Thoughts from both sides of the brain ...

Whats on Your Mind?

 

100 things #21 I am intrigued by but not as committed as some folks ...

to preparing myself for 2012. I am however completely amazed at one artists ability to create such dimension with chalk on a sidewalk to give the earth below the appearance of floating over that Mayan Calendar. Amazing ... just amazing, I'm glad I got the opportunity to see it first hand because this photo does not do the piece full justice.

Whether you call it The Apocalypse, Armageddon, A Quantum Leap, The fifth Dimension, Winter Solstice of 2012, or The age of Aquarius ... it all boils down to the end of the Mayan Calendar, the end of a 5,125 year cycle based on the Ancient Mayans understanding of our solar system.

From what I understand on a surface level only ... the Ancient Mayans predicted that starting in 1999, we would have 13 years to prepare ourselves for the transition from one world age to another. They predicted some type of great upheaval at the end of this cycle that would not necessarily mean anhialation of the world but rather an opportunity to flush out it's evildoers to make way for a new time of balance, a time where men and women are totally integrated. In this new time, this new cycle they predicted that women would become world leaders.

What are your thoughts on some of the 2012 theories?

100 things #20 I love being in the midst of a crowd ...

especially when it's an artsy crowd like this one.

Over the weekend, David and I went back to Lake Worth for the street painting festival.

Every year, these artists gather to paint the streets with chalk.

The amount of work involved in compleating one of these pieces is difficult to describe and the thoughts of the whole thing being washed away with the first rain, sort of makes you wonder why ...

I guess it's like the sand castle artist ... they create the art for the love of art.

My new camera really got a work out ...

There were literly hundreds of pieces to look at, sort of like being at an outdoor musem.

It was interestging watching these people work and trying to figure out why they chose the reference pieces that they did.

I have to share my camera with David now, he is starting to become as hooked as I am when it comes to searching for color and flavor to capture. I'll have to start posting more of the photos here that we take on our one day adventures.

It wasn't easy choosing just a few favorites to post today but space is limited, I am saving my very favorite for a post of it's own.

I have every intention of returning next year, if any of you feel like joining me let me know ... I will say it was about 80 degrees here in Sunny South Florida on Sunday, not a cloud in the sky.

I was reminded ...

by a new friend today that taking a look back at our past lives, our past life experiences can give us insight on who we are today and who we want to be tomorrow.

Still preparing for a visit with the Muses ... after reading this (thanks DB) I felt that maybe taking a look back at some of the moments I've felt most creative, might help me to invite more creativity back in to my daily rounds.

The following was a creative moment for me ...

The Creativity Game ...

Rain: June 2005

Photo's are of Stephanie painting a giraffe face ... forgot to photograph the dragons.

On day 2 of the convention I decided to move away from the airbrushing and take some beginning face painting classes but first, I wanted to play Oliver Zegars Creativity Game.

Let me just say that I was so not prepared for this game. Keep in mind that although I do consider myself to be a somewhat creative person ... I have not had any paint or drawing instruction and certainly no real experience applying paint (make-up) to skin.

Luckily, I'm not easily intimidated or excessively shy, because this game was defiantly not the right place to start, especially as it happened to be filled with so many experienced painters.

Here's how we played the game ... first 2 people drew a color card, we drew medium green and burgundy. Those were the background colors along with white. Then someone drew another color card for the line color, it was yellow ... black and white lines were also allowed for highlights and shadow. The next card drawn was a shape card, it was an oval. Last card was the character card, we chose a dragon.

The following step of the game was to paint our faces respecting the guide lines chosen with the cards. Ahem ... did he say paint medium green, burgundy and white background ovals with yellow, black and white outlined ovals to make your face look like a dragon????

There was no demonstration ... just instruction to get to work creating our dragons. I felt a little better when I realized that surprise had swept the entire room and I was not the only one perplexed by the thoughts of all those colored ovals.
I was very surprised at how distracted I became by the oval thing ... yep, I was stuck on oval, but like everyone else I began applying my paint.

The more experienced in the group knew to use the white to highlight the places where a light source would naturally hit. Me, I was still stressing over all of those ovals, but kept painting.

Once most of our faces were covered in oval shapes using the assigned colors, the yellow lines started to be applied. We were making oval eyes, oval scales, oval nostrils and teeth ... we even did our best to make oval fire for our dragons to breathe. Oh my ... ovals, ovals, ovals!!!

I was doing just fine until I decided to look around at the other dragons, by the time the black and white details were being applied many of the faces would have qualified to be used in a Broadway stage production. I kept applying my ovals and soon it was time for us to put down our brushes and move on to the next part of the game.

Here's where it became important not to feel embarrassed or intimidated, for the beginners (me) as well as for the experienced (nearly everybody else). We moved to the head of the class and placed our chairs in a huge circle. Ummmm ... now it was time to discuss each individual dragon out loud.

We talked about the things that we liked, the things we wish we would have done differently and the things we would defiantly do again next time. Every single person in that room walked away knowing so much more about face painting than they did when the walked in.

Oliver and Stephanie were among my favorites. There were several raffles throughout the weekend for a hour one on one session with the instructor of your choice. I decided during that class that If I won, I would have chosen one of them because they both had such warm eyes, because Oliver spoke the language of art with such passion and because I figured that where one of them goes, the other is not far behind. I'll bet they would have both been there.

Imagine for a minute, being told in a Belgium accent that even on your worst day as a face painter you will paint so much better than the five year old. You paint his face to look like a dragon and the five year old becomes the dragon.

GRRRRRAAAAAARRRRR!!!!! (Ithink he said GRRRRRAAAAAARRRRR!!!!!)
I was not eager to have a photo of my dragon face taken at the time, now I sort of wish I would have. I would like to have been able to compare it to the amazing green and burgundy with yellow dragon I will learn to paint by the next time we meet. Thank you Oliver and Stephanie for the inspiration.

A little more than a name ...

Picture "The Muses" from: brown.edu/~maicar/MUSES.html

Since one of the few things I really know about the mythological ladies of art is their names ...

• Calliope: the muse of epic poetry



• Clio: the muse of history, education and knowledge



• Erato: the muse of sensual poetry



• Enterpe: the muse of lyric and music



• Melpomene: the muse of tragedies and elegies



• Polymnia: the muse of sacred song



• Terpsichore: the muse of music and dance



• Thalia: muse of comedy



• Urania: the muse of astronomy and astrology
  
  

I thought I should do at least a little research on them before we meet. I found photos and just the right amount of detail about each of them in a High School Student Essay written by: Heather Clegg-Haman found here--> The 9 Greek Muses