92 days into the 100 day project.

I have shoe boxes stuffed with paper swatches, an indoor cloths lines filled with hanging tags, and taped cutouts stuck on my walls that are all part of my "paper, glue, scissors" The 100 Day Project. There were days when nothing seemed exciting, and other days where I would produce 4-5 cut out images. Morning were the best for me, but when I couldn’t sit down and work on the 100 day project because of an early morning commitment, I worked on it in the evenings. As the project winds down, I wonder about the lasting effects; how has the project infiltrated my paintings, how does sticking to something daily effects my psyche, how does doing something, anything everyday effect my habits, and lastly what next?

#1 of MY 10 things great about NYC

I was feeling uninspired the other day.
I was thinking I needed a dose of art.
Not European, not gallery art, not commerical. But something with some roots to it. I was thinking about how I wish I could go and spend a day at the MET likeI did last May.
It is hard not to get inspired in NYC, but you do run the risk of over-stimulation and feeling very insignificant. All in all the MET it is one of the reasons I love New York, plus it is a great building. I don't think there is a building that big in a over a 200 mile radius of me, not including an ice arena.

Complicated

Do artists make everything more complicated? Or does sometimes it just seem that way?

Drawing and habit

j renee benda
























Drawing is still basically the same as it has been since prehistoric times. It brings together man and the world. It lives through magic.
Keith Haring

It is only by drawing often, drawing everything, drawing incessantly, that one fine day you discover to your surprise that you have rendered something in its true character.
Camille Pissarro

How Dickens is like Art

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way - Charles Dickens

Do I dare compare the 100 day project or my recent studio time with a Tale of Two Cites? Sometimes making art is like the best of times. Sometimes not. Sometimes there is lightness in everything you do and sometimes not. Sometimes artists feel hopeful and then sometimes we don't. But this is true about everything in life. So even though sometimes there is a long winter it is ALWAYS followed by spring.