Thanks for all of the encouragement in getting through this transition period! Today we got our driver's licenses changed and became official residents of Pueblo--all very exciting. I'm especially excited to be getting our auto tags renewed with Colorado plates soon. It turns out that Coloradans as a whole aren't that fond of Texans, especially ones who move to their state. And many of them don't have any problem telling you so. To your face. I kinda wish I had known that before moving here, but I'm working on fitting in as much as possible which mainly means keeping my mouth shut and when I do have to open it, keeping the 'y'all's to a minimum. (We've been told 'you's guys' is more acceptable than 'y'all' but there's no consensus on it at this time. It may just be a Pueblo anomaly. Either way, it will be a while before those particular words glide smoothly out of my mouth.)
Thankfully, we've also met some wonderful people who have assured us that Texas is a completely acceptable place to be from. It's just funny how after living 8 years on the Texas/Mexico border I was looking forward to no longer being a cultural and racial minority and, as it turns out, I stick out as much like a sore thumb here as I did there. Oh, well.
The good news is that art is progressing! My bff Shannon and I are getting together at least once a week now to paint. (I so wish Shannon had a blog or some kind of online presence so I could introduce you to her more appropriately, but I don't see that happening any time soon so I'll do the best I can and try to stop referring to her in that annoying way as my bff.) We're starting off easy focusing on enjoying our time together, our music and our wine, and just letting the paint flow without judgment. I want to try to capture the progress of our work from blank canvas to finished painting so you can get a glimpse of how we work together and how a painting can progress from just pretty colors to a sudden idea, to oh-this-is-so-much-freakin-fun, to Oh-I-love-it!, to I-hope-I'm-not-the-one-to-screw-this-up and back again.
The first painting started out in no particular direction. Our styles and frequently used techniques are so very different that we didn't have any idea how it would develop but just wanted to have fun. If we ran into resistance or self-doubt, we quickly reminded each other that we weren't there to create a fabulous work of art, just to have fun.
Shannon started out on the left and I started out on the right and we worked for a while and then switched back and forth. Our first priority was just to get color on the canvas. At some point, I got the idea to drip ink and that's when the fun really started and the painting took off in its own direction.
I added some swirls, Shannon brought out the spray paint and layers began to pile up. We were totally into the white on this one and the sharp contrast of the red and black. Once the background was built up, and we had exhausted all the ideas that had been flying through our heads, we took a step back and wondered where to go next.
After years of experience painting murals, Shannon is so much better at realism than I am and it's one of the things I admire most about her skills as an artist. Thankfully, before we could think about it too much, she saw a garland of flowers draped across the canvas and just started painting. I joined in with little dots and details while she brushed on flowers and scraped them off again.
The hours flew and we worked later than we expected to so we decided to call it a night. It seemed that there were several other things that the painting still needed but we weren't sure quite what and saved them for the next day. However, in the early morning light, we met our creation again with squeals and pronounced our first painting done. Each process and painting will be completely different with their own challenges an rewards, but I was pleasantly surprised how easy this first try working together had been. And this, my friends, is how easily addictions are started. Stay tuned for painting number two!
