Jen Jovan Art Musings and Random Thoughts

We Slumber Beneath Soft Moons

1/13/2020

We Slumber Beneath Soft Moons

"We Slumber Beneath Soft Moons" - mixed media on cradled Aquabord, 24" x 36" x 1.25". Ready to hang (back has been pre-wired for hanging). Available here and at Artfinder.

To some extent I happily don't know what I'm doing. I feel that it's an artist's responsibility to trust that. - DAVID BYRNE

This week I followed a breadcrumb trail left by the muse, which enticed me to abandon an abstract when this beastie appeared in the underpainting shapes. Hello, sweet slumbering creature!

It is tempting to begin the new painting year with a plan. With a goal. With a genre. With an organized approach. But that would be the way I started each new year in the past. Time for something new. A random, willy-nilly love-fest with the muse and her (his?) secretive and mischievous ways. To trust, as Byrne says, that I happily don't know what I'm doing.

And maybe we don't have to know what we're doing after all. So much of the good stuff in life is unexpected - happenstance and random shiny things that grab our attention and divert us from the known path. Because maybe the known path isn't really the right creative path for us in the first place. Let's diverge, shall we? Grab my hand and let's go!

About the painting - beginning with a deeply saturated underpainting in watercolor, adding random marks, liberally sprayed with water and squeegeed to begin. Once the large shape was isolated, adding inks, acrylic and gesso to define the creature while reserving large portions of the watercolor body. More spray and blotting for texture. The background was a wrestling match of many layers as the painter (ha ha - that's me!) vacillated on colors and whether it was day or night in the painting (silly painter! It was night!) Each layer painted with acrylic and gesso, sprayed and squeegeed until the right amount of drama existed in the background. Then a soft layer to isolate the moons, spray and blot for texture.

The Aquabord accepts a gajillion gallons of water (only a slight exaggeration). This substrate easily handles all the times I change my mind. :)

Let's begin this week with someone who happily has no plan when painting and trusts that completely.

Do any of you have paint brooms?

6 Comments

Dotty Seiter link

1/13/2020 03:29:32 pm

Jen, I am speechless at the trust and derring do.

jen

1/13/2020 04:18:49 pm

Dotty! Woot! Derring do is what we do, right?

Carl

1/13/2020 04:33:01 pm

What a wonderful little creature emerged. Thanks for sticking with it.
I do a fair amount of planning in my life and work. I was after all a project manager in another life. But when I step up to the easle or camera or computer. I’m a blank slate all plans go out the window and input the muse in the drivers seat as much as possible.

1/13/2020 05:08:33 pm

Carl! Thank you! And it always amazes me how you can be so productive and organized and YET be so inspired every day. You are a great example for the rest of us!

Carol Edan link

1/15/2020 02:28:20 am

Such a sweet slumber cat! Need a cat like that to put me to sleep! Wow what a painter! Can't wait to see what you will be doing after your workshop! You;ll need lots of walls!

1/15/2020 11:40:05 am

Carol! We all need a slumber cat...:) This will be the second workshop I've taken with Jesse Reno. His process informed my early work, and I simply cannot wait to see what it does for me now!

We Slumber Beneath Soft Moons

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