Uncategorized – Page 52 – joy murray art~stories~life

Moonflower Morning

October 13, 2018October 13, 2018Posted in gardening, UncategorizedTagged autumn, FallLeave a comment

Fall fell all at once this week. One day the high was 90 degrees, the next the high was 64. I expected a more gradual drop, but I love the cooler weather and the impending turning colors of leaves. Here, we have a lot of oaks, so the dominant color of fall is this lovely golden light filtered through yellow and brown leaves.

But these last few days have been cloudy and my moonflowers aren’t following their usual bloom schedule. The first cool cloudy morning, they were open, big as you please.

20181012_095611 — This is a bit blurred, but it was a delight to see the moonflower and dahlia blooming at the same time.

In these fall days, leaves are dying back. Some leaves give you more color for a minute, but some just go from green to brown and you become deeply aware of mortality. I don’t try to cut back the diminishing leaves too much. That’s part of the landscape, even of a porch garden. Plants bloom, give me pleasure, then fade away.

20181012_095641 — Moonflower among the fading dahlia leaves

I cut and watched a waning elephant ear leaf fade over a few days. The yellows and browns seemed so vivid, I enjoyed watching the curling edges brown and the complex swirl of the leaf structure.

Fall is a welcome relief from the heat of summer. A beautiful and melancholy season. I stroll around the neighborhood and see gardens transforming. People are decorating for Halloween and I see everything from ghoulish bones and monsters to funny pumpkins.

I think of the people I know and love who have died, and I long for another kind of ritual, more like the Day of Dead, celebrating those we have loved and lost and want to keep close through stories, food and visitations to their resting places. Cleaning a grave, remembering that we are mortal, that we don’t have all the answers, that our lives passing like an undecipherable dream.

I saw a dead robin as I was strolling around and it opened up a stream of grief, I started thinking of lost friends, sad songs, and then actually started crying. It was so strange. I wondered if a depression was coming on. Is the change of light going to be especially hard this year? I have so enjoyed this sunny summer. I can’t believe it’s over. Though many sad and troubling things happen in summer, it seems I reflect more on them in fall.

I wrote a poem about 5 years ago about what leaves tell us about life.

Leaf Story

Under the gray sky

We walk upon a carpet

Of ruby and gold leaves

Enchanted to find

The ground so much

Brighter than the sky

We say this is the time of loss

The leaves blazing a

Last gasp of color

Before they die

Dust to dust

But the leaves crackle out

Another side of the story

As they make their yearly journey

Back to simplified elements

Flowing in the winter rains

Back to their roots

Where the tree absorbs them

Where they make their slow way up

To begin life on a limb

Again

And again

A friend took me to a local nursery for discount plants — the ones that didn’t get watered and are drooping and browning. We grabbed up all the ones with live buds and brought them home to give them some TLC. I should have mums blooming in another week. Another friend brought me some new plants, new color.

20181012_174608 — Ornamental peppers – probably will miss the heat but they hold on to their jewel like colors

20181012_174558 — Coleus good for summer and fall

20181010_175733 — Angelonia looks like a little orchid — one of the sale plants enjoying the care it’s getting

20181012_174514 — Egyptian Star flower and angelonia

I’m learning this year that there are flowers that prefer shorter days and long cool nights. They are coming to life as others are dying back. It’s normal to feel the sadness of this old world more keenly as summer ends.

A robin doesn’t worry about its mortality, it flies, it maybe reproduces, it lives, it dies. As do all things. Even the oaks, hundreds of years old, who will give me filtered golden light in the coming month. They will one day fall, making room for some acorn to thrive.

Everything, perhaps, is as it should be.

