A poem by Dave Jarecki

we can't run up
to the old lady at the bus,
grasp her hand,
but can
watch our way
into her, peel
her clothes
to expose
young flesh,
see
how eyes flick
to a child she recalls
dead in his crib.
take
the seat with her,
know
her list, the friend
and meat she picks,
how she hates the cold,
is used to rain
and fine
slow rides.

For more of Dave's fine work please check out his site: http://davejarecki.com/creative/

Just Finished....

I just finished this painting today. It is inspired from a walk I took around my neighborhood this morning. We had 2 inches of snow here in Portland, OR which pretty much brings the city to a halt. Today the sun is out and the sky's are bright blue so all the snow sparkles and shimmers in the light.

Bus Stop Girl

I rode the bus down town a few days ago and notices this girl waiting at the bus stop. She had this billowy red cloud of hair that fell all the way down her back.
I remembered as much as I could during that minute stop.


I have never painted from memory like this before. I usually have the sitters in front of me, like in this next picture of my friend Dave. Dave came to my studio for about three hours to sit for his portrait.
He played amazing music for the entire
three hours.

I found that I enjoy working from memory. I can simplify details because I no longer have the image in front of me to reference.
But part of the fun in painting portraits is enjoying the sitters company.

The Big 100

This fall has been very busy for me. I have participated in some awesome art shows here in Portland. I created 4 paintings in 8 hours at a live painting event called "Pulse". 35 artists participated in this event and all art work created in the 8 hours was auctioned off as a fundraiser for the Children's Heart Foundation.
"Little Things" at Guardino Gallery, 2939 NE Alberta St, which runs through December 28th is a show where all art is 7x7" or smaller.

The painting to the right is a piece I created for a show called "Blue Squared" at Vino Paradisio, 417 NW 10th Ave, which runs through January 4th. The theme of this group show is Blue and all the art is square.

And finally "The Big 100"
at Olympic Mills which opens Friday, December 5th from 6-11pm at 107 SE Washington St.

The Big 100 is a group show with over 100 artist participating. We were all given 10 pieces of wood, 8x8" to create on and we only had 10 days to do it. Each piece will be sold for $30.00 with a portion of the sales going to charity. My favorite thing about shows like The Big 100 is the limited time to create the art. I didn't have time to over think each piece and tried something different.

Here are three images out of my 10 that will be in the show. I have a











few of my traditional landscapes, but I also played around with the composition of the lines and broke out of the horizontal. I am excited for the opening and to see all the other work by great local Portland artist!

Linda Lee

Here is a painting of my very beautiful mother.
She came to visit over the weekend from Pittsburgh, PA. We had a great time together cooking and antique shopping.

On her last day we got down to business in the studio. I painted her portrait while she worked on a painting of her own. She painted a lovely autumn landscape. It reminds me of the rolling hills in Southwestern Pennsylvania. I have the painting she made hanging in my studio. Not only is my mom beautiful, she is also a very talented lady.

Serve your Country

One of my larger painting, Reflection" (oil on canvass, 48x60") has been selected to be part of the Art in the Embassies program. The destination of my painting is the U.S. Embassy in Doha, Qatar. I was notified a few months ago the the Ambassador, Joseph Lebaron, serving a 3 year term in Qatar was originally from the the Pacific NW.
As part of his diplomatic service, the Ambassador chooses American Art to be placed in the Embassy for the length of his stay. I was fortunate to be invited to participate. To learn more about the program go to http://aiep.state.gov.

The glamor of the road.

I recently had the opportunity to travel on the road with two of my favorite artist, Vortman and Chris Cank. The collaborative team that make up Vorcan. Under the name Vorcan these artists paint to live music all over the US. Here is how the trip went:
First I was told that we were going to Canada to paint the group Eoto. We made it as far as Olympia, Washington, painted Eoto, then turned around and headed south to Eureka, CA to paint the BLVD at the Red Fox Tavern.

This was my first lesson of the life on the road with Vorcan:
Expect plans to change.

The drive down to Eureka was beautiful and we got to stop at a small beach in northern CA for a minute to check out the beautiful sunset over the Pacific Ocean. This still didn't make up for the fact that we weren't going to Canada...

Blvd is an electro-hip hop group based out of San Francisco. They were happy to let us paint during there show and invited us to SF the following night for their CD release party.
Here I am to the left painting to BLVD. And below is a picture of Chris and I painting to the opening band On The One. These guys rely on sales of their art at these shows, to pay for food and gas to make it to their next gig. Life isn't always easy on the
road. Good night = sleeping in hotels. Bad nights = sleeping in the tour bus, which for now is a silver Scion, packed full of art supplies. We hit the road after the BLVD show and made our way further south to San Francisco.









We all took turns driving and catching up on sleep in the vip lounge (aka the back seat).
A huge part of success on the road is attributed to the kindness of friends and strangers. A great gift came from our friend Tim, who graciously let us take showers at his house the morning we arrived in SF. And to our friend Anna who let us crash at her house the following night.

Getting gigs isn't always as easy as having the band invite us to continue painting with them. Below is Vortman painting to the BLVD at their CD release party at Slims in SF.

