - a series focusing on the crown chakra at different states of mind / soul.

Some will be more medium sized, like in the sketch shown, but all are tightly-cropped and focus on the head and immediate surrounding energy. One, called "Preoccupation" is weighted down at the top with fabric and shows the tension of energy from the rest of a person's existence being held down by worrisome thought.


I also want to go ahead and make a painting that my friend Helen and I were planning to do before she passed away last month. It involves a person at the center, curled up and sheltering themselves from prying hands. We were discussing her extensive experiences as a cancer patient and the inner resistance to always being "worked on" even though you know it's helping. She often talked about us collaborating on a whole show called "Fear Gone", a joint venture between my sculpted canvases, her notebooks, sketches, medical records and leftover medical devices, but now I think creation of this piece and another one that shows the same person unfurled and free despite the hands would probably complete the process for me. Her courage and determination in the face of catastrophic, life-changing illness was a tremendous inspiration. Her ability to never let her spirit fall, no matter what happened to her physically was amazing.

Anyway .... I'm going to need a LOT more casts.
Hoping to recruit a bunch more models for this round. Anyone who's interested in volunteering, let me know! I've also found a great way to process my latex goop into a smoother consistency. It's almost buttery, but still has some stucco-like qualities and doesn't need to sit for months in the latex to get there.

New progress!

The graphics business has been *very* busy since June, so not much time to work on artwork. The show at Lotus and Orchid was good, but unfortunately, like so many galleries these days, they had to close. Noelle Ellis was a wonderful gallery manager and I hope she'll be able to start another one up when the economy picks up again.

I've finished one commissioned piece - well almost. When it dries, we're going to mount a board with a wood plane embedded into the hands of the figure. There will probably be some touch-ups after that. He person commissioning the piece is the figure cast for it and he's known for his trademark pink logo and company vehicles, so I leaned more to the red, rather than blue base-tone. It's a fiery looking piece with only touches of greens and blues along the physical pieces and heart chakra area.





I'm also starting a pair of related paintings. The first one is the initiator/emitter of a thought pattern. The second is the receiver of that thought, showing his response to it.

They'll be primarily blues and light yellows with inclusions of other colors, a bit like "Resolution". Just started blocking in the basic colors on the first one today.

Haven't thought of titles for any of these yet. I hate titles.