IMG_20180821_0001 — Moonflower, watercolor and ink on paper

~~~

Thanks for reading my post. If you like it, share it. If you find a typo, please let me know and I’ll send you a thank-you postcard.

You can get prints and cards of some of my work on Redbubble. They also print my work on lots of other items, including phone skins, tote bags, shirts and journals:

https://www.redbubble.com/people/JoyMurray?asc=u

If you’d like to support my art and writing, please consider becoming a donor on Patreon, a monthly donation platform that helps me pay for internet service, art supplies and living expenses. A little bit each month goes a long way. If I get enough supporters, I can make this blog ad-free! Here’s a link to my Patreon page:

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=8001665

If you prefer to make a one time donation, you can do so at paypal.com Please email me at joyzmailbox@gmail.com if you’d like details.

Combating Unreasonable Goals

October 12, 2018Posted in UncategorizedTagged Creative time, Gwenn Seemel, InktoberLeave a comment

Every year, I think, I’m going to participate in Inktober, create an ink drawing daily, thinking I’ll get my mojo going, by creating a daily draw. If you’ve read my blog, you know I have a daily draw category that I post for a few days, then it disappears. My own mind gives out, and all my ideas disappear in a dusty poof scattered all over the studio floor.

IMG_20181012_0001 — Pencil ghost of a self portrait I may finish or not

I have this idea that I can do a complex daily draw as a warm up, then get all my other ideas done, too. I have lots of ideas, but then I feel I should concentrate on one or two, get those done and focus, focus. Get that one thing finished before starting another. I could use Inktober’s daily deadline to illustrate one of my stories.

I start, but then what I’m working on with such diligence escapes –like some slippery creature — it wriggles out of my hands and mind.

IMG_20180825_0002 — Unfinished elephant ears

In February 2016, before I left Portland, I fell into a deep depression. After getting medical help, I really needed some sort of structure in my life so I started a daily draw, Drawing Depression. Then at the end of April, I moved to Memphis, my hometown.

Ever since I’ve tried to get that project restarted and finished. I kept a notebook when I went through a mania to help restart the process, but I haven’t been able to. I’ve also been ready to write and illustrate some of my family stories, some fiction, some of my stories from never driving, and all my adventures with public transportation.

I have bits and pieces of projects all over the studio. And now I’ve started making fabric sculptures again.

When I was getting counseling in Portland, my counselor told me that it seemed like I kept putting myself into a box, that I tell myself I have to do things a certain way, and then I fail, and feel as if I’ve done nothing. Which was odd to her, because from her view I got quite a lot done. And a lot of what I create sells. So maybe, just maybe, I don’t work in a linear fashion. Maybe I need to work on things when I’m inspired to do so, then come back when I’m inspired again. Because I always am, at some point.

But I want to be linear soooo much. I want to carry out what I start, one, two, three. Beginning, middle, end.

I look back at my life, I look around me now, nothing is linear. Everything spirals. But I work a little bit on a lot every day.

I wonder why I can’t do a daily draw anymore, but the fact is, I draw in a more elaborate way and I’ve started using different materials.

IMG_20181012_0002 — Praying Mantis on my dahlia, in ink, acrylic and some random marker idea that petered out in the upper right corner

At times my visual journal is only a scrapbook of places I’ve been — theater tickets and programs, art show postcards, summaries from doctor visits, photos of mushrooms that appear like magic in the night, odd bookmarks and doodles. It’s not daily and it changes shape, but it grows with time.

IMG_20181012_0004 — A day at the library

20181010_173036 — Hey, look what appeared in the back yard

IMG_20181010_0001 — Experiment with pens and watercolor, painting and cross-hatching

I read and listen to Gwenn Seemel’s blog for inspiration (you should, too). She works on many projects at once and it’s been greatly helpful to me to see that. When I am tempted by something like Inktober or NaNoWriMo (write a novel draft in November — November when the holidays start and life/family gets weird? Seriously? I tried that, too. As well as one picture book manuscript a week for a month. I created nothing but stressed out scribblings), I try to remember both my counselor’s validation of my work style and a quote by Seemel:

“The work will be done when it needs to be done.”

She creates in a world where she avoids “clock time.” Here’s a link to the blog and video she created about it:

Creative time from Gwenn Seemel on Vimeo.

http://www.gwennseemel.com/index.php/blog/comments/creative_time_temps/

“The good news of creative time.” Ahhh.

My creative time is not like anyone else’s. And neither is yours. Perhaps you thrive on these challenges and they improve your art. I know my Drawing Depression project was enormously helpful in its time, but its time ended when it needed to end. I know there is still a seed of a larger work in there, but I can’t do it until it’s time to do it — when my mind, my heart, and my life all aligned to make it happen.

I have a daily practice. If I don’t do something creative everyday, I get very cranky and anxious. I draw, I knit, I add to a painting. I write down an idea. Something.

But I can’t make myself create to someone else’s schedule or to my own inner voice that keeps harping on about how I should be getting my work done.

In re-starting my fabric work, I’ve made sure to tell my clients that it will take a long time for me to complete the work. I hand-stitch them, I create them with love and imagination. I create them, within reason, outside of clock time. Otherwise, they’d all look the same and would lose their art and magic.

Plus, I have interruptions and a long term disability to manage. I intended to write this Wednesday, but the man who is installing my grab-bars needed to come over and work, I had an unexpected visit from a friend, and a slightly sick cat who vomited in my studio. My creative energy was zapped by life. But I managed to finish dying a scarf and got in a few rows of knitting.

While I did other things, I rethought a painting I’ve been working on for a few months, planned colors for new work, wondered how to lay out an illustrated story. The next day, I needed to make some progress on a commission.

So, no Inktober for me. No pressure like that anymore — though I still obviously feel it’s siren song. Every day, instead, I just need to tell myself to belief that my own way of doing things will continue to what’s right. And MY work will get done when it needs to be done.

IMG_4423 (2) — She Never Knew What to Make of her own Unraveling by Joy Murray

~~~

Thanks for reading my post. If you like it, share it. If you find a typo, please let me know and I’ll send you a thank-you postcard.

You can get prints and cards of some of my work on Redbubble. They also print my work on lots of other items, including phone skins, tote bags, shirts and journals:

https://www.redbubble.com/people/JoyMurray?asc=u

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=8001665

If you prefer to make a one time donation, you can do so at paypal.com Please email me at joyzmailbox@gmail.com if you’d like details.

Dahlia and Moonflower

October 8, 2018Posted in gardening, Photography, UncategorizedTagged dahlia, Moonflower3 Comments

The days are getting shorter but some flowers like that. Moonflowers, of course, and dahlias, asters, mums. Last night a moonflower opened right next to a dahlia bloom and I was able to get a good photograph of it.

