i've been painting shapes and patterns. again. some i like more than others. but when i see them all as a whole they begin to feel more visually cohesive.
when i started moving the brush around and making these grey zig zags i looked up at a rumpled taped magazine page that has been on the wall above my art table for around 2 years. it's of a matisse painting that i found in a doctor's office. and i stuck it up on that wall with yellow tape long ago because i wanted to study it. find within it the thing that attracts me. i've been wanting to recreate it in my visual journal ever since, thinking it had something to teach me. so today i did. finally i did.
and now i am turning mental somersaults thinking of the matisse book from the library i'm going to check out tomorrow and come home and find more matisses to paint in my journal. because there's things i want to know about painting. and i think matisse can teach me.
i'm looking at towels and sheets and pillows and bowls and glasses. my representations of course do not resemble those things when i'm done, but i'm fascinated by the patterns and shapes around me.
and mostly i love knowing that i don't have to stop. i can just keep going. keep sitting at my table in the morning sunlight listening to birds and cats and coffee dripping into my cup.
and KEEP GOING. keep going. keep going.
today when i drove out to the beach and had my taxes by my quirky wonderful tax fellow of the last ten years…he said, "isn't it great to be alive? isn't life amazing? we're on a planet that is whizzing through space…going i don't know how many miles per hour…and"
i didn't want to interrupt and say, 'hold on let me get out my notebook and write all this down!' so i'm a little fuzzy about the part after us whizzing through space, but i really understood the joy he was trying to convey. i really really did. the end.
beautiful, fun, colorful Matisse patterns…. I was really irritated about the finale of Downton Abbey. seriously. but your journals made me smile.
BTW….love those candy pages…just wanna lick ’em (kind of like that scene in “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” (1971 version, natch…THE only version to watch IMHO) with the lickable wallpaper…tasteee.
Matisse will show you the way. Paint on, sister, paint on……
Isn’t it great when something sublime comes out of the visit to the tax man (or dentist or dry cleaner)? Our tax man entertains us with magic tricks — literally. He’s a frustrated vaudevillian. I have a suspicion, Ms. Moss, that your tax man probably shares these insights with just you and no other client. He knows sympatico when he sees it 😉
Yummy, yummy pages!
I’ve opened this post up a couple of times over the last couple of days and left it up for inspiration. I’ve started my own pattern journal, altering a library discard book on Paul Klee’s drawings. It is so much fun and so meditative! Thank you three times over for all the beauty and light!
You are experiencing the joy of freedom – freedom to explore whatever you wish whenever you wish. How great is that!
Between you and the Tax man WOW I don’t know if my feet are touching the ground!
I absolutely love the bold visual richness of your art, it makes me happy.
oh my goodness, i love these patterns! i’m so impressed by your…bravery.. in just sitting down and painting…anything! the blank page scares me to death…i always feel like if i don’t draw or paint or make something magnificent (which doesn’t happen often) then i have failed…must. stop. thinking. that. yours are really really delightful.
What a wonderful, joyous, uplifting post. I felt stirrings of hope in my heart for the first time in a long time….looking at the yummy colors and patterns in your visual journal and reading about the tax man!! Your joy is contagious, thank goodness!!
Wow, wow, wow. Just wow.
The blue flowers on the field of grey. Yum.
love it!
Beautiful colours and joy in that journal – very Matisse-esque! I’m enjoying the last of a three day weekend – and you, you lucky girl, are still in just the second month of your long break. Talk about joy!!!
Erin in Morro Bay
Not working every day allows you to enjoy those things all day long! I am retired (almost one year ago today) and an slowly but surely casting off all of the rushing around, crazy getting things done so I can do what I want to do… It is a whole different world and I LOVE IT!
i l.o.v.e. your visual journals! when i saw the page opposite the grey stripes i knew you had been touched by henri! what a happy, happy thing to have happen to oneself.
what a awesome story to share with us. I can feel your energy, light, and wonder reach me on this sub-sub basement freezing cold day here in MN and I am lapping it up like a kitten offered a bowl of cream. I LOVE stories like that and even more I ADORE people like that, that offer those little bits of life’s sweetness roll off their tongue, happiness shared. I am totally diggin’ your painty, sketchy, pattern filled journal. The colors are bouncing off the page and blitzing me with their tricks, and twirls; dancin’ on the paper, ballet with paint, seriously..all that glorious, serendipitous movement. I bet you didn’t know you are a choreography and that you are paint whisperer. Matisse is beaming down on you, oh yes he is!!!!!!!!
And, once again, I’ve read your post and feel like I can accomplish anything today. Or not. Either is okay. I’m just whizzing along like everyone else, enjoying the ride.
Odd thing… I just went to a Matisse exhibit at the Met in NYC this weekend, so I definitely have him on the brain… (great show btw) As you know he’s all about bright colors and simplifying shapes. So when I open your post this morning (I’ve been reading daily for years now)and I look at your first image of your journals and patterns (which I’ve seen umpteen times) and I think “Matisse!” before even looking or reading further. And then you start going on about Matisse. I think someone is trying to tell me something too. 🙂 Oh and I’ve also had that same thought about feeling in the moment joy and how big it feels despite being a spec on our planet that is whizzing through unending space. 😉
Love the journal pages. Love the Tax Man and his expression of wonder and joy. I plan to steal his thought for my art journal. 🙂
Moss meets Matisse!
I do Love his creations too. Will be delightful to see what comes of your dalliance with Henri.
Morning Sunshine? Oh! Any sunshine welcome here – February in England not quite so bright…still near freezing…
Whizzing on thru… glad of the warm joy you convey. Did my Downtown email land?
xxxj
Great… Magnificent
“and mostly i love knowing that i don’t have to stop.” that says it all! You are the trail blazer for grabbing life. Thank you for that
Who would know that Mr. TaxMan is your own private angel… Sounds like you know.
Your joy ozes out of these pages, so glad you’re sharing it via blogging and photos to the whole wide world moving through space & time.
XOXO
yes.
What is also amazing is that he is that zen and happy…and he does TAXES! You have the right tax man.
I am entranced with your meditations in paint. It’s exploding off the page with expansiveness, creation, and joy 🙂
perfectly lovely, all of it, including the comments. thanks everyone!
Love the new look of your blog. Is that Echo Park? Re: moving through space at lightning speed, I think it’s something like 67,000 miles per hour, 18 miles per second. Rather unbelievable, isn’t it!
What a delightful, inspiring day! Thanks for sharing it.
I love it when I run into people who are so joyful, so grateful to be alive on this amazing planet. Joy is something to seek out, to make sure walks in the door every day and to write down your thanks for this gift. I believe that what you focus on expands, so the more joyful and thankful you are the more joy and blessings will come into your life. How could it be otherwise? It has to be a law of physics, right? If it isn’t, then I’m making it up: The Rule of Joy.
I’m in love with your tax man, sight unseen. Really.
What a fantastic idea! Learn from the masters by playing in your journal. I’ve recently learned the love of mark making, magical shapes and patterns. Why does it need to make sense? Who put that rule in the art journaling rule book?