I’m B -a -a- ck!

Finally, at long last I have completed all of the illustrations, including the cover illustration for the wordless book “Born To Fly”. If you remember, it is part of an awareness campaign to warn children and their parents about the dangers of child trafficking. It is now in the capable hands of Cathleen Kwas, book designer extraordiniare. The final step will be the printing. Diana Scimone, the head of Born To Fly Int. and creator of the Born To Fly book, is looking into making it available for online viewing. So, I am back. Back with a little extra time to keep up with my blog, finish neglected projects and begin new ones.

I had another wonderful opportunity to participate in an outdoor painting event last weekend. The weather wasn’t ideal, but it was a lot of fun meeting people and starting a new painting. Here are a few “in progress” shots. I intend to title the painting ” Railroad Man”. I’ll be sure to keep you posted on my progress.

All Were Born to Fly

I’ll admit that I started out slow. I was frequently ’stuck’ and unsure how to proceed. But now I am consumed with an illustration project for a non-profit organization called Born to Fly Int. Born to Fly seeks to end child trafficking through awareness. The seriousness of the cause makes me feel the weight of responsibility to draw better than my ability would normally allow. How many times a day do I stop and wonder if my illustrations tell the story adequately? Well, If I stopped every time that thought crossed my mind I would never accomplish anything. So I just plow on through, praying, hoping and drawing. This project differs from anything else I have ever been involved in, in that it is a wordless book. I have a copy of the text (by Diana Scimone) and my job is to interpret the text pictorially. I have found that it is important not to rush the story, because then it is like a film that jumps ahead. It leaves the viewer wondering what they just missed. Two weeks ago I felt that I had turned a corner, and thought to myself, “I think I might be getting the hang of this”! Not to say that it isn’t still challenging. Let’s just say that for right now it isn’t quite so excrutiating.There is an oil painting half finished on my easel begging for my attention. I’m afraid that it will have to wait a little longer. Blossom, my heroine is anxious for me to get back to work because she is about to learn that she, like all of us, are born to fly.

I Paint Dead People

Kind of creepy huh? The truth is that I also paint the living. The important thing (to me at least) is that they were captured on film revealing a bit of their personality as well as the personality of another era. I love to imagine what life was like for them in the early or even middle part of the twentieth century. Those old photos give me a glimpse at a life I never knew. Pictures of my grandparents first as children and then young adults seem to be strangers looking back at me. What are the emotions I see? What can I tell about their personalities? Were they happy? Scared? Weary? In love? In one picture there is a group of children standing in front of a house in the middle of nowhere. It appears to be around the end of the 1800’s and they all are wearing large hats and holding dolls. Hmmmm… I can’t begin to guess what that was about. In another picture I see my great Aunt as a young girl clowning around with a man’s hat. I didn’t know she had a sense of humor! Now I’m looking at two young men with their arms companionably draped over each others shoulders as they grin into the camera. One is smoking a cigar, the other a pipe. I like to think that they are best friends celebrating something. Maybe one of them is getting married in the morning. I have collected hundreds of these pictures from my parents and other relatives. I insist on snagging every photo destined for the trash bin as my parents prepare to relocate. “NO! I want that! I might want to paint it later!” Even if I never get around to painting half of them, it’s important to me that someone preserves our pictorial family history. It’s my pleasure to be that person. And besides, I will get around to using most of them as references in paintings eventually. If I live long enough. And if I don’t, maybe someone will paint my portrait from an old snapshot they find stuck in the bottom of a dresser drawer that they are getting ready to sell or throw out. Then the tradition will continue. They will “paint dead people”.

Have some old photographs you would like to have painted in either oil or soft pastel? Contact me at Leah@lwiedemer.com

Fear of Flying?

Let’s face it. A long flight in coach is really just something we endure in order to be rewarded with a visit to a favorite destination. Some flights can seem longer than others. This was one of the longest for us so far.

My husband and I were seated in the middle of the center section on a flight from Orlando, Fl to Milan, Italy. The young man next to my excessively patient husband seemed a tad unsettled. Across the aisle were seated his young wife and a woman we presumed was his mother in law. The man quickly removed some prayer beads from his pack and began to finger them nervously. He didn’t speak to us, but it was obvious he was in some distress. Meanwhile, his companions spoke softly to each other, smiling and clearly enjoying themselves. On take off he closed his eyes tightly and seemed to pray with even more fervency. Soon the flight attendants made their rounds and our young seat mate ordered himself a drink. And then another. And another. With three or maybe four drinks in him he relaxed and promptly fell fast asleep – with his head on my husband’s shoulder. That man of mine sat perfectly still for almost eight hours to avoid waking the sleeping stranger on his shoulder. As the plane landed his wife thanked my husband for his patience and shook her sleeping beauty for several minutes before he was fully conscious.

It was a long and uncomfortable flight, and one I would not care to repeat under those same circumstances. It did however give us both a humorous memory and me just another reason why I love my husband so much. Who else in the whole world would go to those lengths for the comfort of someone they have never met and would likely never see again?

