The snake painting’s coming along great! It took some time to figure out how to paint this particular marble pattern. I used a combination of greys and greens layered on top of another and finally mixed in some gel matte medium for a thinning out of colour to get a more translucent quality. I’m pretty happy the way it’s coming together. Still got a ways to go though. I'm painting in some of the shadows now. The painting needs a little pink, just a tiny bit, not too much, for I love the way pink and green go together.
In the meantime it's given me a lot of time to reflect on things, as all paintings do. For some reason I find myself in a path much less travelled. Which is a good thing, but takes a lot of explaining. Being an artist is probably 90% believing in yourself and 10% trying to spell it out for people who just haven't yet encountered one. Lot of people ask why I don't work 40 hours a week at my day job, I feel like I have to justify myself all the time. Well, good art takes time! An artist dies a little everyday for everyday they don't get to make their art! What would this world be without art! What are we, animals?! So I work 25 hours at my day job to support myself and 80 hours on this other thing that will likely outlast my existence.
I've decided to go where my talent takes me and so far it's taken me to some really amazing places, and experiences! I love knowing my art plays a part in people's homes and lives all around the world. My art is collected all across North America, it can be found in Australia, Switzerland and Hong Kong, and that's only for sure what I know of, but not just that- in a tipsy topsy turvy kind of way, knowing that I wanted to stay true to who I am in my craft, not wanting to compromise my vision in anyway, it somehow lead to me to my day job, a homeware nurse! I love my job, being integrated into people's lives in this meaningful way, sharing authentic experiences, meeting people from all walks of life, witnessing true courage as people face the inevitable, I feel very lucky, and inspired! Not only that but it's flexible, affords me a life of painting, I paint 3 days a week. To be honest I've begun to take a couple extra visits here and there on my painting days just to break up the long hours of isolation, it's helped a lot with my mental state. I also just figured out how to hook up my phone's Spotify account to the car stereo so now I can continue to listen and discover new music just like I do while painting as I drive around from visit to visit. I get asked a lot on how I came to be a nurse and how nursing and art are related. People seem to think the 2 are opposites, right brain, left brain sort of thing and that most lean towards only using 1. To that I suggest Leonardo Da Vinci used both.
So art and nursing, what are the similarities? What are the differences?! Explain yourself! Painting today, I came to the conclusion:
Both art and nursing heavily involve communication, one relieves pain and suffering, the other increases happiness, both point in the same direction.
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