COMPOSER SERIES

“MUSIC WAS MY REFUGE”

“Music was my refuge”

"I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness" By Maya Angelou.

I’m working my way up to creating a new series. My son, Cameron, has commissioned me to create several large collages of famous composers. The first one will be of Claude Debussy. He composed Clair de lune, which happens to be my favorite classical song. Cameron and his girlfriend own “Singing Strings” They both play the piano and Nakisa plays the violin and teaches classes. They like the idea of placing paintings of famous composers all around their home and music studio. This series will be a challenge since the paintings/collages are to be quite large. I’m not sure whether to have musical notes peeking through the face of Debussy or whether to paint the portrait of Debussy using my newly learned technique, which is a very, very old technique, of Renaissance painting. I’m taking a course in it now and I was extremely surprised at how difficult and labor intensive this method is.

"Dead painting" My rendition of Joris Van Son's painting

The method includes starting with a campintura, which consists of darker tones and then works it’s way into what is called a “dead” painting and then goes on to two additional coats of paint. The old masters used natural pigments, which they had their assistants grind. At least I was able to use artist grade store bought oils for mine. I went through that pigment grinding technique when I was working on my 6’ fresco. Whew! My body still hurts from that challenge.

View showing wooden cradle

In the class I am taking, we were required to do a rendition of one of the Rennassiance masters. Joris Van Son was chosen. I worked for so many hours on this painting that it would be impossible to sell it. I’m not sure I could part with it anyway.

I’m going to continue to experiment with my women collages until I am sure I know which direction I’m heading with Debussey and then, after probably several attempts, I will create my first Renaissance style painting/collage of Debussy, which will be, by the way, the first male I will ever paint.. Should be interesting.

Side view- Notice how the notes drift through her face, making her look as though she were a zentangle

In the meantime, I’m offering for sale “Music was my Refuge.” She is 8x10” I painted her onto a birch paint panel that has a cradle edge for easier hanging. I hope you notice the crackles I was able to finally achieve on this piece. It is amazing how long it took me to figure out how to place crackles over paper so that the background shows through. I was always able to attain great crackles when I used paint in the background, but never when I wanted it clear. It took the help of several blogger friends. I want to thank Terra Sheridan, from
Terra Sheridan’s Musings Terra advised me to use Deckle One Step Crackle Gel. Diane, from My Art Journal uses Tim Holtz’s crackle paint. Lynn Stevens at Trash to Treasure has good luck with Tim Holtzs' paint too, and lastly, Moriah Butterfly from MLB Studio who not only sent me a detailed e-mail but who is going to create a video on how she crackles her wonderful folk art dolls.

Let me know if you are interested in this first original painting in my composer series. I realize “refuge” is not a composer but I'm sure you get the drift. I have priced her at $55. You can e-mail me for shipping details.

Oh, one last thing. There is an added bonus to my completing this painting. Cameron promised to learn how to play Clair de Lune for me. I'll definitely be working on it.