Marvin Makes Messes

Marvin Makes Messes

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Marvin Makes Messes
pen and ink on wood panel
8 x 12 x .75 inches
This item is unframed but ready to hang.
(click on the image to purchase)

Clutter and mess show us that life is being lived...Tidiness makes me think of held breath, of suspended animation... Perfectionism is a mean, frozen form of idealism, while messes are the artist's true friend. What people somehow forgot to mention when we were children was that we need to make messes in order to find out who we are and why we are here. - Anne Lamott

I am learning to be messy.

Messy should be the first instinct of humanity.  Get your hands sticky, get your feet muddy, get your hair tangled, get chocolate on your face.  Now smile. :)

As a child, the only thing I was praised for was my tidy room.  Because the one thing I was that my siblings were not was tidy.  They embraced the mess, celebrated it, perfected the art of messiness.  I cleaned my room.  

I now understand tidiness was my way of trying to control something​ in a situation that was out of control altogether.

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​Even now, when I am anxious or stressed, I start cleaning.  In the studio that means organizing supplies, putting gesso on substrates, rearranging things.  What it does NOT mean is painting or writing.  Lamott's point is solid - messes are the artist's true friend​.  It is a sure sign for me that I am deep in a good exploration if the studio is a mess.  Who cares?  There is paint to be flung with reckless abandon!

​​Where are you on the mess spectrum?  Are you a morning bedmaker?  Do you have a floordrobe?  Is there paint on your hands?  Briars in your hair?  Ice cream on your face?  Leave a comment below!  As a bonus,  you'll be entered in the June Reader Giveaway!  

The current state of my paints

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About the art:  I can't seem to stay away from monsters.  This is a larger iteration of a guy I recently made and kind of adore.  He's enthusiastic about EVERYTHING!  Beginning with an unprimed cradled wood panel, I applied a sparse layer of white gesso (keeping the background a bit like a white-washed picket fence).  I used black gesso to create the vertical backdrop for Marvin, masking off the areas for balloon and figure.  The rest was a joyful meditation of pen and ink (Rotring Tikky Graphic Artist Pens work well on gesso'd wood) and then a black Posca pen for the ground beneath Marvin.