Against the clock with music

Created for Inspire Me Thursday as specified ... against the clock in a way - the timing and mood being provided by a sufi music CD purchased today. Further constraint: colors picked at the beginning ... orange, cinnabar, raw umber, black. Executed in acrylic on Fabriano paper in approx. 40 minutes.

Not quite polka

A late polka entry for Inspire Me Thursday. I like the liveliness and lightness of polka dot patterns and thought about creating something with polka dots all along, without ever finding the right combination of spare time and right mood. Today I pulled out the roll of a painting I'd started earlier this year. Noting that it had some round elements that had polka dot potential, I went to work with black for enhancement. The whole painting measures about 100 x 180 cm and is acrylic on orange kraft paper.

Transformation

From the last thoughts of Erica M. Youngblood

At age 45 I'd reached a point where I was willing to try anything to transform my imperfect physique. I'd always thought certain parts needed improvement – my overlong, sharp nose, my receding chin, my sagging bosom and flaring hips –, and when I chanced upon Madam Oryema through an ad in an esoteric magazine, I thought I had things licked. Little did I suspect that her patented blue shrinking pill would turn me into a candy-coated blue peanut. Here I am now, immobile on the floor, waiting for somebody to come in, sweep me up and dump me. Or worse: pick me up, wipe me and munch me.

Faithfully recorded by Leonard Blumfeld

Drawn and written for Inspire Me Thursday and 'Shrink'.

Twigs, blossoms, sunlight

Twigs, blossoms, sunlight
Acrylic on paper, 2002

Posted for healing at Inspire Me Thursday.

Even though I do not necessarily think of healing as a prime objective of my painting effort and paintings, there definitely is an effect I look for in what I paint and what I'd like viewers to experience.
Several years ago I had an art exhibition titled 'Between harmony and disharmony.' One of my friends who attended the opening said, "You know, in your previous shows there were some paintings that were disharmonious, but there's not a single one here today that feels that way to me." I took that as a compliment and accomplishment.
But back to the experience I'd like to evoke ... I'd like the people who look at my art to feel that they have received something best described, perhaps, as nourishment for the soul.
And that would qualify as some sort of healing, wouldn't it?

Leonard Blumfeld

Everyday art

It's 'art in the everyday' at Inspire Me Thursday this time around, and this photograph is exactly that. It is a snap of a section of a lamppost I took a few weeks ago, which has, over the course of its existence, obviously been exposed to various events and layers, such as posters stuck and removed, rusting, cracking, spray painting, weathering and who knows what other everyday occurrences.

L. Blumfeld

The hummingbird speaks

... and then there are those parts of Nature
ideally made for my fluttering approach,
colored an attractive red, to take a sweet
drink ... even though sometimes
big-eyed beings eye me from close-by ...
and I’ve also found the fount empty at times ...

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2008)

Inspired by Inspire Me Thursday.

The peony that invaded the park

The peony that invaded the park
Two photos merged for Inspire Me Thursday and Whimsy.

Dramatic mountain landscape

Dramatic Mountain Landscape
Gouache and oil crayon on Guardi Artistico paper

Posted for Inspire Me Thursday's Crayon Art theme.

I use this technique quite frequently, starting with light shades of oil crayon, then painting over the crayon with gouache or watercolor. The waxy crayon repels the water-based paint, creating an interesting effect. Thanks to the excellent picture quality of my new reflex camera, not much work on the digital image is needed to obtain colors that are close to the original.

L.B.

Forgotten entrance

It's still Doors for Inspire Me Thursday, and it's Wordless Wednesday.

How Bunzilla was saved

A real story of incest, pregnancy and medical skill


When we lived in the village and the children were small, we had a female miniature rabbit who gave birth to two babies on Easter Sunday in 1992. One of them was sturdy, the other a little runt. Both of them were incredibly cute. There is nothing sweeter than baby rabbits. We called them Bozo and Priscilla, naturally assuming that the little one had to be a girl. We gave Bozo away after a while and kept mother and daughter together.

Much to our surprise, Priscilla also turned out to be a boy. We noticed because his mother started giving what looked like practical sex education lessons to her offspring. Priscilla was renamed Oedipus, and we kept mother and son separate from then on.

Being sickly, Ed stayed in the kitchen with us, while Bunzilla, who was robust and healthy, stayed in a stall outside. She had developed a nasty temper and could only be touched with leather mittens (hence the name).

However, they managed to get together long enough once, and she got pregnant. She gave birth to a dead baby but seemed uncharacteristically listless for days after the delivery, so we took her to the vet’s. It was amazing to see how this unfriendliest of all rabbits seemed to realize that the vet was trying to help her, and how she cooperated with him as he pushed and massaged her sides to eventually get another dead little rabbit out.

Bunzilla recovered quickly and became her usual ferocious self. We gave her away eventually. Ed, who was smart, loving, musical, funny, had a hay allergy and crooked teeth that needed to be cut regularly – horrible handicaps for a bunny –, remained with us until he died in 2002.

L.B.

I doodled the bunny drawing this morning for no particular reason. When Inspire Me Thursday came up with a request for medical art today, I added the sentimental rabbit memoir above to make it all faintly – very faintly – medical. Or veterinarian, I should say.

