No, I didn't get to paint but the sky was so clear and the weather so mild, it was a beautiful day.  I have added a couple of new reviews but they are not documentaries.  I had seen the one on Pollock before, but thought it was worth a second viewing.  Back to my brushes. 

"Rosiness is not a worse windowpane than gloomy gray when viewing the world."  - Grace Paley

I have begun my next painting.  The inspiration is quite direct and I am looking  forward to the relationship.  Now it is new and exciting; later it will be like an old friend who shares my memories.   No surprise, pictured is my color of choice.  Back to my brushes. 

"I don't like work - no man does - but I like what is in the work - the chance to find yourself."  - Joseph Conrad

National Ag Day is a day to recognize and celebrate the contributions and the abundance provided by agriculture.  In honor of the day I am posting one of my favorite watercolor portraits I painted of a local farmer.  I thought his hands at work were beautiful.   Take a moment to visit the National Agriculture Day website by clicking this link.  Back to my brushes. 


"Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil and you're a thousand miles from the corn field."  - Dwight D. Eisenhower

I thought I would touch on drying a painting for just a moment more.  Indulge me.  If you run across a problem like I had blogged about earlier, there are alternatives.  When I restored the piece that was damaged I re-wet the back and re-stapled it and let it dry and then proceeded with the restoration project.  This is probably the best solution if you already have staple holes in the paper, and what I should have done in the first place.  (Hindsight, right?)  If you are planning on floating your painting in the frame this won't be an option.  I staple my paintings unless I am using 300 lb. paper or it is a particularly small piece.  For that reason I keep drying boards, and I might add that I have never had an issue drying on my boards.  So again, don't use acrylic as a replacement for a board.  How many little shards of paper did I remove?  I lost count but my tweezers and magnifying glass came in handy.  Back to my brushes. 

"When we are chafed and fretted by small cares, a look at the stars will show us the littleness of our own interests."  - Maria Mitchell

I'm going to give you some free advice, because I learned the hard way.  I had a painting that was complete but it developed a bubble at the framers.  I haven't had this problem before and I don't know why it happened this time.  I stretch my paper and staple it in preparation for painting, so before I remove it from the board it is dry and flat.  Naturally I was never going to be satisfied with it bubbled, so I decided to bring it home and flatten it.  No problem.  I put distilled water on the back and let it sink in then layered weights on the back and left it to dry.  Easy.  (Smaller pieces or paintings on 300 lb. paper I don't usually staple.)  I have several boards that I dry my work on and I know which ones they are because I put yellow electric tape around the edges.  Why?  The boards I paint on have left-over paint on them and I'm concerned the extra paint might transfer.  On the drying boards - no problem.  Well this time I didn't have any drying boards available.  What I did have available was some leftover acrylic sheets I had used in a workshop.  How many problems did this cause?  Let me count the ways.  First, it wouldn't dry.  Well, that makes sense of course looking back on it - after all, it's acrylic so no air will move through it.  So I left it to dry longer.  Uh oh.  What happened?  When I went to remove it - it stuck.  When I finally got it removed, about half the painting was left on the acrylic sheet.  And that wasn't all!  It also pulled tiny little shard-like pieces of paper up.  It took a second for my head to get around all the problems I was facing.  I just stood there, gobsmacked.  After the initial shock wore off I cursed a blue streak and pulled my hair.  Aaargh!!!!  So what did I do?  I fixed it - as in fully restored.  It took 50 hours of concentrated effort, but I did it.  Luckily I had a photo of the finished painting so I could use it as a go-by.   And the truth is that it was easier because I just did what I had already done.  I had already made all the decisions the first time around.  I began to think restoration work wasn't too bad.  But the time, tick-tock, I won't get that back.   Hard lesson learned.  Save yourselves!  Don't.  Ever.  Do.  This.  Back to my brushes. 

"Disappointment is an endless wellspring of comedy inspiration."  - Martin Freeman

So I was coming home from my framer today and was listening to this interview on NPR about an exhibit in Chicago of Van Gogh's bedroom paintings -- three being displayed together.    I could hardly wait to get home so I could see the images on the Science Friday website.  In case you missed it, check it out.   http://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/revealing-van-goghs-true-colors/  .  Back to my brushes. 

"History repeats itself; that's one of the things that's wrong with history."  - Clarence Darrow

Finished!  Signed!  Cheers!  Yep, I'm dancing. 

"If people stand in a circle long enough, they'll eventually begin to dance."  George Carlin