Lola Jovan Art Musings and Random Thoughts

The Chops and Changes of Time

12/4/2023

"The Chops and Changes of Time" - oil on paper, 21 x 21. (To purchase, click on the image, right)

Since the only test of truth is length of life, and since words survive the chops and changes of time longer than any other substance, therefore they are the truest. Buildings fall; even the earth perishes. What was yesterday a cornfield is to-day a bungalow. But words, if properly used, seem able to live for ever. VIRGINIA WOOLF

Oh, the lifespan of words.

Words from long ago, ages and ages before, still rolling around in the modern world creating thoughts and emotions and AHAs and oh-OHs. Woolf is right. But sometimes, the words that linger aren't an AHA or an oh-OH but an oh, no.

The Chops and Changes of Time

You know the ones - we spoke them when we didn't mean to, or didn't mean them, or didn't know any better. Or they were spoken to us - in anger, in frustration, in hatred or without understanding or compassion. Those words seem to live forever, too.

I'm trying to be better with words. The words I speak and write, the words I read, the words I hear and mostly, most importantly the words I say to myself on the inside. If words are like construction materials - surviving longer than any other substance - then what are my words building? The inner visual of this city of words under construction is enlightening. Methinks the city could use some soft play spaces.

Big thanks to everyone who rescued art from "gesso murder" (as one collector brilliantly called it) during the once-a-year save-the-art-from-the-gesso sale. My heart is full knowing all the paintings that whispered (or shouted) are heading off to the place they truly belong.

And stay tuned for the last Reader Giveaway of 2024 - the twelfth month of giving away art! Woot!

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Devouring Grief

10/9/2023

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Devouring Grief

"Devouring Grief" - oil on canvas, 15 x 30 x .75 inches. Ready to hang. Available here, at Artfinder and at Bluethumb.

Crow, devouring grief,
grows broader feathers, wide wings,
strong to soar with hope. - MARY W. COX

Our crow family at home has welcomed back Nicola (we think he is a fledgling from an earlier season), who was shunned over this year's breeding season. And the interloper (as we call a new crow) is being more and more tolerated by Rocky and Natasha. The interloper doesn't have a name yet - we shall see if they let him stick around.

In the studio, this crow was waiting for a poet. Insisting on pinks in his beak and a stark blue eye, despite my many attempts to make him fierce and monstrous. Cox's poem arrived shortly after our Lilly departed, and just after this crow was completed. I have goosebumps. Her words, this painting - a little nod and nudge from the universe.

Mary, you and the universe were in cahoots!

This piece is painted upon one of the many canvases given to me by the late Valerie Erichsen Thomson, and so is already a piece laden with the passage of time and the brevity of life. And yet, the tilt of this crow's head - is that a knowing smile?

Broader feathers, wide wings - oh yes. And some big ol' feet and long legs, please. Now you're talking.

The Downside of Lycanthropy is in full swing at Unlimited IPA in Portland, OR and right here on the website. A month of monsters, werewolves and the challenges of being very different in the modern world.

Take a gander! Add a werewolf to your own peculiar collection. I'd love to hear your thoughts. :)

Self-Control is Eclipsed By the Moon

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Alice and the Frozen Moon

7/31/2023

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"Alice and the Frozen Moon" - oil on Yupo, 22 x 24. Available here, at Artfinder and at Bluethumb.

It's dreamy weather
We're on
You waved your crooked wand
Along an icy pond
With a frozen moon
A murder of silhouette
Crows I saw
And the tears on my face
And the skates on the pond
They spell Alice.
- TOM WAITS, "Alice"

A last moment in Wonderland, where Alice finds herself in a dystopian landscape under a frozen moon. As always, our Alice is observant, curious, contemplative. We leave her here now, in solitude, booted and ready to explore other worlds.

Alice and the Frozen Moon

What has been uncovered while in the rabbit hole? The many sides of Alice, the peculiarity of life and the nonsense of trying to understand others and their realities, and the many dark shadows surrounding the creation of Alice in the real world. And as life imitates art, my own plunge into a rabbit hole has revealed nonsensical situations, people and dark shadows as well.

I've got a pile of books in the studio, and I pause to read and reflect while contemplating the paintings in their various stages. Permission to Feel (recommended by blogger, reader and artist extraordinaire Dotty Seiter) has been a map through some of the more challenging parts of my own Wonderland. The Book of Delights, by Ross Gay, has me teary and grateful. Journey of the Heart, by John Welwood, has me nodding and feeling seen in the world of sensitive hearts. And now, these and others are interwoven here in the studio with Alice and all the symbolism of an extraordinary, timeless story.

Let's head off together, dear reader, on the next adventure now. TTFN, Alice. I'm sure we'll be back again. xo

click on the image to buy the art

About the art: the inspiration for this piece resulted from a long afternoon with the AI bot and imagining Alice in various unexpected places. By combining more illustrative concepts with an abstracted background, a forboding, dystopian landscape emerged.

Beginning with a gamsol and paint laden brush, I sketched the basic composition of the piece in loose, watery shapes on yupo, leaving a blank spot for Alice and for the moon to preserve the whites a bit. Slowly building layers with rubber wedge, paper towel, chopsticks and palette knives, then creating Alice with tiny brushes and hard edges. As always, resisting the urge to overly define the background shapes and instead focusing on the path of light.

It's the final day of A Song For The Hunted.

Helaine and I are overwhelmed by and so grateful for all the positivity, support, delight, love, purchases, shares, and comments from all who visited our show.

Thank you!

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Consciousness Alone is the Most Exhilarating Thing

12/19/2022

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Consciousness Alone is the Most Exhilarating Thing

"Consciousness Alone is the Most Exhilarating Thing" - oil on linen panel, 10 x 10. Available here and at Artfinder.

“Do you not find consciousness alone to be the most exhilarating thing? Here we are, in this incomprehensibly large universe, on this one tiny moon around this one incidental planet, and in all the time this entire scenario has existed, every component has been recycled over and over and over again into infinitely incredible configurations, and sometimes, those configurations are special enough to be able to see the world around them. You and I—we’re just atoms that arranged themselves the right way, and we can understand that about ourselves. Is that not amazing?”
― Becky Chambers, A Psalm for the Wild-Built

I'm lost in space again in the studio. It's an exhilarating place to be.

Fueled by our most recent read, a delightful book in the Monk and Robot series. Filled with tea-serving traveling monks, robots who live in the wild and philosophies that just leave me weeping with delight. Life as imagined on this moon world is something to be carefully sipped and savored.

What have I done this past year? I've thrown purposeful productivity to the wind in favor of a more meandering existence. I mean, I get the important things done, but maybe the most important thing is really simply existing. Just being is good enough. In fact, it's splendidly marvelous. It does result in a very random path in the studio, with no less than ten paintings in various stages of exploration. Each of them on top of a prior painting that has been recycled.

And, thanks to the insightful recommendations of reader/artist Carol E, there is a huge container of cold wax and a new book of inspirational techniques waiting to become...something. Atoms arranged in the right way, perhaps?

About the art - using the Afterlight app to insert an inspirational photo of a space helmet into a portrait reference photo, I created a jumping off point for a light pencil sketch on linen. Choosing an extremely narrow color palette and adding thinned layers of oil paint with rubber wedge, brush and fingers. Allowing dragged paint to become highlights and reflections. Wondering what the woman in the helmet is pondering.

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The Chops and Changes of Time

Devouring Grief

Alice and the Frozen Moon

Consciousness Alone is the Most Exhilarating Thing

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The Chops and Changes of Time

Devouring Grief

Alice and the Frozen Moon

Consciousness Alone is the Most Exhilarating Thing

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