Alison de Lima Greene, me, and Three Girls

Meeting Alison de Lima Green, the Curator for Modern and Contemporary Art at Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and the juror of the VAA Open Exhibition, titled “Other Stories About Who We Are” was a transformative event for me. Not only did she select my work for the exhibit, we had a delightful, albeit brief conversation at the opening reception. It was a brief conversation because, even though the art was the star of the show, everyone there knew that the real star was Alison de Lima Greene, and everyone wanted to talk to her. She made it a point to meet all of the artists in attendance, for which I was grateful. Admittedly, I’m fangirling here — the opportunity of having her see my work was the only reason I entered the show. That she selected it — priceless! AND, her juror remarks were so eloquent and well said — if only someone had recorded it! (Maybe they did — anyone?) 

In her juror statement in the printed exhibition pamphlet, she says that the works in the exhibition were “chosen for their visual wit, their emotional engagement, and that almost ineffable quality of being able to capture and trigger one’s imagination.” (!!!!!)

As the night was coming to a close, and she was getting ready to leave, I realized that I didn’t have a photo with her, and she graciously acquiesced to the above photo, even “curating” the photo by directing the photographer (daughter Anna) on where to position the camera angle to get the best shot. She’s a genius. 

Sigh. Maybe someday we’ll be friends. (Alison — want to grab a coffee sometime?)

Another moment of fangirling — on an Instagram post where I had posted a photo of the painting and was (excitedly) making an announcement that it was selected by Alison de Lima Greene, artist Marta Chilindron “liked” it. For y’all who don’t know, Marta Chilindron is a big deal. She is a sculptor with works in museums across the country and world, including a piece in the new Kinder building at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. And she “liked” my post! Eeeeee!

Sigh. Maybe someday we’ll be friends. (Marta — want to grab a coffee the next time you’re in Houston? I’d love to meet you.)

With Natalie at the #Obamaportraitstour

Lastly, over the weekend, my museum buddy friend Natalie and I went to see “The Obama Portraits Tour” at the MFAH. The two portraits are absolutely riveting — an extremely well written Paper City article by Leslie Loddeke, in which she explains the symbolism and significance of the portraits, commissioned by Smithsonian Institution’s National Portrait Gallery is here. It’s well worth the read.

Afterwards, Natalie and I really did grab a coffee (and tea) and have a chat, because we ARE friends. Sigh. Good times. 

It is my pleasure to announce that Three Girls, or The Three Graces was selected by Juror Alison de Lima Greene, the Isabel Brown Wilson Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, for inclusion in Visual Arts Alliance 38th Juried Open Exhibition. Word on the street is that she only selected 10% of the work submitted for the show, only 50 pieces (!), so, understandably, I was overcome with emotion when receiving the news, and admittedly, choked back a few tears upon hearing it. 

Three Girls, aka The Three Graces, oil on linen, 24″ x 36″

It takes a long time for oil paints to really dry, and watching this one settle into what it is becoming has been a delight. It’s truly wonderful to see it in person, and to that end, I encourage all of you in the Houston area to see it in person at Sabine Street Studios from May 9th – June 11th. 

Mark your calendars — the opening reception for the show will be May 18th from 6-9pm. (Juror remarks are usually around 7.) The Amazing Reese and I will be at the opening reception and would be delighted to see you all — Sabine Street Studios — 1907 Sabine Street, Houston, Texas, 77007.

16″ x 20″, oil on linen

Work began, and as the painting progressed, it became increasingly obvious that something was “off”. It was not without calculations and finagling and tweaking of the vanishing point, which the Amazing Reese helped me accomplish by stretching a piece of thread across the canvas, that the painting finally started coming together. 

Finding the vanishing point with a piece of thread

Painting is a mystery. How is it possible to take an idea or an image and convert it to a flat surface? Though I’ve spent years painting and creating, the finished product still overwhelms me with wonder. 

P.S. I’ve known the young lady in the painting her entire life — literally — even to the point of being in the delivery room when she was born! 

There’s a beautiful scene in the movie, Big Fish, where the main character, Ed Bloom is recounting the story of his life to his son. He tells of being completely enamored by a young woman he sees across a room. As he walks toward her as all action around him is stopped, beautifully illustrated by even a spilled bucket of popcorn with popcorn kernels suspended in mid air.

They say when you meet the love of your life, time stops, and that’s true. What they don’t tell you is that when it starts again, it moves extra fast to catch up.

And then, the action in the scene fast forwards. 

My own life is feeling a little bit like that right now. The last few years have been spent almost exclusively concentrating on restoring my health, and now, it seems like time is moving extra fast to catch up, and specifically, in this case, illustrated by having another four of my paintings on display in an art space in Pearland, Texas.

These will be on display through June 3rd at the Vineyard Church Art Gallery, 2905 Harkey Road in Pearland.   

