Portrait Marathon at Aucociso

A busy afternoon @ Aucocisco Galleries yesterday! I'll be doing this again next Saturday, the 17th! Thirty minute portraits for $100, $150 for couples or a family of three. Gift certificates availble at this sale price until the 24th, redeemable at any time. E-mail me at mmiller@meca.edu.

Fine Tuning the Spirits

Great Grandfather Godfrey
36" x 36"

Great Grandfather Adelbert Congdon

36" x 36"

Great Grandmother Harriet Bullock Congdon

36" x 36"

Some of the portraits for my upcoming Mything Persons exhibit will be more "finished" than others. I will leave some of the drawings more gestural and loose. I just want them all to have a presence...

Here are three of the more finished ones. I have thoroughly enjoyed working on these drawings to this degree of "finish" - it's so satisfying! I used to think that only my fast and loose drawings had any interest or value, when an older and wiser artist friend of mine said, "Martha, these are just two different ways of working - one is not better than than the other."

Words to remember...

Happy Autumnal Equinox!

Giuseppe Arcimboldo.

Icons Updike and Katz

I've just started rereading John Updike. I inhaled his Rabbit series back in the eighties (when I was in my thirties) along with several other of his novels; Roger's Version, The Witches of Eastwick, Couples, and The Coup, to name a few. In recent years I have not been able to get into much fiction. I've mostly read artists' biographies and books on theology. Funny how our literary tastes can change. But while at the library last week I picked up Updike's collection The Early Stories and am thoroughly enjoying again his fine artist's eye and visceral, detailed portraits of his characters. Funny also that I should find on-line today this portrait of Updike by Alex Katz (top image), an artist whose portrait work I think of as the opposite of visceral. Typically iconic, cool and slick, his faces and heads never really interested me. Not enough juice, I'd thought. But today I see in them a depth, and a ripple of emotional movement under the surface that I had not detected before. Like I said, funny how tastes can change...

A Paned Foursome

I stayed up late last night to submit on-line (at the very last minute - it was due by midnight) my application to the Portland Museum of Art Biennial. This will be the 5th or 6th time that I've applied. I have never gotten in, and honestly thought that I wouldn't bother this time around. A bit of sour grapes, probably. Or, just dreading rejection, again. Then I caved and submitted these four pieces from my ancestor portrait series, Mything Persons. I had to hustle to take these photos and piece them together in photoshop. Just four images are accepted - I wanted to show the drawings unframed, and also behind the windows, and I wanted to submit four portraits. My challenge was how to do this in four images. My sister suggested that I put them side by side in each of the four images - I called the museum and they said that this was OK and not breaking any rules. So here they are. My problem is that I never feel that what I have to offer is of enough significance to warrant being chosen for this *venerated venue.* I think my work is too trivial, not of universal appeal, not conceptual enough, blah blah blah, ad nauseam. I decided to silence that nasty voice and simply submit what is my most recent work. Take it of leave it, I say!! (But I would be thrilled if they take it...) (and I know I'll be sad and disappointed if they don't...) Who am I kidding? This is always an emotional ordeal!!

I dreamt last night that a woman who was in charge of a biennial (it was not the PMA) chose a pale and delicate pencil drawing of mine - a triptych of sorts - to be in the show. She loved it, and I felt so appreciated, understood, and honored. Who is she? Maybe me. Maybe I need to remember that what I think counts!

So here is my artist statement that I banged out at 11:30pm, just under the wire, without looking back. Ah, the rat...(ha ha ha! Freudian typo!!)...I mean, Ah, the ART scene. Wish me luck!!

Mything Persons is a series of portraits taken from a scanned family photo from the late 19th century. Typically I do my portraits from life, but this photo was so compelling, I had to draw these faces that look familiar yet strange. As I stared at the digital image of this old photograph on my computer screen, and zoomed in on each face, I searched the eyes for clues that link them to my life: Were they happy? What did they eat for breakfast that day? Did the women yearn to be more than wives and mothers? Did they enjoy sex? Were the men kind? What dysfunctional behaviors and what loving habits did they pass on to my generation? They look at us through old windows, holding onto their secrets as they merge with our own reflections.

Fridays at the Farnsworth

10 minute charcoal powder and charcoal demo.

Me starting the demo...

Some pics from the Mixed Media Portraiture class that I'm teaching on Friday afternoons at The Farnsworth Museum in Rockland. Charcoal and ink, and a sweet mother and child model duo were on the docket that day. I have a wonderful group of students, and I really enjoy the scenic drive up the coast each week!