Recycled

Detail from Diamond Doors, 2006
Acrylic and ink on photo paper

This was when I discovered high-gloss ink jet photo paper scraps as a medium for painting. It makes a bright white shiny background on which even bright colors appear somewhat dull. I liked the effect.

Not such a great scan, I'm afraid.

Posted for Reuse Reduce Recycle at Inspire Me Thursday.

An envelope

Envelope for a letter to God dictated to me by Annabelle (with some of my suggestions incorporated).

– Leonard Blumfeld

Posted for Inspire Me Thursday's envelope prompt.

The land with the velvet hill (peace will come)

The land with the velvet hill
(detail from The Fortress of Golkonda, 2004;
gouache, oil crayon and acrylic on paper)

Today's theme proposed by Inspire Me Thursday is PEACE - the peace symbol is turning fifty.

I'm not using the peace symbol itself here but make reference to someone who was a symbol of the peace movement of the 1960s and 70s – Melanie. In particular, I'm thinking of her song Peace Will Come whose lyrics are the reason why I chose this painting.

The song seems to focus on the peace inside oneself, yet also establishes a connection to the whole world or even becomes the world. We are all part of it, and it might not be the worst idea for everyone to buy one – a piece of peace.

Peace Will Come

There's a chance peace will come in your life please buy one

Sometimes when I am feeling as big as the land
With the velvet hill in the small of my back
And my hands are playing with sand

And my feet are swimming in all of the waters
All of the rivers are givers to the ocean
According to plan, according to man

Well sometimes when I am feeling so grand
And I become the world
And the world becomes a man

And my song becomes a part of the river
I cry out to keep me just the way I am
According to plan

According to man, according to plan
According to man, according to plan

There's a chance peace will come
In your life please buy one.

There's a chance peace will come
In my life please buy one.

For sometime when we have reached the end
With the velvet hill in the small of my backs
And our hands are clutching the sand

Will our blood become a part of the river
All of the rivers are givers to the ocean
According to plan, according to man

There's a chance peace will come
In your life please buy one

(Written by Melanie Safka, song released in 1970)

The following video shows Melanie performing Peace Will Come at the Johnny Cash Show:

Two in communication

Two podpeds in communication –
an insinuation of slight unreliability
Ink on paper, 2008

Posted for Inspire Me Thursday's "2" theme.

Rosy spring come on in

Inspire Me Thursday is asking for wallpapers this time around; here is a section of a larger painting (acrylic on crinkled up paper) that I could possibly imagine as a motif for a bright sitting room with large windows into a garden.

Also, I intend it as an invitation for spring (not only at One Single Impression), which so far has come in flowers but not in temperatures:

Easter has come
with daffodils
in snow

– Leonard Blumfeld

Acrylic blot mutation

Believe it or not – this started out as a blot according to the instructions at Inspire Me Thursday. Not in ink, but in acrylic. I then enhanced it with a black ink pen. It looked like a dog's face with gigantic fuzzy ears. I did not find it esthetically pleasing but scanned it anyway and then tried out various effects, eventually settling for the kaleidoscope one shown here. The dog is gone; what's left looks like some Swedish folklore motif perhaps. And is easy on my eyes.

– Leonard Blumfeld

My kitchen, right now

It's all about kitchens in Inspire Me Thursday this time around. My contribution is a razor-edge-of-time snapshot of my kitchen's current but no so unusual state (messy).

What you see are primarily the yet unwashed containers of last night's and today's foods and drinks and some utentils. The pièce de résistance, however, is my grandma's flowered coffee pot in the background.

And yes, it was takeout last night. My daughter came over, and we ooled* Chinese while watching a rental DVD - Because I said so with Diane Keaton as the high-strung and meddling mother of three girls. The movie has its moments but isn't the greatest ever made.

* To "ool" - family speak ever since we watched Ringo Starr's Caveman way back when the kids were little. Even our dog knows what the word means. One of our all-time family cult movies.

Intrepid little bird

Intrepid Little Bird (2006)
Acrylic on kraft paper

Inspire Me Thursday's proposition for this week was:

Action Painting

This week let us be inspired by Action Painting, a “style of painting in which paint is spontaneously dribbled, splashed or smeared onto the canvas, rather than being carefully applied.” Think Jackson Pollock, the American Abstract Expressionist painter who was fond of huge canvases on the floor, applying paint with a stick or other objects, using a ‘drip’ technique, walking around the canvas, being ‘in the painting.’

I was immediately reminded of a series of paintings I did in 2006, for which I partially used a drip technique. What I call "Intrepid Little Bird" above is just a small section of a larger painting done with a combination of dripping and rolling.

– Leonard Blumfeld

Blurry face

Section of "Blurry Face"
Gouache and oil crayon, 2004

Posted for Inspire Me Thursday's "Faces" theme.

Glass ...

Inspire Me Thursday's prompt this time is "Glass" – here's my creation (not brand new, I admit, but today's digital modification of an acrylic painting dating back to 2002 that had turned out somewhat like a glass pane):