Peonies in a Clear Vase, oil on board, 32″h x 29″w

Lily Pondering, oil on linen, 30″h x 30″w

Sheer Delight, oil on linen, 20″h x 16″w

 

Perchance to Dream Oak, oil on linen, 30″h x 30″w

The Amazing Reese and I have a previous commitment, and will miss the “meet the artists/opening reception” night this coming Friday, April 22.  

Last night was the opening reception for Visual Arts Alliance 38th Juried Membership Exhibition. It was a wonderful reception — for a Wednesday night, there were a lot of people in attendance — and the quality of the included work was impressive. It is wonderful to have my work in such good company. 

Studying my painting with juror, Lester Marks — always interesting to see my work through someone else’s eyes

It was so nice to be back in person, though, to be fair, with all things pandemic considered, VAA did an amazing job for their virtual 37th Juried Membership Exhibit back in November 2020. (Girl with Apple was in that show.)

Happy to have had “Martin” chosen for the exhibit by juror, Lester Marks

Though Houston is the fourth largest city in the United States, it often feels like a small town. It was such a treat to catch up with several old friends throughout the evening — some were fellow artists, and some were friends who showed up on my behalf. Thank you all, or as we say in the South, thank all y’all. 

Delighted to see one of my favorite people — I love her!

The show will be on display through the month of April at Sabine Street Studios, 1907 Sabine St. here in Houston. 

I’m ever so grateful to be back in the studio, painting, pausing, and painting again. It feels like my soul is waking up a little bit more every day. Alleluia!

It is with delight that I announce that my painting, Martin, was selected by juror Lester Marks for inclusion in the Visual Arts Alliance 38th Juried Membership Exhibition. Martin and I became friends way back when I was just a newbie on the Houston art scene. We don’t see each other nearly as often as in the past — life got big and messy for us both — but we still pick up conversation right where we left off, as is intimated in Martin’s pose in the painting. This is a 14″ x 18″ oil on linen portrait painting that captures the subject’s likeness with complete regard to his intellectually sharp nature and chatty personality. 

Martin, 14″ x 18″, oil on linen

The juror for this show, Lester Marks (in his own words) serves as the Mayor’s Ambassador to the Arts here in Houston, the fourth largest city in the United States. He is affiliated with Houston Arts Alliance, a quasi-governmental agency overseeing the funding of all the arts in Houston. He has been recognized by ARTnews as one of the top 200 collectors in the world, and by Art and Antiques as one of the top 100 collectors in America. 

This painting, along with the other selected member works, will be on view from April 4th – 30th, at Sabine Street Studios, 1907 Sabine Street, 77007, with an opening reception on April 13th starting at 6pm. The Amazing Reese and I will be at the opening reception. Hope to see y’all there.

When I first started painting in my early 40’s, there was an immediate jolt to my soul, a connection so strong that I actually started to see life in a different way. That’s one reason this blog is named Finding My Glasses, named not only for the obvious reason of my near constant pursuit of looking for my actual spectacles, but also because suddenly I was seeing the world through a lens where colors, shapes, and lines became part of how my world was interpreted on a day to day basis. Since painting in oils was developing into a new skill, there was a huge learning curve, one which I’m continually exploring, and a daily pull and tug to create as much as time and space allowed. 

For the last few years, all of my energies, spiritual, emotional, mental, physical, and creative have been intensely focused on a very basic “struggle” to return to full health after breast cancer, or as full as it can be after breast cancer. There hasn’t been much of anything left in this old body and soul to spend any amount of time in the studio….until recently. One of my dear art friends suggested that perhaps it was time to start pursuing art again, and at first encouraged me to tidy up the studio, and then to make a cup of tea or coffee and just go sit in the studio…..say a prayer, and if I’m supposed to pick up a brush that day then I will, otherwise, give myself grace and try again another day. So that’s what I’ve been doing. (For all of the extra sitting time in the studio, I’ve brought in a more comfortable chair.) This contemplative mindset is also very much in keeping with what my therapist has been nudging me toward — giving myself grace to sit and not be busy all of the time. It’s a BIG change for me.

Early on in my art journey, I decided that, for me at least, it was best to forge my own path so as to not be unduly influenced by anyone else’s work. I had read stories of  great artists before me who had destroyed their own work if they saw it was influenced by a mentor or teacher, and I wanted to avoid that step if possible, so, with the exception of one life drawing class at Glassell School of Art, and a three month still life drawing class, I am, in art speak, self taught. Part of what that means is that there is a LOT that I don’t know. It often feels like I’m starting at square one. The struggle to convert the idea for the painting, how I see it in my head and dreams, onto a two dimensional surface is real. But what joy is experienced when it all comes together.  This is one of those times! Both self imposed structure and grace have permitted time and strength to work on this painting. It’s a 36″ x 24″ oil on linen that I’m happy to now present. Voila.

The Girls, oil on linen, 24″ x 36″

Painting portraits is my absolute favorite of everything I paint. Mixing colors and seeing globs of paint transform a blank canvas into a recognizable human being is thrilling, even when bad eyesight has me scrambling between cheater glasses and a magnifying glass to get everything painted in the right place. Three years olds are adorable — that’s all there is to it — and are particularly difficult to paint because their features are so delicate and unformed that it’s hard to find shadows on their faces to distinguish one area from another.  This portrait was painted for a grandmother who has commissioned me to paint portraits of all of her grandchildren at the charming age of three. 

