WHICH ONE?

Quintet

[First published in April, 2016]

Over the years of entering art shows, my fellow artist friends and I have joked around, wondering which we would prefer of one of our paintings:  that it win a prize? Or that it sold?  We go back and forth and eventually say we would prefer-- both!

Up till recently, I’ve only experienced one or the other.  I’ve sold paintings.  I’ve gotten a few prizes.  Great experiences, no doubt, each separately.

But this weekend, I received first place at the Potomac Valley Watercolorists Green Springs Show.  I’ve never won a prize that prestigious.  If you are familiar with PVW shows, you know the competition was stiff.

Walking across the room to receive the award, I felt as if I might pop open, like a spring flower bursting forth in bloom.  When the judge told the gathering that she’d awarded this painting first place because “it sparked joy in me like no other painting in the show”, I almost wept.  It seemed the pinnacle.  Nothing could make the day better.

I was wrong.

Later that evening, after celebrating and spending time with family, I checked my emails one last time before bed.  And that’s when I discovered that “Quintet” had sparked enough joy in another couple that they purchased the painting that evening.  I floated to bed that night.

So now I know the answer to the question of which I would prefer: to win an award, or to sell a painting.  The answer is: BOTH!

MY HOUSE-WIFELY TENDENCIES

[First published in March 2016, I think, or somewhere near then...]

Garden in the Abstract

Let me be the first to tell you that I am not, actually, a very good housewife.  Until my youngest daughter was three, she didn’t realize that our family even owned a vacuum cleaner, she thought only the cleaning lady had an “hola” (she didn’t even know what a vacuum cleaner was called!).  I like a clean house, but I like someone else to make sure it’s clean.

Still, I do have house-wifely tendencies, which mostly show up in my frugalities with regard to paint.  Paint is expensive.  I don’t like to waste it.  Watercolors are kind to my frugal soul, allowing me to use them over and over once squeezed out.  Just add water!

Acrylics, on the other hand, dry quickly when exposed to air; so, if I am painting with acrylics and suddenly am called away by a child’s calls (phone or voice), I may return to find lumps and puddles impervious to my brush.  Or, I may have a palette full of useable paint when I realize I have only 20 more minutes to paint before I need to clean up and go.  What to do?

What I’ve taken to doing in the latter case is to pull out a clean sheet of paper and just begin laying the paint down all over it.  I’m working fast, so I’m usually using a palette knife or a wide brush.  My goal is two-fold:  use the paint AND cover as much of the paper in an underpainting as possible.  I’ve been pleasantly surprised with the outcome of this process, since I seem to intuitively create interesting shapes that provide a great springboard to a finished painting.  This painting, “Garden in the Abstract”, is the happy result of this technique

The dried acrylic has turned into another fun tool for me.  It can be peeled off the palette paper, and comes off in most interesting shapes, which I then press onto my painting.  These bits and blobs, which I’ve learned are called “skins”, provide color, shape and texture—again, a fun jumping off place for the underpainting or a little bit of inspiration when the painting process gets stuck.

I don’t mind being house-wifely – when it comes to painting!

UNFINISHED SYMPHONY

[first published November 2015]

“Unfinished Symphony” is a portrait of our daughter Gillian with a Rwandan girl named Arielle.  Gillian met Arielle when she was serving with a church group that feeds street children in the capital of Rwanda, Kigali.  We have many pictures of that time; this one struck me because of the juxtaposition of expression, the joy on Gillian’s face, the more somber look of Arielle.

I worked for a while on the painting and got to this point—and then I stopped.  I loved where it was and every time I picked up the brush to continue, I couldn’t bring myself to do more.  As silly as this sounds, I love the fact that Gillian is mostly green, and that Arielle is many colors as well.  It reminds me of the children’s song that goes “Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in His sight, Jesus loves the little children of the world”.  Leaving this painting as it was meant more to me than continuing to work on it. 

Allowing it to be “unfinished” also gives it more meaning to me, as I can then look at these two girls and see them as representatives of much in the world that is unfinished, but that is beautiful.  I see them—and the painting—as a symbol of hope

SHORT AND SWEET

Relaxation

[First published January 2016; this group of paintings went on to be displayed in the Prayer Chapel at The Falls Church Anglican.]

One hundred and twenty-five characters.  That’s all.  Including spaces and punctuation. 

That was all I was allowed to write for my artist’s statement to accompany my exhibit at the National Institutes of Health.  Ask any artist—pretty much any of them will say that writing an artist’s statement is a very difficult endeavor.  And to do it in 125 characters?  Daunting.

I don’t even post on Twitter, which would have given me at least a little practice in being really concise.

After ruminating for a bit (like, oh, a month or six weeks or so), the deadline loomed.  So I wrote down words I wanted to include and counted up how many letters there were in each, then began to string them together like beads.  Here is what I came up with:

Carolyn Marshall Wright’s watercolors capture impressionistic moments – of mystery, of connection – in luminous immediacy.

One hundred and twenty-four characters, thank you very much!

If you like the artist’s statement, you’ll like the art even more.  Here is another piece from the show, which runs through March 4 in the Hatfield Building at NIH.

DELIVERY

[first published July 2015]

“Delivery”--That word is weighted with meanings.  We wait for a delivery by FedEx or Amazon; we speak euphemistically of a “special delivery” when we talk of a baby’s birth; we refer to being released from something negative, like a difficult relationship, as delivery.  In all these meanings, delivery is good, positive.

