I spent these past 12 days at my family's cottage in the Kawarthas. Much of my time was devoted to diligent work on the painting visible above. Other activities included daily swimming; writing; games of Trivial Pursuit, Slang Teasers (aka Balderdash), and Monopoly; a 1000 piece puzzle assembled by half a dozen collaborators; heated conversations about physics, grammatical mood, and the photocarcinogenic components of sunblock.

And, of course, reading.

I didn't devote myself to reading a single text, and so regrettably finished nothing -- rather, I dipped in and out of a multitude of novels and non-fictions, frequently reading passages aloud to my companions (a behavior they tolerated gracefully). I'd like to share with you a series of  excerpts, many of which I did blurt out aloud or mark with a little dogear at the corner of the page.

I like to think that it betrays something of my thinking patterns that, when they are ordered carefully, each of the separately selected quotations shows thematic linkage to the quotation following it.

While I have not finished as much as I had expected to finish, I have started much more than I expected to be starting.

in second year zoology:

"What is that [you're drawing]?"
"Sort of a flower." (I often find myself drawing sort - of - flowers.)
"It looks like a fish."
"Oh yeah, I can see it. There're its gills."
"And the eye is there."
"Well, that's more appropriate for the class."
"Is a fish an animal?" Pause. "Oh, god...forget I asked."

The other day I decided it was time to resume work on a painting I started earlier this summer. I was out of paint thinner, so I went down to the basement to see what I could find: no thinner, but, hmm, industrial degreaser. I decided, in the spirit of adventure, to give it a go. Grease, oil ... my scientific principles told me that the result would not be dreadfully different. Like dissolves like.

The result was slightly different. The paint didn't thin as smoothly at first, but needed some encouragement. Water was repelled more strongly - I found some interesting uses for that.

What blew me away was the effectiveness with which it cleaned my paintbrushes. We're talking about brushes I forgot to clean in July and hadn't touched since. Stuck 'em in, left them briefly, and voila! good as new. No word of I lie.

Of course, I immediately fetched the brushes that had been neglected for longer - upwards of a year. (Yes, I am guilty of paintbrush abuse.) I then went out to the Coach House Open House, had a fantastic evening, slept in a little Friday morning, worked on updating my website ... drank  wine... possibly ... and, if memory serves, may have left the brushes until Saturday.

The degreaser had eaten through the metal. At least, it had on the less expensive brushes. Only one brush was completely ruined - costing me a grand total of $1.75. The expensive ones were completely fine. Actually, less ruined than they had been before.

For some reason the bristles were whole and fine.

One of my expert advisers expressed concern about the painting, which had come in contact with the insane solvent, but I used it for corrections, ie. painted it on and wiped it off, so the concentration left behind is probably harmless. It looks fine, and the stuff is fast acting. Professional. Yes, that's me.

A couple weeks ago my sister told me that she was to have nude models in her art class. Naturally, I said, ask your teacher if I can sit in. I forgot all about it, but my sister remembered and last week told me I was allowed to attend class at any time. Any class. I felt more comfortable crashing my sister's class. Wednesday, female; Friday, male.

Unfortunately, my sister had some type of sporting event on Wednesday. I could have gone alone but talked myself out of it by concluding that it would be a good exercise to draw a man, since generally I don't. (At the time I didn't think to go both days).

On friday I scrounged around for my sketchbook, and I met my sister and her friends out front of her school. The day was hot and hazy, and the greenery seemed lush. Inside the classroom, it was even muggier. I regretted wearing jeans.

We sat down and readied ourselves. The teacher talked to the students about the assignment they were working on - they needed to hand in a certain number of each type of drawing (contour, gesture, finished etc.). Though I could guess at the meanings, these words meant little to me because - as the teacher found out when she asked - I had never done life drawing with a live model. The model was doing push ups at this time, wearing a blue bathrobe.

I didn't regret my choice to draw the male model. It removed the sexuality from the situation. He also had an interesting body to draw. He did a few three and two minute poses, two ten minute poses, and one fifteen minute.

Click to see a ten minute. I should warn you that he, in the way that men tend to, has a penis. 

~

 

It's not that I don't want to learn. it's that, right now, I'd rather play pool and paint pictures of naked women.
unfortunately, comparative vertebrate morphology can't wait.

During the Easter long weekend I participated in the making over of my second cousin's bedroom(see entry). When we were at Ikea she picked out a photograph that she wanted - a pink sort of flower - that was blown up and mounted. Her aunt/my cousin-once-removed told her to hold out for something better - I'm not entirely sure if she volunteered me or if I volunteered myself, but here is the work-in-progress;
It is a Magnolia flower, referenced from a photograph that I took, done in oil on canvas. It is also the biggest painting I have attempted to date: