Good Reads

I am on my second Amazon Kindle. I have purchased the Kindle Fire both times, because I like to stream movies and old television shows that are available on Amazon Prime. For example, after I went through Firefly, the Joss Whedon scifi/western 13 episode tv show, I went into Prime and watched all 7 seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, also Joss Whedon. It's me. I turned into a nerd in my 60's, and it is all Nathan Fillion's fault for being on Castle.

I digress.

I buy all novels I want to read in Kindle format, but when it comes to art books or anything to do with instructions, I want a real book in my hand. I like to flip pages, go back and forth. That is not always easy to do with the Kindle, so yeah. Give me the paper paged book every time. The two most recent purchases are above.

Jane Davies is an artist living in Vermont who does collage and abstracts. I adore her work. If I could afford it, it would be hanging all over my house. I took one of her online classes and learned a great deal. When Jane announced her book was published, I ordered it immediately. It is not disappointing me. Dang, this woman challenges you from the start. The first project in the book is mark making. So here is the thing, because there is always a thing:

Dina Wakley had us make marks in her latest online class.

Jodi Ohl has us making marks in her new online class, which I downloaded yesterday, entitled The Zen of Abstract Painting. And now Jane wants us to fill sheets with marks.

There must be something to this, right? Today I am pulling out sheets of paper to do nothing more than make marks. I am going to try every type of pencil and pen I have, and different brushes. Except these sheets are not going to be pitched. I've decided to organize this by labeling each line or area of marks with the implement I am using. Did I mention I bought a package of bamboo skewers on sale at Walmart for $.99? Mark makers. I have a few Catalyst tools in my stash. Yep, mark makers.

Reading these books has helped me realize I am still too tight, too anal with my work. I must loosen my grip and let the medium fly. To a certain extent, that has happened with water colors. But not yet with acrylic paint.

Stay tuned. This could get interesting, or this could be the Prednisone talking that I am now on for sciatica. Ya gotta laugh.
Linda