Fogged in during the last days of winter

Days of fog …

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Santa Monica has been soaked in fog for so many days I’ve lost count. I have been continuing to work on some abstracts that were influenced by my trip to Portugal. I am posting a couple here that are hanging in an office now. The larger piece took some weeks to complete. I layered paint on it to resemble the way paint is layered on walls in Los Angeles. I often see squares painted over concrete to cover graffiti. The layers start to peel after time, weathered by sun and the moist film left after fog settles in for a night.

Sun bleached tiles

The second painting, the smaller of the two, is a bit creamier, like sun bleached tile near the beach. I’m not sure exactly where I have seen this, but it may have actually been inland Mexico in Cuernavaca. I remember someone saying that Cuernavaca is a city of walls.

Walls

To me, walls represented the separateness that plagues communities. Walls keep neighbors from knowing each other, although Robert Frost wrote that “Good fences make good neighbors” in the poem Mending Wall. However, it isn’t Frost’s words, the saying is a 17th century proverb. Frost though ruminates on walls: “Before I built a wall I’d ask to know / What I was walling in or walling out / And to whom I was like to give offense.” I wrote a poem after the visit to Cuernavaca, reflecting on the walled in residents of the city and how it feels to be walled in. It was published in an online at http://www.moriapoetry.com/falin.html …

Walls as art

This work is an attempt to turn the walls I see every day into an inspiration. If you drive around Los Angeles, walls take on various meanings depending on the materials used to create the wall, how its aged and weathered, and what people have added to it.

Walling in or walling out

I had the fortunate experience to live in a neighborhood without fences for a few years. I can remember walking to school through yards. I knew all my neighbors – good or bad – they knew me, too. There was a sense of freedom when I lived without fences and could run through the neighborhood to the park, school or a friend’s house. In spite of the feeling of separateness that a wall can invoke, there are some interesting and even beautiful walls. The second painting makes me think of a beach side wall, creamy colored, but sun bleached – maybe close to a hot tub.

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Spring finally did show up

The first day of spring passed and I am flying into autumn with a trip to New Zealand and Australia. I am looking forward to seeing new places, new art, and meeting new people. Look for some new stuff when I return.

Thank you

As always, my work is for sale and you can contact me at trishfalin@gmail.com if you are interested. All work is copyrighted, and can be used under the Fair Use guidelines (not for profit). If you share this web page, let me know. Thank you for stopping by …

Grit, concrete, rainy days inspire new vision

Black iron, copper, gray, titanium white and sand

12×16 Abstract 1267

Rainy days make the city feel more like concrete: gray sky, gray buildings, gray sidewalk. The graffiti painted over haphazardly with an off white. Lines beneath are ghost writing – visible in spite of the cover. Layers of patches and paint leave a gritty surface.

Etching stars into a gritty surface

The 12×16 Abstract 1267 has layers of black and silver with black lava, black and iridescent pearl underneath the top surface of unbleached titanium, gray and black. The shapes of stars were cut into the thick wet top coat to resemble the effect of cutting wet concrete or peeling paint.

Infinite love

Working with black iron metallic paint underneath gray and titanium white, the coarse, wet metallic bleeds through. I used a rust activator to bring the rust to edges. I used a copper metallic paint through the top part of the work and a blue patina aging solution brings out a bit of blue. This painting was inspired by the colors this past

14×18 Infinite Love

week on some cloudy days. The cliffs of Santa Monica appear to rust in the rain and water takes on a sandy gray color to blend with the beach. The sky boils with charcoal, gray, and small holes where I can see a hidden blue sky of a sunny summer day. This part of the year is full of weather transitions, turning winter to spring with brief reminders of how summer feels.

Valentine’s day

The painting also expresses a concept of unconditional love. I hope you have a good Valentine’s Day. Although the day is a contrived event designed to benefit businesses selling flowers and candy, I hope it can also be a time where people express love. On a dark and stormy day, the deep interior can still be warm.

New travel plans: New Zealand and Australia

This time of year is the best time to take a trip. I am hoping to find some summer weather or maybe an early autumn. I am heading to Auckland, New Zealand March 22nd to spend a few days seeing the area. This will be my first visit to New Zealand. I will fly from New Zealand to Sydney, Australia. This will also be my first visit to Australia. I picked Sydney because I have heard there is a big art community in Sydney. My visit to Portugal inspired my new work. I hope New Zealand and Australia will also be a source of inspiration. If you have any suggestions for what to see, let me know

Thanks for stopping by…

I appreciate your feedback and have been inspired by blogs kept by everyone who has stopped by. Travel pictures and experiences shared by you inspired me to choose New Zealand and Australia for my next trip.

Copyright

All work is copyrighted by me and is for sale. If you are interested in purchasing work, you can contact me at trishfalin@gmail.com. I am still researching how to sell work online. If you have a suggestion of a site or method that is working for you, let me know.

Other works inspired by Portugal… these are cell phone photos. I didn’t get a chance to photograph these five before they were went to their new home.

20×16 Abstracts hanging in their new home

20×16 Abstracts in their new home

Bare trees under a winter sky

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Under a gray winter sky

The days feel much colder now as January is half way through. After visiting Portugal, it feels even colder here in Santa Monica. The sky seemed to become an endless gray cover and I found myself reaching for black, white and every shade between the two. My own version of 50 Shades of Gray… This painting is a black and white version of the last post which was filled with rich and warn hues of brown and gold. I also used some mediums to make the surface appear rough and worn like an old tree weathering a winter.

Drifting from bright color to the gray day

This painting took some time to develop, and then a while to dry. I have continued to experiment with black and white with a small amount of color and will post some of those works soon. While in Portugal, I went to a museum dedicated to a woman who was an abstract artist. Maria Helena Vieira da Silva grew up in Lisbon and was greatly influenced by the structures around her. If you are interested, you can read about here in Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Helena_Vieira_da_Silva. I was impressed by the museum and the people who were there working the day I came were very gracious. The museum is near the aqueduct. I have been inspired by her work and inspired by a country that dedicates a museum to a woman who was an abstract artist – a rarity.

Less is more – the impact of sparse color

I am intrigued with the impact of very little color in a work. I have been experimenting with a more structured look like da Silva. It is strange to do something so completely different than my colorful work.

Thanks for stopping by …

I appreciate everyone’s feedback … it is inspiring to hear from others and also to visit your blogs to see your travel pictures, and read about your experiences. The best part of WordPress is that I can interact with people from around the world. I am currently trying to decide where to go next, so I will be reading about your trips. My next trip is the end of March and beginning of April… I’m hoping to explore a country I haven’t seen yet.

Copyright

All work is copyrighted by me and is for sale. If you are interested in purchasing work, you can contact me at trishfalin@gmail.com. I will be working on a way to sell on the web site during the next month and plan to put something up in February.