What happened in 2018...
"Dave Scott -Astronaut"
Apollo 15
(9x12", Oils on Linen) Price: Not For Sale
After a horrendously difficult year in 2017 of selling one house, buying a second condo next to our original one and trying to finalize two house sales, pack ALL THE THINGS, and move all three around like Tetris, we successfully still have a home and studio to work with. But it took its toll. On top of that, going into 2018 I was already severely burned out with trying to produce art for shows. I was coming out of that around May/June 2018 and had started drawing a lot to be proactive at getting ahead of proposed paintings I had to complete for shows in the Fall. I'd just finished the last of what I could get done before actually starting to lay paint when the world, my world got spun on its axis at full tilt. On my birthday in late June, I was just about to start laying paint on a small portrait of Dave Scott, Apollo Astronaut, when my hubby said 'Come on, let's go out'. Reluctantly, I said okay. He wouldn't tell me where we were going at the time. We get to a beach side bar to meet a school friend of his. I'm not dressed for it, nor really inclined to be a bar fly in any way shape or form but I go along with it. I trip on the sandy pavement and fall. I sprain my right wrist, break my right elbow, scrape up the palms of both hands, and the muscles in my left foot seize up very painfully until the next day. I'm not going to go into the semantics of that day, other than it truly fouled things up for quite some time. I went to my doctor's office that day and was immediately sent for an x-ray. Took two days to find out that I indeed had broken my arm. Doc's nurse told me to stop doing everything, go buy a sling to immobilize said broken wing and booked a date with an orthopedic surgeon the next Monday to see if I needed a cast. On the day between the accident and the diagnosis, I was looking a deadline in the teeth and decided to start painting on a pre drawn up board. I got 98% of the above portrait done of Dave Scott...didn't finish the final detail on his helmet clamp or helmet swing joint (round thing near ear), but I came very close. I was holding up my shaking right arm with my left near the end, but just couldn't do that last tiny bit of detail. I downed tools for the night and thought I could do it in the morning. But that was when the nurse rang... It was now less than five days before we had to leave for Spacefest in Arizona. My first big show with ASTRONAUTS. I'm a product of the 1960s and adored the space program, so I was determined to be there, meet them, buy autographs, and maybe sell a few tiny paintings and/or prints. I spent quite a bit on this once in a lifetime chance of meeting ASTRONAUTS. You might guess that I'm a fan. LOL The other little painted portraits didn't get painted, but I framed up Dave Scott's and took it with me. I paid extra for him to sign the back of it and indicate his Apollo flights. I took photos of him with it. That all changed my little painting from simply art to an artifact. On the back of the painting, in a plastic bag are the photos, the receipt for the autograph, and a certificate of authenticity: just in case I get a major financial offer to buy it that I can't refuse in the future. Meanwhile it sits proudly on my study wall and I am so danged proud of it, at what I painted that day. One of my best ever wet-in-wet, painted in one session, sketchy portraits. The photograph above just doesn't to it justice. The painting has such vibrancy and almost a 3D look to it in real life. Maybe I'll paint the other drawn up canvas of astronaut Charlie Duke one of these days.
After that, my husband's anxiety over a couple of minor medical issues of his own went into overdrive and my own mindset spiraled trying to deal with his plus my own. I lost six weeks of painting time but managed to squeeze out a couple of portrait pieces...sadly nowhere near what I'd previously planned...and a few space pieces for Illuxcon 2018, trying to fill an expensive display space I erroneously purchased the previous year. I filled it, but not with what I had originally planned, sadly. After that major burn out again, I failed to paint again for just over two years. 2019 brought it's own difficulties with beloved husband going through eye surgery and needing multiple doc' visits throughout that year. Just a FYI, I am now breakable, post-menopause, and ended up breaking my right pinky finger the week of hubby's eye surgery, and my right thumb socket six months later in another fall...just on carpet that time. Just when things were starting to calm down after Christmas in 2019, 2020 brought the Corona virus and the lock down, and it's own set of anxieties and fears. Like a lot of creatives out there during this time, I felt the creeping paralysis that strangled my creativity big time. My reserves were directed toward keeping my husband balanced and working throughout the scariest of that year and 2021, since his career didn't completely stall. He painted and drew, and kept up his contracted projects, and we dredged paintings, books, prints and drawings out of our archives to sell online. We actually did quite well. Me? I buried my head in endless reading of books, and I kickstarted my writing again in a big way, and we visited with friends and family via Zoom and kept up contact with our singleton friends who were alone at home during the shelter in place. Keeping connected. One blow, though was that during July of 2020, my beloved Dad passed away at home in Australia. He was very sick, but the actual loss was still devastating to my tiny family. The borders were still closed until recently, but hubby and I are planning a trip home soonish. We're waiting a bit to give things a chance to settle down, especially with the attempted Russian genocide taking place in the Ukraine. You have just got to ask 'what the hell is WRONG with people?'
Anyway, I've started to paint again. My depression, post menopause anger issues, etcetera, that made doing even the most tiniest of things seem like gigantic hurdles is finally coming to an end. Which is what making this blog post is all about. Making myself finish image processing, collecting my thoughts, and get out of the way of my too introvert mindset and reaching out to the world again. Admittedly, it still is difficult some days, but it's getting better. Over the next days and weeks, I'll be adding more blog posts showing off the rest of the art from 2018, the singular commission piece I did for a publisher in late 2019, and the few little space/rocket doodle paintings that I've managed in the last six months. As for the pages you see below, these are from my special sketchbook that I've kept for 30 years, where I sketch a public figure (author, actor, musician, explorer, astronaut, etc.) and get them to sign it for me. I filled the last pages of that book in 2019, so my lovely husband surprised me with a new one where I drew astronauts to christen it's first pages as well. So...onward...
Dave Scott - Certificate of Authenticity
and photos
On the easel...
Pages from my special sketchbook/autograph book and the source from where some of my future painted portraits may come from in the future.
The two astronaut drawings here are actually signed, but I don't have updated photos of those right now.
Thanks for stopping by. I hope to put more up soon. Expect portraits, birds, space doodles that include rockets and space stations. Meanwhile, stay safe wherever you are in the world and hug each other when you can. I've lost several friends and family this last few years, as have others, and life is way too short... Bless.
Marianne
