the usual last minute changes have occurred. this time very important ones, as you will observe if you compare this version with the earlier one below.
the collaged pieces of map i added on the lower half of the watercolor/collage simplified the composition and allowed the most interesting elements to shine.
the map, by the way, is of the area where we live here in crestone/baca. very familiar and much loved territory.
this habit of last minute adjustments is interesting. just as i’m about to walk out the door, i cast a glance at the painting and catch something that, just moments earlier, i hadn’t noticed. to act immediately on these aesthetic alerts, you could call them, is all important. tomorrow, i may not notice them. having spent my entire day looking at this composition, it’s become as familiar as mikela’s face & body when i return to the house at the end of every day.
if something is off, it alerts me, and requests that i take action in the moment.
i knew right where to find the rolled up bunch of old maps, and pulled out the first one that came to hand, not consciously realizing i was honing in on our home here in the baca grande, as well as the mountain creeks where we take our walks and i go to paint plein air. there’s no describing just how much this addition has made to my emotional relationship to what i did today.
could it have to do with the pages of popescu’s amazon beaming i read last night before falling asleep? it was all about his deepening relationship to the land, to the mayoruna tribe and to loren’s new concept of time itself.
3:07 PM: today i continued work on 4/16/21 watercolor/collage, which i started yesterday. i worked all day, as the snow continued to fall, albeit a rather light, wet snow.
i added some collaged elements, which are distributed throughout this piece. they introduce the unexpected, interrupt the logic we’re addicted to and introduce the element of play.
DETAIL of the new piece
at work this afternoon on 4/16/21 watercolor/collage
4/16/21 watercolor/collage at the end of my painting day
8:37 AM: we got about 3.25” of fresh snow last night. Although this is great for our snowpack & our yearly average, the future for precipitation in the entire Southwest is bleak, and will move progressively to extreme drought & unlivable conditions; maybe even in our lifetimes but certainly over the coming decades.
i should get to the studio by about 10:30 and will post re:continuing work on 4/16/21 watercolor/collage.