As the title says, this is in progress. Hopefully, this will be one of a pair of paintings (diptych to be). You can’t see it in this snapshot, but in the grassy, palette knife painting around her, there are various letters of the American Sign Language Fingerspelling Alphabet as well as some stylized Lily of the Valley flowers. I will take better photos when this gets farther along, but I was hoping for a little feedback first. This painting, and the other that you can see on Flickr are to be carted off to a studio on Friday to figure out “how the hell do you hang these things?”.
Another study to prepare for the semester ahead… and not feel utterly useless. The spots and stripes on this image are from my window. I made a mad dash to use the last bits of sunlight to get a decent photograph of the piece.
Detail photos are available on the Flickr Feed should you like to look closer.
A study from the beginning of May. There’s nothing quite like signing up for a drawing class and realizing that you’ve been out of practice for a while. In an effort to not embarrass myself, I’ve start “borrowing” pictures found online and using them as figure studies. Yes, unethical and unfair, I know .. you can give me grief over Creative Commons and Common Use if you like, but most of the pictures used were listed under a Creative Commons license. That, and half the time I cannot remember where I pulled the photo from by the time I’ve used it. … If anyone in the internet recognizes their work, I’d be happy to recognize them for it.
On top of being an ‘artist’ and preparing to apply for my MFA, I have also been training to be an ASL to English interpreter. She wears many hats, she does. At any rate, I will continue to take classes and prepare and practice to achieve my certification an ASL interpreter along with my MFA.
Why do I bring this up?
I had promised to have some artwork up for April and truthfully I have some! But the scanner right now is disconnected. Sorry. So instead, I present for your distraction, my “final exam” for my ASL IV class. True, it’s not perfect, but here you are:
Hi! I have a story I want to share. It’s about a car accident. Years ago I lived in Chicago. My boyfriend and I decided to move from chicago to Connecticut. We borrowed a van, packed it and it was FULL. It was Heavy. It was old and slow, but … Whatever. Privately, I was very worried. I’d never driven through Chicago before. I asked my friend, ” I’ve never driven through Chicago before! How do you drive in Chicago? How do I find the freeway!” My friend told me not worry. It’s easy, the signs are very clear. Just find the highway signs and follow them. You’ll be fine. I thanked her.
So my fiance and I , the two of us got in the van, with my boyfriend driving. My job was to find the highway signs. It was easy. There was one that said go right, go left, go straight. Suddenly, the signs dissapeard. There was nothing. We searched and searched, drove and drove. Finally, I found one. It said the highway was up ahead on the left. We pulled up to the intersection and stopped at a red light. Another car pulled up next to us. On the other side of the intersection was a long, huge hill. We waited for the light. Finally, it turned green. We started to turn, but it was slow going. I looked out the window, and a car was racing down the hill right toward us. I yelled, “hurry, hurry!!”. The van poked along and the car rushed toward us. It seemed to take forever, the car rushing toward the van, the van slowly trundling across the intersection. And then, it broadsided us. I brushed myself off and asked if my boyfriend was okay. “Are you ok?” he asked. “I’m fine, but you’d better pull over.”
We pulled over and so did the other car. We called the cops and they showed up. The van was fine except for a large dent just behind my seat. A few more inches and I would have been dead. The other car was crushed in the front, totaled. The cops talked and discussed…. Finally, after one hour, the cop told us we were fine and we could go. We were surprised, but got in the van and took off.
Wow, I was really lucky. A few more inches and I would be dead! That car missed by a hair! Anyway, that’s an accident I’ll never forget.