Painting in Progress – Final

The painting is complete. I think I’m finished tweaking on it, but you never know… Until it’s framed there is always a chance that I will decide to make a minor color adjustment here and there. The final steps in my process are pressing in the pastels by putting it under a heavy board and giving it a light coating of fixative spray. Occasionally the fixative obliterates the whites and I have to go back in and re-do those. I decided, for now to leave in the pillar on the left. I was concerned that it would be distracting. I’m still not sure. Tell me what you think. I’m always open to suggestions and criticism.

Painting in Progress 3

Here we are in the third installment of our painting in progress. As you can see, I worked on the upper left side of the painting filling in the last of the porch furniture. I chose to paint the child’s chair that I mentioned in my last post, red for two reasons. I wanted to subtly highlight it by using the only red in my otherwise limited palette, and that is the color it was when I was a child. I continue to tweak the values, adjusting them as I compare one against the other. There is a large porch pillar on the left side. I’m a little concerned that it will be distracting. I painted it, but I may crop it out later if I decide the composition is better without it. I plan to complete the painting in my next sitting since it is simply a series of horizontals. Then I will do the final adjustments and finishing touches and call it a day. I welcome suggestions, comments and criticisms.

Painting in Progress 2

This is my second installment. Now that I have the main subjects in I am working systematically from top right to left. I will still go back and make adjustments, but as I am left handed and this helps to keep my hand from smearing the work I have completed. I’m sticking with a limited palette, and have included the pastels I’m using in the photo. To tighten up some lines that are a little too mushy I use pastel pencils. It definitely helps to take photos as I work. For some reason I can more easily spot errors in a photo than in the original. You can see an example of this where the porch floor meets the wall in the upper right. There needs to be some adjusting. The wall needs to come down farther. I’ll fix it before I move on. Black is a difficult color to work with. Since it is so messy, I will wait till everything else is finished before I go back and make the blacks as solid as I would like them to be. Next I will do the top left, where I just noticed in my photo reference there is the same child’s chair that now resides in my living room. Awww… that makes me smile.

In Progress

How would you like to take a little painting journey with me? Come along while I document my work on a painting in soft pastel. The subject is my dad when he was a boy. I’m basing it on an old, black and white photograph. My support is grey, suede paper and I began with a white chalk outline. My plan is to work on it taking pictures of my progress at regular intervals. As you can see in this first photo, most of the boy is completed. I applied several thin layers of pastel, building up gradually until I was satisfied with the color and density. I’ll make further minor adjustments later after more of the porch structure is completed. I’ve included the photo I’m working from and the pastels I used in this first shot.

First installment of painting in progress

Check back next week to see how I’m doing, and let me know what you think so far.

The Outdoor Studio

I recently spent an enjoyable evening  painting outside at an event called “The Baldwin Park Art Stroll”.   Artists were simply asked to to set up easels or tables and spend a few hours creating their art.  Most of us were outside on the sidewalk, but a few had spots assigned inside of businesses.  The weather was perfect, so I’m not sure that there was an advantage to being inside for this particular event.  If the weather had been inclement, would anyone have been strolling anyway? Probably not too many.  As it was, there was plenty of foot traffic and most people at least paused to look and voice a positive comment.  Several people watched for a while, took business cards and then returned later to see how I had progressed.  I chose to work in soft pastels, because of its ease of transport and also because I can get finished looking results very quickly.  My equipment was minimal.  Consisting of a french easel, cigar box of pastels, pastel pencils for details, a wet rag, photo reference and velour  paper as my support.  I also brought along a chair, water bottle (for my comfort) and two framed pieces in the same genre as I was working.  If you are an artist and haven’t tried painting in public, let me encourage you to step out and give it a try.  This type of event is win/win for artists and patrons alike.   Folks love to have the opportunity to watch artists create and speak with them about their process.  It’s a great chance for the artist to showcase their work and talk about their passion  in a no pressure setting.  For me, gallery shows can feel somewhat pretentious.  I prefer a more relaxed, informal setting.  Also, being able to work whenever there is a loll in traffic is a big plus, because I don’t have to stand around feeling awkward with a clenched  ‘gritting my teeth’  kind of smile on my face.

I’d like to hear about your experiences and preferences.  Please leave a comment.

Florentine Scavenger Hunt

The other day while having lunch with some friends I asked if anyone had been watching the Dickens stories on PBS’s Masterpiece Theater. There was a pause, followed by blank stares. They eventually recovered enough to vote me “group nerd”. This doesn’t bother me for I have embraced my nerdyness! It is a badge I wear proudly, although at times it requires a certain amount of dogged determination. For example, I recently plumbed new depths of nerdom, during our last trip to Florence, Italy. I thought it would be fun to track down all of Dantes Plaques. I read that there are about thirty of these plaques scattered throughout Florence mounted on facades bearing a quotation from “The Divine Comedy”. It always takes me a day to acclimate to Florence and find my bearings. But by the second day I was ready. Armed with a notebook and camera for recording my finds, we entered the most ancient part of Florence to begin our search. We found the approximate location of Dante’s home, the home of Beatrice, the church where Dante was married and even a small trattoria bearing the name of Dante.

I didn't know that the Alighieri's were in the restaraunt biz!

With our necks craned at 45 degree angles we scanned every facade for a plaque. Our search continued for two days and though we met with limited success, we found a dozen of the plaques, ate our weight in gelato and still had time to search out every location that bore a connection to Michelangelo. WooHoo!! Okay, I’ll save that for another day.

Here is what they look like

and this is another one