It's been a great while since I've been on, same amount of time since I've been in the studio.  Today I am almost finished the studies, just black and white on top of diox purple to go.  The paint is drying now or else I'd update the WIP page.  What have I learned?  Well, it hasn't gone as expected and I'm not sure how much I've actually learned about color or if I've even regained my painting "vocabulary".  In the beginning I insisted that I needed to "relearn" what I had "forgotten" about color and my process.  I still don't remember the old process, but I'm not the same person I was when I stopped 9 years ago.  Why should my work be the same?

     So, here's where I'm at.  I really enjoy the act of laying down the "gestures" in the first part of the process.  Oddly enough I am more interested in the movement/compostion than I am in the color layering effects.  Sort of reminds me of Kandinsky.  Why call them gestures?...well, they make me think of doing gestures in life drawing studio.  Every day we'd get around 15-30 minutes of one minute poses to capture the figure and "warm up".  I guess every study has been a warm up of sorts for me, a start.  This time however, there's no model to look at, just the forms, lines and shapes that come quickly from my mind. 

     I have opened up my thinking regarding what I want to do/explore, but no permanent answer to "do I know what type of artist (I) want to be?" (as a friend very intuitively inquired when I expressed my struggles of late in the studio).  Let me think about that one.  I enjoy the time I get to spend in the studio, though it has been very limited.  Work days have been long and gruelling this past month.  When I get home I just want to eat and vegetate into oblivion in front of the computer.  After today I am reminded of how engaging even 30 minutes in the studio can really be.

  So in answer to the "what type of artist" question: at this point I'd say I want to be one who explores.  This process has been about opening creative pathways and thoughts for me.  About letting my mind go to really think about what I'd like to try and where the next step may lead.  It's been about remembereing that I do have a creative mind that needs to be fed by the creative process, not just back episodes of Hell's Kitchen on hulu (I don't know why, but I love it when he calls people "donkey", cracks me up).  The quest continues I suppose, I'll keep feeding my mind, keep reading, keep painting, keep meditating....and a little Gordon Ramsey doesn't hurt either.  

     Anyway, I'll update the shots tomorrow and write some more. 

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