New Piece in Another Medium

During winter I often amuse myself reading gardening magazines and catalogs, and this year a photo in one caught my imagination: a shady spring garden filled with Virginia bluebells, pink bleeding hearts, ferns and hostas. I immediately thought of the spot in my front yard under the two maple trees--wouldn't it be lovely to have a shady flower garden there? I ordered the plants and began to envision masses of blue and pink flowers against a backdrop of greens.

Yesterday afternoon I went out to prepare the blank canvas for my new artwork in this living medium. Creating a beautiful garden is a different sort of challenge for a painter, since plants and flowers are far more intractable than paint. Plants have specific needs as to soil, sun and climate that must be met for them to grow into a beautiful work of art. And yet the two arts are closely related. I think of Monet and his garden at Giverny, and feel close to the great artist in this predilection we share.

The new flowerbed began with the back-breaking labor of digging up the sod around the larger maple in the front yard. Maple roots are very shallow, making digging a slow, laborious process. It's hard to believe doing these few square feet took several hours and I was too exhausted to finish the back third of the circle. I did have time to spread one bag of soil conditioner on about half the bed before the evening and rain overtook me.

My new plants will be arriving soon; hopefully I can finish digging tomorrow when the weather clears and start under the other maple. Eventually I'll tie both pieces into one continuous flowerbed. I haven't decided yet what sort of edging to use--stone, wood or black plastic?

Flores Article Finally Complete

The Chicken Coop Across the Street, watercolor, 6" x 10"

It only took a year and ten months since my trip to Flores in the Azores Island, but today the third part of my photo-essay on Flores is finally complete. Check it out at elenamaza.com. This last part was much harder because I am now my own webmistress, so had to create the page layout as well as the rest. The only good thing about that is that it forced me to learn new skills, though I've long way to go in understanding html code.

You can now read all three parts:

Part One: An Artist-in-Residence on the Island of Flowers
Part Two: Lagoas and Pocas, On the Trail with Pierluigi
Part Three: The Florentinos

I'd love some feedback on the piece--would you want to travel to Flores after reading my article? Would it be helpful if you were an artist going there for the first time? You can leave a comment here, fill out the survey on the left, (or both) or send an E-mail to elemaza@verizon.net.

The Cycle Begins Anew

For several weeks I've been eagerly searching for the first harbingers of spring, but the balmy temperatures last weekend just days after the snow earlier in the week still caught me by surprise!

I puttered happily in my garden, fertilizing the raised bed, planting snow peas, pruning, and bagging debris. Planting a rose my sister had given me last year became a major project--as I began to expand the original flower bed, it became necessary to move several large stones that formed the edges. The stones were so heavy I could not lift them, so I ended up rolling them one by one into their new places for a better looking shape. Now all we need is some rain (and a back massage).

Along with the shoots emerging from the ground, dormant spirits rise as this artist prepares for a new cycle of growth. I was reading from Hensche on Painting*, and came upon this:

Therefore to study color, it is best to to take the less complicated forms; still life objects in scale, and obvious color, is the ideal study. Starting with the head or figure is not advisable. As Chase said, "Where there's still life, there's hope.

After taking the still life class this past winter with Lee Boynton, who was one of Hensche's students, I heartily agree. Now I think I'm ready for painting outdoors once again.
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* Henry Hensche, (1899-1992) was the leading teacher of American impressionism at the Cape Cod School of Art from the 1930's until his death.

In Natural Light

Same Still Life with Green Bowl

Today we painted the same still life set-up as last week but without the floodlights on. It was a cloudy day outside so the challenge was to paint the same thing in a completely different light and color key from last week's, with its simulated sunlight. Some of the differences jumped out at once, but other more subtle color changes were harder to see. In this light the lit side of the objects becomes cooler and subdued, while the shadows become lighter and warmer, with softer edges.

At the end of the class we put out two paintings next to each other for comparison. Look at the painting below. Fascinating, don't you think?

Green Bowl

Green Bowl with White Pitcher and Apples, oils on canvas board, 11" x 14"

I notice that as we progress through each class, our set-ups become a little more complex. We have more elements to deal with, more colors to harmonize. This one could have used a little more work, but as usual I ran out of time. It's starting to come together for me, though. Each time I see more color, more subtle gradations; so difficult to achieve, yet that's what makes the painting come alive. I understand better how every change in form must be a change in color and vise-verse to build up the forms convincingly.

More Still Life

This was last week's still life: a robin's-egg blue pitcher with tangerines. It was a joy to paint these colors, though I don't think I got them 100% true, the painting somehow seemed to flow naturally during the class.

This week's still life set-up seemed a lot more challenging to me, and it was quite a struggle to find the right colors for this white bowl with the green apples. The apple shapes were also harder to model, even with Lee's instructions. But overall, I think the paintings are improving--my colors are more varied and exciting.

I get to feeling restless on these late winter days, just waiting for the weather to become sufficiently temperate to allow outdoor painting. Come on spring, hurry up!

Happy Valentine First Year Anniversary

Today marks the first year anniversary of Maza Studio Blog. My very first post was on Valentines' Day of 2008 (Dreaming of Spring), and little did I dream then where this venture into the blogosphere would take me. I've sold a number of paintings through this blog and received comments and Email from so many parts of the US as well as a few countries abroad... It's fascinating to see how information still travels at the human level through cyberspace. Eighty-four posts later, some of which became mini-essays and/or evocative vignettes, I've started to blossom as a writer in other sites too, doing op-ed essays for Cubanology Biweekly.

A word of thanks to my subscribers and followers--it's your thoughtful feedback that keeps me going when the going gets tough.

Today I mailed back my Moleskine sketchbook to Art House Co-op in Atlanta after filling it with funky, true-to-life ball-point pen and prismacolor pencil sketches. The image above was my last entry in the sketchbook. The theme for Sketchbook #3 project was "Everyone I Know" and we had about one month to fill the notebooks and mail them back. The sketchbooks are supposed to be exhibited in numerous venues all around the country. In the DC area they will be at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Georgetown on March 3. I'm hoping mine will be among those selected for DC. It's filled with very amusing drawings of people I see in my peregrinations, with telling scenes documenting these past few weeks--some lucky buyer will have a chuckle with it.

To top things off, I had my first sale of the year today--the painting of the Dorsey House Garden was acquired by a lady from Burtonsville who claims the Dorseys among her ancestors. She told me she had done a Google search on Dorsey House and found my painting on this blog, which she liked enough to contact me.

Not bad for Maza Studio Blog's first year. Here's looking forward to the next year: Happy Valentine's Day!

A Little Mid-Winter Color

These are some of my recent works produced in the still life class (they're both oils on 9" x 12" canvas board). It's really fun to plop down these bright reds and oranges here and there as appropriate. The colors and shapes are challenging, trying to balance one against the other and make the forms "read" with just color. In nature it's much harder to find these colors. We're using bright tungsten floods to light the still life--the amazing thing is to see the actual colors of the objects, what is called "local color" and then see them in the dramatic light of our set-up. It's the difference between night and day!

If you are interested in buying either of these, just send me an E-mail and I will be happy to sign them & sell them at a great price for you. I need to keep funding my art education and this is a fun way to do it.