cedar’s blog

Cedar March 25th, 2008

This week I found out that my belly dance teacher is moving to Taiwan because her husband is being transferred there for work. I’ve had so much fun in her class these past several months, and I’m sad that it’s coming to an end.

In her honor, I’ve made this small painting of a beautiful dancer in costume.

Belly Dancer
Acrylic on Canvas
10″ x 8″

This painting is going to my teacher, but if you’d like me to paint a belly dancer for you, talk to me.

What I have enjoyed the most about my belly dancing class is hanging out with other women of all ages and shapes in a non-judgmental setting where we can have fun, laugh together, and celebrate our shared experience as women. Belly dance is a celebration of femininity, physical and spiritual. This may sound corny, especially to men (I don’t know what the male equivalent would be–sports? hunting? roughhousing?) but I think that the celebration of what we are is important–everyone is born into their own body and their own life. There is no way around it, so we might as well embrace it and rejoice in it.

So often (especially in our culture, I think) women are tormented by insecurity, questioning their own beauty and self-worth, trying to live up to some unattainable and vaguely defined standard. Insecurity can make women bitter, jealous and petty. It can make them spend all their money on clothes, hairstyles, cosmetics and plastic surgery. This is such a waste of our energy, when all the beauty that we need is already right there inside us, if we would just recognize it.

That’s what these next two paintings are about. They both started out as sketches for self-portraits (it’s been awhile since I’ve done one) but as I painted them, they became less and less an accurate physical likeness, but at the same time I felt they were representing me more and more. Finally I realized that it wasn’t myself I was painting, and it wasn’t any other real-life woman either.

I was painting goddesses–I don’t mean goddess in the literal sense, as a deity, but rather, the goddess that’s in every woman–the feminine spirit–that dichotomy of gentle beauty and fierce strength within the same person. Cliché? Maybe. A little corny? Maybe–but it’s rooted in truth, and this thought process has inspired some pretty successful artwork:

Ruby Goddess
16″ x 20″ Oil on Canvas

Lavender Goddess
20″ x 24″ Oil on Canvas

I got my artichoke seeds in the mail today (which had been on backorder.) I am so antsy to get out there and plant my garden, but I have to wait another couple of weeks, until the danger of frost is past.

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Cedar March 21st, 2008

My paintings of lotus flowers have really connected with art buyers. Of the original six paintings, all but one are now sold!

The Lotus Series is striking and elegant, painted in opulent tones of ruby, ivory, sage green and gold. Here are the 3 newest additions to the series:

All are 20″ x 20″, Oil on Canvas.

Lotus VII

Lotus VIII

Lotus IX

As long as you keep buying them to hang in your homes and offices, I will keep painting them! I am a bit in love with these paintings myself, and wish I could keep them for a little longer before sending them to the gallery.

I use water-soluble oils, which eliminates the need for turpentine and other toxic solvents. But even so, the fumes from the wet paint itself have a way of accumulating into a noxious miasma around me, and sometimes I’m so focused on my work, I don’t notice how woozy I am until I get up from my easel. The other day when my husband got home from work, he walked into my studio and said, “Why does it smell like cancer in here?” Another reason to look forward to spring–opening all the windows!

This weekend I hope to get a little work done outside–start fixing up my neglected garden plots, turn the compost heap, and pull out some residual dead plants in anticipation of new life.

Happy Easter to everyone! Happy Belated Equinox!

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Cedar March 13th, 2008

I haven’t updated in awhile–life has just been speeding by!

I signed with a new gallery this week, the Premiere Fine Arts Gallery in Lambertville, New Jersey, owned and operated by Anthony Mustello.

This means I now have regular representation by 4 galleries. (”Regular representation” just means that they sell my paintings continuously and always have some of my artwork in stock–as opposed to a one-time showing.) So, that’s 4 business relationships I have now–relationships I must value and maintain.

My career is picking up speed as I become more established as a professional in my field. Of course I’m happy about that–I’m thrilled to share my talents with the world and to receive recognition for my work, and I’m so thankful for the income my art brings in. But at the same time, I am feeling the pressure to maintain a standard of quality in my work, and to spend enough hours on my artwork so that I am constantly creating something new and exciting.

I think I’m at a time in my life where I’m in the thick of it, so I can’t step back and see how well I’m doing (or not.) It just feels hard–and like I’m always falling behind and never up to my own standards.

However, that’s how I felt during my entire senior year of college too, and I came out of that with lots of experience, lots of friends, and a 4.0 GPA, achieving honors in my major. So, I’m going to just nurture my faith in myself and my work, and try to stay focused on my long-term vision without letting it make me too serious. At least, that’s the goal.

Anyway, here are a couple new pieces for you to see:

Mocha the Huntress
Acrylic on Canvas 8″ x 10″

(Reference photo courtesy of Ashley Van Alstyne–thank you Ashley for letting me use your beautiful photo!)

And this next one mimics the basic composition of my painting “Radiant Sky” but is actually quite different from that one.

The word ethereal means: characterized by lightness and insubstantiality; intangible. This painting turned out so airy and sunny. It looks like such a perfect day that it’s only halfway in the real world, and halfway in the realm of imagination.

So it’s titled: Ethereal Day
Acrylic on Canvas 24″ x 20″

I have been told before that I would be good at painting the scenery on theater sets, because my work sometimes has a dramatic, storybook quality. I think this painting definitely has that.

This past week I’ve done extensive modifications to one of my existing paintings, Upward Momentum. The collectors who are buying the painting were torn between this one and another one, but this one is bigger and they wanted the bigger size because they’re moving into a new home with lots of blank walls. So I made some changes to the painting to make it more like the other one they liked (Towering Trunk.)

Here’s the old version of the painting:

And here’s the new version:

As you can see, the composition remained the same, but everything else is now quite different. I like the new version a lot better–my favorite part is the beautiful highlights on the trunk of the biggest tree.

In other news, I’ve started germinating some of the seeds for my garden. Perhaps only fellow gardeners will appreciate the level of sheer giddy excitement I feel when I look on my windowsill and see this:

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Cedar March 3rd, 2008

Here’s the newest cat in my series:

Lucky
Acrylic on Canvas, 8 x 10″
Reference photo courtesy of Marc Pitman (Thanks Marc!)
…I love his clear sea-green eyes!

The weather is absolutely gorgeous today–I’m painting outside today, just because I can. The air is soft and the sun is shining. Aaahhh–my spirits are lifted.

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