I realized that I needed to be more structured when I come into my studio to work on paintings. It is important to me to continue having discipline when I'm working.
For now shifts in value, temp., and intensity are what I'm focusing on, with a purposeful attention to having a focal point.
I see a difference from one set of paintings to the new body of landscapes I'm currently working on with these few elements of art taking a front spot in the drivers seat.
Wednesday, May 31, 2017
Tuesday, March 28, 2017
3/28/2017 working on my artist statement for my new body of landscape paintings...
keep in mind its a work in progress......
keep in mind its a work in progress......
Artist Statement for Landscapes 2017
My most recent body
of work it's not just about painting the landscape for its quality of sheer
beauty... it represents much more. My
work at its core has always been about a memory--a moment captured in paint not
to be forgotten. The places I paint can
seem uninteresting to some, but to me there is an unexplainable moment when I
realize I must capture the image that has presented itself. It's not only about
the former but also the mechanics of painting
Color has always taken a large role in my paintings. Shapes. .
these objective and non-objective interests obsessively drive me to
paint.
My previous body of work, though more abstract aesthetically,
the concept still remains in this new body of (work) landscape paintings.
The moment, time is fleeting.
first with my camera
then I transfer the landscape to canvas.
The more I stop and think about why and how I put paint to
canvas the more I realize just what a big influence the patriarchal members of my family have had upon my
interactions with each of them personally.
From a very early age watching my father and grandfathers
lay mortar to bricks, a trowel to large slabs of cement and small rubber hand
held spatulas loaded with bondo placed upon the curve of a fender
The part color takes in my landscape paintings is to not
only capture the colors that are presented to me at the time I take the
photograph, but to also capture how the colors made me feel, it is partly what
drives me to stop and take in or absorb if you will the colors within the
landscape and the feeling that I experienced within that moment.
Shapes that I find within the landscape are very comforting
to me for reasons I cannot yet explain.
They offer to me a sense of grounding or a familiarity to something else
that I cannot explain. It is never
really about replication of the landscape. It is something greater.
Static and irrelevant (how others see the landscape?)
They only look for a brief moment at its beauty...the time
they spend with it is but a brief fleeting moment....I would argue that the
exposure to instant and immediate gratification via electronic devices have
left the ability to stop and absorb something as simple as a color of a shadow
or the shape of a branch....
As a child taking many trips to our lake as a family we
spent many hours surrounded by nature....
also living in the country surrounded by trees and wild
life had a significant influence upon me
throughout my life.
I remember being taught by my mother to make "sand
trees" with the beach sand immersed in the lake water ....their shape and
textures intrigued me. The castle became
unimportant ..this is my first recollection of how key these elements of art
shaped me at a very young age
Monday, March 27, 2017
Friday, March 24, 2017
3/24/17
"Its been a long time since I've heard my own voice..."
Too many things to mention.....good and bad....but non-the-less I'm making memories and I'm back to painting.....
I have a brand new beautiful studio....and inspiration galore.....
I thought it might be good to document my journey.....so I decided to start my blog again.....
I hear one of my most favorite mentors ...Malcolm say..." painting is harrrrrrrd!" ha ha ha
I have the painting "bug" again....my brain is starting to fire on cylinders that I haven't used in a long time. It feels good.
Counting Blessings.....
"Its been a long time since I've heard my own voice..."
Too many things to mention.....good and bad....but non-the-less I'm making memories and I'm back to painting.....
I have a brand new beautiful studio....and inspiration galore.....
I thought it might be good to document my journey.....so I decided to start my blog again.....
I hear one of my most favorite mentors ...Malcolm say..." painting is harrrrrrrd!" ha ha ha
I have the painting "bug" again....my brain is starting to fire on cylinders that I haven't used in a long time. It feels good.
Counting Blessings.....
Friday, October 19, 2012
Who are your ancestors in art?
Lately I have been having some great conversations in the grad painting studio... YEAH!... amazing right? New fresh air has blown into the dept. .... and it feels goooood!
I was asked by my committee head.....who my antecedents (great new word I just learned, excited about that ...ha! ) in painting are? Though I thought I always new where I fit.... this conversation led me to research this topic in a way that I could relate to. Family. Who is my uncle in the painting world? who is my aunt... etc. etc. So I have begun to build a family tree of my ancestors in art and I don't feel that it will be limited to just painters.
While researching, I found a stronger personal voice that speaks to who I am NOT as a painter. I unequivocally am not a "non- objective" painter. So if I am described as such....we will have a debate...be prepared!
Otherwise, I am in the hunt for those that came before me and what their story was that they had to tell.
Their truth.
My truth is unfolding as we speak.
".....the world in on fire, Have a nice day!"
I was asked by my committee head.....who my antecedents (great new word I just learned, excited about that ...ha! ) in painting are? Though I thought I always new where I fit.... this conversation led me to research this topic in a way that I could relate to. Family. Who is my uncle in the painting world? who is my aunt... etc. etc. So I have begun to build a family tree of my ancestors in art and I don't feel that it will be limited to just painters.
While researching, I found a stronger personal voice that speaks to who I am NOT as a painter. I unequivocally am not a "non- objective" painter. So if I am described as such....we will have a debate...be prepared!
Otherwise, I am in the hunt for those that came before me and what their story was that they had to tell.
Their truth.
My truth is unfolding as we speak.
".....the world in on fire, Have a nice day!"
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Since committee meeting are upon us....Saw this hanging on a professors door and thought I'd share....
Critique:
Eleven constructs of good work:
1. Dynamism-Work that is visually arresting and causes delight.
2. Depth-Work that is not consumed in the first look but revels more upon further viewing.
3. Contemporaneity- Work that reveals something of "the now."
4. Concept-Work that is driven by an idea and the unique expression of that idea.
5. Engagement- Work that exudes the intensity and commitment of the maker.
6. Originality- Work that contributes to the ongoing search for "the new."
7. Personality- Work that communicates something of the core of the maker.
8. Soul- Work that feels whole, complete and alive.
9. Parallelism- Work that fulfills the expectations set up by its compositional gesture and stylistic phrasing.
10. Subversion- Work that subverts the brief in an effort to explode beyond the banal.
11. Craft- Work that is well made.
Eleven constructs of good work:
1. Dynamism-Work that is visually arresting and causes delight.
2. Depth-Work that is not consumed in the first look but revels more upon further viewing.
3. Contemporaneity- Work that reveals something of "the now."
4. Concept-Work that is driven by an idea and the unique expression of that idea.
5. Engagement- Work that exudes the intensity and commitment of the maker.
6. Originality- Work that contributes to the ongoing search for "the new."
7. Personality- Work that communicates something of the core of the maker.
8. Soul- Work that feels whole, complete and alive.
9. Parallelism- Work that fulfills the expectations set up by its compositional gesture and stylistic phrasing.
10. Subversion- Work that subverts the brief in an effort to explode beyond the banal.
11. Craft- Work that is well made.
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Poetry as Insurgent Art /Lawrence Ferlinghetti
I am signaling you through the flames. The North Pole is not where it used to be, Manifest Destiny is no longer manifest. Civilization self-destructs. The goddess Nemesis is knocking at the door....
What are poets for in such an age? What is the use of poetry? If you would be a poet, create works capable of answering the challenge of Apocalyptic times, even if this means sounding apocalyptic. You have to decide if bird cries are cries of ecstasy or cries of despair, by which you will know if you are a tragic or a lyric poet. Conceive of love beyond sex. Be subversive, constantly questioning reality and the status quo. Strive to change the world in such a way that there's no further need to be a dissident. Read between the lives, and write between the lines. Be committed to something outside yourself. Be passionate about it. But don't destroy the world, unless you have something better to replace it.
If you would snatch fame from the flames, where is your burning bow, where are your arrows of desire, where is your wit on fire?
The master class starts wars. The lower classes fight it. Governments lie. The voice of the government is often not the voice of the people.
Speak up, act out! Silence is complicity. Be the gadfly of the state and also its firefly. And if you have two loaves of bread, do as the Greeks did: sell one with the coin of the realm, and with the coin of the realm buy sunflowers.
Wake up! The world's on fire!
Have a nice day!