Thank you to the friend who encouraged me all those years ago to pick up a paintbrush. Thank you to the friend who, when asked, offers gentle and helpful criticism. And, thank you to the grandmother who trusts me to paint her grandchildren. 

This is a 16″ x 20″ oil on linen. 

When things go wrong, or right for that matter, the Amazing Reese has a way of putting it all in perspective. He asks, “Do you believe in predestination?” Now, without going down a trail of religious doctrine, Reese’s point is do I believe in something beyond my understanding that is guiding how I interact with the world, or conversely, how the world interacts with me? Some people call it fate, or destiny. The idea that some things happen for a reason and sometimes the best thing is to recognize this instead of agonizing over the outcome. I’m mentioning all of this because last week something happened to me for the very first time and it was weird, and disruptive, but ultimately, must have been for good, because no other explanation makes sense. For reasons beyond my understanding, the blog entry that I wrote about my time in Mexico with fellow breast cancer survivors was flagged for removal by google, because it violated their guidelines. (?) Google then re-evaluated the post and said the post was reinstated, but somehow it has disappeared into the great internet abyss, and I’m left with wondering whether to write about my time and impressions of Mexico again, or just leave well enough alone. (?) 

The main reason that I wanted to write about the vacation I just took is that I very much wanted to have a public record of my gratitude for the people who have supported me throughout the last four years as I have crawled, walked, and more recently, run through my breast cancer journey. So many people have contributed in small and big ways — prayer, notes of encouragement, paying for a house cleaner when I couldn’t do my own housework, driving me to appointments, bringing meals, flowers, contributing financially to ease the burden of medical bills, helping me crawl into bed when I was so weak with the effects of chemotherapy that I couldn’t even do it myself, loaning (and giving) me books, loaning me passwords so that I could use a Netflix account, loaning me a TV so that I had access to entertainment while recovering in bed, loaning me old movies on dvd, information gathering so that I had access to resources such as the therapist I’ve been seeing to help me process the trauma of it all, giving me mileage points to buy my plane ticket so that the trip was a blessing and not a burden financially — there have been SO many people who have helped. me. little ole me. THANK YOU ALL!!!!

So, fully vaccinated, I went on vacation…to Mexico….with fellow breast cancer surviving ladies, and it was lovely. There were 13 of us in total, there was instant camaraderie, and even some fellow HER2 positive breast cancer ladies (four of us.) We compared scars, emotional and physical. We ate together. We reflected together. We relaxed. We shopped. We roamed. We rejoiced and complained. I’m eternally grateful to have had a week to re-set my perspective, reflect on the last few years, and do it with lovely people in a lovely place. 

All 13 of us

P.S. — the blog entry that I published last week is back! Just using a few extra words here to express my gratitude. 

Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

A year and a half ago, I was granted a breast cancer survivor’s vacation to Rome through Send Me On Vacation. As those of you who are regular readers of my blog may remember, to pay for the plane ticket, I sold some paintings, and shopped for the least expensive ticket I could find, and bought it. Then, the entire world shut down because of the highly contagious, new coronavirus that was hospitalizing and killing people by the thousands. The trip to Rome was postponed. And postponed again. And postponed again. And again. It has been postponed so many times that I don’t even remember. So when the organization sent out an invitation to attend a trip in Nuevo Vallarta, Mexico, I quickly decided that this trip would be a delightful alternative. (On a side note — two weeks ago, the money for the plane ticket to Rome was finally credited back to our bank account, which has helped subsidize fees and incidentals while in Mexico. For this trip, one of my dear friends donated his airline miles for the plane ticket to Puerto Vallarta. So grateful.) 

Sayulita, Mexico

On our way to another adventure together, vaccinated and covid free.

It was a special blessing to spend time with new friends with whom I formed an instant bond. As beautiful as our surroundings were, in thinking back on the week, my favorite times were spent with these ladies. We took a taxi together into Puerto Vallarta to the south, and Sayulita to the north, and San Vicente to the east to roam the streets, visit the markets, barter for bracelets, sit in the square, and eat a meal (or a popsicle). In San Vicente, where our taxi driver took us to show us his hometown and buy us a popsicle, we were still at the square when a political parade moseyed down the street! I LOVE Mexico!

Thank you to those of you, friends and strangers, who have prayed for and supported me from the very beginning, when I announced my breast cancer diagnosis on this blog almost four years ago. Looking back on that blog entry, I was naive to think that everything was going to be completed within a year — little did I know or understand. With each day that passes, I continue to progress toward health and my new normal. I’m grateful for an opportunity to have renewed my spirit through this vacation. I’m exceedingly grateful for the new friends I’ve met. And, I’m grateful for those of you, dear friends, who continue to love, support, and pray for me, scars and all.

Sunset in Nuevo Vallarta, Mexico