Portrait of Christy and Peter

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I haven’t had time yet to whip up some code for a gallery. All those sequestered wee hours are for indulgent painting and online furniture oggling. There was a time, about six years ago, when I’d have been golden just to poke around with a tangle of hypertext markup language all afternoon, sipping a gin and tonic on the balcony in the quiet, self-indulgent pause of life just before children. But those children, they showed themselves up and, well, here I am pilfering those last scraggly minutes of my day, trying to spin gold from little piles of straw.
…By the way, that’s one of Ford’s favorite Grimm’s, which is funny because it was one of my favorites, too, growing up. Rumplestilksin is so greasy-good!
So, in lieu of a proper gallery, where I can tack up all my late-night progress notes, here’s a painting. It’s the wedding portrait that Tonya asked me to paint of her friends, Peter and Christy. It’s okay, I’ve been allowed to divulge it! But I still feel al little awkward in doing so. Anyway, Tonya’s springboard for me was the famous American Gothic. With that in mind, she sent me a few snapshots and some bio (the props in the picture hint at their interests). And do you know? It was FUN. And I hear they loved it. My work here is done. I couldn’t ask for a better way to put myself to good use. Well, except for the mothering part. That’s pretty fun, too.

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The encaustic class blinked by last week again. But so that I could start working with the wax at home, I thrifted a vintage electric skillet (to keep the wax in liquid while I work) and invested in a heat gun (which fuses the layers–a tutorial to follow soon). So, I’m sorry to all the spiders and cockroaches and trolls and whatever else crawls the garage floors at night: I’m moving into your space.
I almost finished a piece last week that I want to share, but instead I’m offering a quiet picture (above) of five minutes before class ended, a leaf, and some leftover wax. It reminds me of the ladies bathhouse atDeep Eddy:
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Back to painting. I’m back in the game! My second commission of the summer (and a curtsey to Tonya!).