I like that the heart shaped moonflower leaf came out, as well as the dew on the purple dahlia.

I put this print in my Redbubble shop. It’s available as cards, a canvas bag and a few cases for phones.

Or just to look at and enjoy here.

~~~

Thanks for reading my post. If you like it share it. If you find a typo, please let me know and I’ll send you a thank-you postcard.

You can get prints and cards of some of my work on Redbubble. They also print my work on lots of other items, including phone skins, tote bags, shirts and journals:

https://www.redbubble.com/people/JoyMurray?asc=u

If you’d like to support my art and writing, please consider becoming a donor on Patreon, a monthly donation platform that helps pay for internet service, art supplies and living expenses. A little bit each month goes a long way. If I get enough supporters, I can make this blog ad-free! Here’s a link to my Patreon page:

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=8001665

If you prefer to make a one time donation, you can do so at paypal.com Please email me at joyzmailbox@gmail.com if you’d like details.

Less Facebook, More Time in the Garden

October 6, 2018October 6, 2018Posted in gardening, handicap, quiting facebook, Uncategorized10 Comments

20180928_085654 — A dahlia bud starts like this

This week I took Facebook off my phone (though I still get alerts for some reason.) I haven’t yet decided on whether or not to remove messenger. I don’t mind people getting in touch with me through it. It functions more like email.

20181006_102027 — And it blooms like this. You can see my sandal and footplate from my wheelchair.

I found myself looking at my phone a lot for awhile, then remembering, there’s no stream of information. Nothing to follow. I read my email, maybe a blog, but then it’s back to reality, baby.

20181005_173743 — I brought a lot to life, even though my own health degenerated. Every day, this summer, I watered my front porch garden from my wheelchair and it just bloomed and bloomed.

A few days later, I took it off my kindle. Now I don’t check facebook before I start to read. I just start whatever book I’m reading and become engaged in a long insightful story. Or, I pick up an actual paper book, and let myself get lost in another person’s story, or the story of natural history, or the way our brains work.

20181002_145514 — I went with a friend to see the giant Art Outside installations of Brook’s Museum of Art

20181002_150735 — Installed on an abandoned building on E H Crump Bvd

20181003_162019 — The original painting at the Brooks has always been a favorite of mine — William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Au pied de la falaise (At the Foot of the Cliff), 1886

Now the only place I can check facebook is by sitting down at my desk and deliberately looking at it, checking on a few people. I read a post that seemed pretty benign, a joke, but turned into a lot of argumentative comments, and I turned the damned thing off. Still, I felt residual anxiety about needing to inform the people I disagreed with. As if that would make a difference. They aren’t going to make a difference in the way I think. Not in the small, hostile comment format.

20181003_161455 — Another exhibit at the Brooks — Wednesday is free day

It’s an addiction, facebook. I have an addictive personality, in many ways. I also tend to fester over things that make me anxious, things I hear about from others. I feel my own powerlessness over it all. And yet, I keep on looking into that small screen of the world, and thinking I can somehow make a difference. Or maybe it’s a kind of thrill seeking.

How will she 3 — How will she bear the weight of her hair? by Joy Murray 2017

My goal with my own facebook page was to share my art, share others’ art, and add a little bit of beauty to other people’s day. I shared serious matters, too. I found a community of people dealing with long term disabilities like me. But it all got overwhelming in this past year. Maybe the whole world was going to hell in a handbasket. All that anguish, it colored my life.

print photo — The Fragile Nature of Delight by Joy Murray

Then I realized I can do all I want to do online with just my blog, and by reading other people’s blogs. Blogs are more thoughtful, I think. We take a little more time, it’s more lie an essay. It’s a long deep breath, not a short sharp gasp.

still she rises — Still She Rises by Joy Murray 2016

There were so many times this week that I thought, I should put that on facebook. I’ve become used to looking at the world in terms of whether it will make a good facbook picture/post. The first few days, it really was like withdrawal. What will I do with all my photos?

hibiscus and glory — Hibiscus, Morning Glory, and City Street

Well, I found I could edit my photos a little bit. And then if I want I can share them here, with you. Friends who support and make time for me. Comments can be made here. Communication can happen. There are no algorithms to worry about.

I’m happy if people share my blogs on facebook or twitter or reblog them. But my job is to deepen and improve my art. That’s what I can do to make the world a better place. Open my eyes to it all, paint and write.

And share.

Thanks to all the new subscribers and Patreon supporters. I hope we all take a deep breath, hold on to our sanity, and take some time to see what it blooming all around us.

20161115_152231 — I saw Delight by Joy Murray

~~~

Thanks for reading my post. If you like it share it. If you find a typo, please let me know and I’ll send you a thank-you postcard.

You can get prints and cards of some of my work on Redbubble. They also print my work on lots of other items, including phone skins, tote bags, shirts and journals:

https://www.redbubble.com/people/JoyMurray?asc=u

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=8001665

If you prefer to make a one time donation, you can do so at paypal.com Please email me at joyzmailbox@gmail.com if you’d like details.

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