Seascape Artist

What do painting seascapes and doing laundry have in common?

First … for me … both are just as necessary in my life as breathing. Being from the landlocked Midwest … one would not expect me to have an affinity for seascapes and seascape painting … but rivers or lakes are just as fascinating to me as either the Pacific Ocean or the Gulf of Mexico – I have not visited the Atlantic Ocean yet that I remember anyway.

I have always loved watching the water .. seeing what critters may be in it swimming or diving or just edging around looking for their next meal. I was never a freshwater fishing person … too boring just sitting there watching the end of a pole waiting for it to bob up & down. Whereas watching the water between hiking around it or next to it was lots of fun … still would be if my RA (Rheumatoid Arthritis) could be reined in and the inflammation downgraded to livable for walking and exercising instead of making me a candidate for passing out just looking at a sidewalk let alone a hiking trail.

Yes … I do seriously miss the marvelously exciting adventures of hiking and biking – I always loved going places and doing things … I am a thin active person trapped in a couch potato body / life at the moment … I keep hoping for a medical miracle … but until I get one .. I will be the one painting those seascape moments of wilderness with no people that held LOTS of silence broken only by the wind, waves and my own breathing.

I have discovered that I can paint seascapes sandwiched in between loads of laundry .. between washer & dryer .. between the second load for the washer … watercolor pencils are easy to sketch out something … go load the washer … brush water over the layer … load the dryer … it makes the time pass VERY quickly when doing laundry and I sometimes wonder where the day went when doing all my laundry … until I look at the amount of painting I have accomplished that day!

I’ve learned that I do not dislike doing laundry now that I am doing something fun between laundry tasks … give it a try and discover watercolor pencils and their magic too!

We all know how scary this turbulent economic crisis is for us as people trying to live normal lives let alone trying to create art amid the fear, unhappiness and horrible events such as the AIG Bonus Scandal.

Yes I called it a scandal … normal people working normal jobs do not get hundred thousand let alone million dollar bonuses from companies generally speaking and those at the top of those financial pyramid schemes are the ones who already scammed billions of dollars out of the system and us … and now they are getting even more that will cost our great-grandchildren and possibly to many generations after them at the rate the Federal Government is now shipping them even more tax payer money (AKA more China Debt – do they own the entire country already anyway with what we already owe them?) … thanks President Obama … if you think you absolutely HAVE to get more of China’s money … I would much rather you sent the money directly to us U.S. taxpayers who could pay their bills … buy groceries to feed their families … make their mortgage payments … etc.

No one in Washington or Congress cared UNTIL it was announced to the United States taxpayers and suddenly because WE cared and are angry and quite vocal about it even standing in line at the grocery store … suddenly these jesters we call politicians care … note the business executives do not care …I’m guessing that some are frightened they might get lynched by an angry mob of their former friends and neighbors though when their names are finally announced so that to me is the reason some are giving the most current $$ back … not because they care but because they are terrified what will happen when their names become public.

What does this have to do with seascapes and art you may be asking?

For some artists this crisis has paralyzed their ability to create art at all … they are too scared … worried … petrified … to work on painting, drawing, etc while for others it has unleashed a tidal wave torrent of frenzied creative splendor in their work that rivals anything they have ever done before or possibly may do again.

How an artist reacts and responds to life and living shows in our artwork .. cessation of creating artwork speaks volumes just as new works gushing out like Texas oil rigs does … for me, I am somewhere in the middle … I am working on small projects in small bursts of creativity … mostly small portraits of palm trees but also learning new skills like scrapbooking.