Yesterday, I got to make a delivery.  It was no exception to the rule of being good and positive.  I delivered a baby boy—that is, a commissioned portrait of a toddler child with bright golden hair and a beguiling smile.  Painting him was a delight-filled challenge; delivering the painting to his mother and seeing her delight was the culmination of a beautiful process.

I’m looking forward to many more deliveries like this one.

SISTERS/SURVIVORS

[first published in November 2015]

In order to understand a bit more about “Sisters/Survivors”, you have to understand more about the female shape in the painting.

A number of years ago, I awoke very early in the morning with a vision in my head and heart, a vision of many little girls, all alike yet each unique, a vision of a painting of them. Right then, at some ridiculous hour of the morning, I did a color sketch of what had come to me. 

As I worked, I wondered about the source of this vision—it was definitely a spiritual impulse, a message from God.  But what was it about?  And as I worked, it came to me. 

At that time, a friend, Gary Haugen, was starting a non-profit organization called the International Justice Mission.  Through Gary I had become more and more aware of human trafficking (in fact, the whole world is now a lot more aware of human trafficking because of Gary and IJM).  I heard the stories he told and couldn’t help but think “that could be one of my daughters”. I felt a kinship with women around the world—all alike, but each unique.  So I felt a calling to continue working out this vision on paper.

One of the first things I did was to make a template of the figure of the girl.  And I used a certain painting technique that involves layering paint, removing it and adding different colors back on top.  By keeping the shape of each figure the same, but working with this technique, I could achieve the desired uniformity with uniqueness. 

In the first paintings I did with this shape, I tended to paint detailed clothing on the figures, bright, colorful. Their faces are never painted.  The resulting paintings tended to be very successful, in a sense; they were accepted into juried shows, and they sold for lots of money.  But people didn’t seem to be getting the message of what the figures represented; while there was some mystery about them, they were also fairly cheery looking. 

I wanted somehow to convey more of what these women go through, somehow demonstrate the pain and anguish, while at the same time including a message of hope and redemption.  So this group of sisters came to be—using colors to represent the pain, the reds and oranges to me are like someone coming through fire.

As I worked on the piece, it became clear to me (and has become clearer even after completing it, as I think about issues having to do with women) that it was no longer about just women caught in human trafficking.  It was about what women suffer everywhere: it was about the friend going through the hell of chemo; it was for the friend whose husband left her after 20+ years of marriage; it was for the little girl abandoned then adopted out of foster care

By not painting the detailed clothing, they have been left stark, reduced to their essential shape.  But in that reduction, they are still whole.  Even with their wounds, they are whole people; and they are together in this suffering and in this hope. 

ARTISTS AND SNOWFLAKES

[First published December 2015]

It’s almost Christmas, but it won’t be a white one here in Virginia this year.  No drifts of snowflakes predicted (rain, in fact, is on the radar screen).  But I like to think about the miraculous individuality of snowflakes, no two alike.  It’s an easy step in my mind then, to go from their uniqueness to the unique vision of each artist, of each human, as we create.

I saw this individual vision play itself out clearly last week, as I painted with friends.  Six of us all painted the same still life, a white bowl of richly crimson berries, a pomegranate, a few other details – but the berries were the main point.  At the end of the day, we hung them all together.

The contrast!

The difference!

Were we all looking at the same objects?

Superfruits, acrylic on paper

Yes, you can see: see the berries, the bowl, the pomegranate; the theme recurs.  But the eyes of each of us see with our own sight.  We make choices – format, type of line, colors, brush shape – that inform our work.  Working out of our own world view, our individual life experiences, brings an authenticity to each piece.  We reveled in the variety we created, triumphant. Each as unique as a snowflake.

HOW DOES YOUR GARDEN GROW?

[First published August 2016]

Never give me a houseplant.  I love them, but—I always kill them.  I don’t try to kill them, it just happens.  And my yard isn’t much better*.  Which is strange, as I am the granddaughter of a renowned horticulturalist. 

Springtime blooms delight the senses–can you smell the peonies?

I didn’t know Granddaddy well, he died when I was small and my memories are hazy.  But as I’ve cleaned out my parents’ belongings in the past year, I’ve gotten to know this man, Roy Edgar Marshall, a bit more.  His story amazes me—setting off for college from the family farm in Nebraska with nothing but $5 and an extra pair of jeans, he earned a PhD, became a highly respected professor at Michigan State University and garnered awards and citations galore.

Clearly, his thumb was green—probably all ten fingers were Windsor Green!  So what happened to the genetics?  How come I can’t even keep an African violet alive?

Don’t get me wrong, I love to look at plants and beautiful gardens.  They fascinate me.  I watch my neighbors’ gardens grow and blossom all around me.  Thousands of shades of green; red and fuchsia so intense I can almost taste it; the play of light in and through petals and leaves: looking at a garden is a visceral experience for me.

Out of this fascination and delight have come the series of floral paintings that began this spring with “Quintet”.  Indeed, these pieces seem to actually grow out of my brush, overtaking my abstract compositions with their organic shapes.

So perhaps this area is where my grandfather’s legacy appears in me – in my paintings.  My gardening equipment includes brushes, palette knives, paint.  I plant my gardens on paper.  And they are growing very well indeed.

*actually, this summer, my tomato plants are actually producing, and I do have some pots of very prolific flowers.  On the other hand, this summer, my daughter Stephanie is helping me with my plants.