What are poets for in such an age? What is the use of poetry? If you would be a poet, create works capable of answering the challenge of Apocalyptic times, even if this means sounding apocalyptic. You have to decide if bird cries are cries of ecstasy or cries of despair, by which you will know if you are a tragic or a lyric poet. Conceive of love beyond sex. Be subversive, constantly questioning reality and the status quo. Strive to change the world in such a way that there's no further need to be a dissident. Read between the lives, and write between the lines. Be committed to something outside yourself. Be passionate about it. But don't destroy the world, unless you have something better to replace it.
If you would snatch fame from the flames, where is your burning bow, where are your arrows of desire, where is your wit on fire?
The master class starts wars. The lower classes fight it. Governments lie. The voice of the government is often not the voice of the people.
Speak up, act out! Silence is complicity. Be the gadfly of the state and also its firefly. And if you have two loaves of bread, do as the Greeks did: sell one with the coin of the realm, and with the coin of the realm buy sunflowers.
Wake up! The world's on fire!
Have a nice day!
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
The Truth
Wassily Kandinsky: Concerning the Spiritual in Art.
There is, however, in art another kind of external similarity which is founded on the fundamental truth. When there is a similarity of inner tendency in the whole moral and spiritual atmosphere, a similarity of ideals, at first closely pursued but later lost to sight, a similarity in the inner feeling of any one period to that of another, the logical result will be a revival of the external forms which served to express those inner feelings in an earlier age. An example of this today is our sympathy, our spiritual relationship, with the Primitives. Like ourselves, these artist sought to express in their work only internal truths, renouncing in consequence all consideration of external form.
These two possible resemblances between the art forms of today and those of the past will be at once recognized as diametrically opposed to one another. The first, being purely external has no future. The second, being internal, contains the seed of the future within itself. After the period of materialist effort, which held the soul in check until it was shaken off as evil, the soul is emerging, purged by trials and sufferings. Shapeless emotions such as fear, joy, grief, etc., which belonged to this time of effort, will no longer greatly attract the artist. He will endeavour to awake subtler emotions, as yet unnamed. Living himself a complicated and comparatively subtle life, his work will give to those observers capable of feeling them lofty emotions beyond the reach of words.
There is, however, in art another kind of external similarity which is founded on the fundamental truth. When there is a similarity of inner tendency in the whole moral and spiritual atmosphere, a similarity of ideals, at first closely pursued but later lost to sight, a similarity in the inner feeling of any one period to that of another, the logical result will be a revival of the external forms which served to express those inner feelings in an earlier age. An example of this today is our sympathy, our spiritual relationship, with the Primitives. Like ourselves, these artist sought to express in their work only internal truths, renouncing in consequence all consideration of external form.
These two possible resemblances between the art forms of today and those of the past will be at once recognized as diametrically opposed to one another. The first, being purely external has no future. The second, being internal, contains the seed of the future within itself. After the period of materialist effort, which held the soul in check until it was shaken off as evil, the soul is emerging, purged by trials and sufferings. Shapeless emotions such as fear, joy, grief, etc., which belonged to this time of effort, will no longer greatly attract the artist. He will endeavour to awake subtler emotions, as yet unnamed. Living himself a complicated and comparatively subtle life, his work will give to those observers capable of feeling them lofty emotions beyond the reach of words.
Sunday, May 1, 2011
Sunday, May 1, 2011
I would like to send a personal invite out to each of you, my apologies for not having post cards to give to you.
New Paintings and Drawings by
Michelle L. Ghisson
Opening Reception
Friday, May 6, 5-9pm.
Bruce Gallery, Edinboro PA
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Friday, April 15, 2011
http://blogs.artinfo.com/secrethistoryofart/2011/04/15/a-new-rothko-what-happens-when-a-new-masterpiece-surfaces/
Rothko is my god.... 2007 a Rothko sold for 71 million........ http://blogs.artinfo.com/secrethistoryofart/2011/04/15/a-new-rothko-what-happens-when-a-new-masterpiece-surfaces/
Friday, April 8, 2011
Thursday, April 7, 2011
April 7, 2011
Going to meet Donna Nicholas for lunch today to talk about the Otis Movement.....excited!
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
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