We were pretty successfull at that show and decided to try our luck the following night in San Francisco as well. Calexico was playing at the Fillmore. Since we hadn't previously contaced Calexico or the Fillmore we had to rely on luck and being in the right place at the right time. We arrived at the Fillmore during sound check to try to catch the band to ask permission to paint. This is where the real majic of Vorcan happens. It is alot of waiting outside behind the venues and hoping the right people come out. Hoping they will take a minute to listen to what we want to do, be excited, and allow us to paint them. Fortunately the members of Calexico are awesome, and were excited to have us paint them. Unfortunately their show was sold out and the folks at the Fillmore shut us down. Such is life on the road as a live painter. We decided to take that night off and have a delicious sushi dinner before heading back to Portland. I was happy to be invited to travel with Vorcan, and to see what a challenge their job is.
To read about thier travels in their own words go to www.50dollarlunch.com.

Portland Open Studios You Tube Video

Portland Open Studios, Octobe 11,12,18,19

Portland Open Studios invites you to explore 98 individual artists' studios throughout the Portland metro area. During this self guided tour you will see a diverse group of artists working in their chosen media—painting, sculpting, blowing glass and much more. You will meet emerging artists in their 20s and 30s as well as mid-career and well-established artists from all over the United States and the world who have chosen to live and work in the Portland metro area.

Artists will share with you how they create their art: ideas, materials, tools, and techniques involved in the creation of paintings, prints, sculptures, textiles, glass, ceramics, and photography. For more information on the event and where to purchase tourguides, please go to www.portlandopenstudios.com . The tourguides are in the form of a beautiful calendar and also have a map to all the studios and entry for two adults.

My studio in NE Portland will be open on October 18th and 19th. Please stop by.

Invasion

Last night I came home to my two favorite artist invading my studio with art and debauchery. Vortman and Chris Cank team together to create art under the name Vorcan.
They have been traveling across the country painting live at concerts and music festivals all summer.
In between shows they grace me with their presence. Here in Portland they paint at the Doug Fir, Good Foot, Dante's and other local venues.
Above is Chris working on the computer, probably posting their $50 lunch. On their website they regularly post a painting that is available for purchase that day for $50. His favorite show of the summer was at the Tri Numeral festival in Asheville, NC where he painted live to Gza, the genius.
Vort especially enjoyed painting the Bridge with guest Mike Gordon at the All Good Festival.
This is Vort passed out on the couch after a night of watching movies and working on the computer.
Unfortunately their stay is short, as they have plenty of shows to attend throughout the country and abroad in Europe. This means plenty of driving and little sleep. But for the next few days I get to hang out with these two very inspiring artists. You may even catch us doing some live painting at Pioneer Courthouse Square.







You can read all about their adventures on www.50dollarlunch.com.

Art Before Web

Today I finally find time to be in my studio. My head spinning with lists of things "to do". I sit down to my computer, check my email and start maintaining my many web portfolios. I have accounts with myartspace.com, myspace.com, talentdatabase.com, The Irving Sandler Artist File Online, creativehub.com, linkedin.com, I have a store on etsy.com, and I just created an account for something called twitter (I only joined this to try to figure out what it is but I really never figured it out...). I think that is it. I have a friends who bugs me to convert to Face Book and some woman emailed me to join some online art community called Meseon.
How much time have I spent creating and maintaining these accounts, uploading my user profile, and figuring out how to navigate my way through each site?
I am not sure that much benefit has come from most of these sites, except some entertainment.
I do spend time surfing valuable sites that notify me of competitions, grants and other opportunities to show my work. Most applications are done online as well. I find myself avoiding entries that involve mailing information, weather it be on CD or slides (they still use slides!!!). Callforentry.org is a great site to find out about many art opportunities and apply for them all on the same site.
Even though I have more important work to do today, I procrastinate by blogging and updating my online portfolios. I tell myself that I am still doing work.
So what was the life of an artist like before the internet?
With that last thought I leave you with a portrait I recently did of my husband Scott. This Portrait depicts a typical evening at our house. Scott comes home from the office but still has work to do, so instead of painting him playing guitar, as I had originally intended, I get him working on our laptop.

The life of a paint brush.

There is nothing I enjoy more then sitting down to paint and grabbing fresh, new paint brush. I just purchased these 7 paint brushes from my local art store yesterday and I cant wait to use them. I like to buy the cheapest natural bristle brushes I can find and yesterday I hit the jackpot. I only paid $25.25 for all of them.
I like the inexpensive brushes because I am cheap, and because my brushes don't live very long.

I paint in oil, usually on wood panels and the wood
just eats up my paint brushes slowly over time. That is unless I kill them first by not cleaning them and have the paint dry in the bristles. This usually happens when I get called away from my studio mid-painting. Probably by a surprise visitor that abducts me to go to the beach, or bar with them. I tell myself that I can clean up when I get home, or even better, tomorrow. Tomorrow is always the best time to do any cleaning. But unforeseen forces keep me out of my studio, and the brush suffers. It is a slow and painful death for the brush. As the paint oxidizes slowly over a few days the brush knows that it has been neglected and forgotten. It hopes that I will come into the studio and realize that it is suffocating. It hopes I will drop it in the mason jar of mineral spirit. That it will get clean and be used again. But sometimes it is just too late. The paint has oxidized. The brush is beyond being saved.
When I do remember to clean my brushes, their life expectancy isn't that much longer. The bristles slowly get broken off by rigorous use. Flat brushes start to taper, and taper until they become filberts and I start to wonder what happened to all my flat brushes. Filberts become even more filberted and rounds get eaten till they are unrecognizable nubs. Somewhere in the middle of this process I realize that I should go buy more paint brushes, to break in the new ones before the old ones die. I like to keep the nubs around for a while, thinking that one day I will still use them, on that occasion that calls for a really rough brittle brush.
but they just sit in the jar on my window sill, with all the other well used brushes. I can always throw them away tomorrow.