Category: Uncategorized

I’m offering 20% off of my original art on my Etsy shop til July 5th.  It’s a way to celebrate the beginning of summer and to help raise funds to cover some unexpected expenses.

These are the pieces on sale:

Shipping is free on all of these.  There are more details of the paintings on the Etsy site.  If you have any questions, just ask.  You can email me at joyzmailbox @gmail.com.

As you may know, I’m living on disability for a degenerative neurological disease similar to Multiple Sclerosis, and have had life long problems with bi-polar disorder.  I’ve managed to keep alive through it all by  family, good friends, and supporters, but also through reading and the arts.  Reading and the arts have literally saved my life by building empathy, and showing me how to navigate a mysterious and beautiful world.

I have used writing to work out many of my disappointments in life, and have used art to celebrate life’s color, sorrow and humor.

My disability payment covers necessities, but I don’t make enough to pay for things like internet service (which just went up $30 per month), and art materials.  These things must pay for themselves.  Now in the heat of summer, utilities are higher. And medical co-pays are going up, even for those of us who are unable to pay more.

If you’re not interested in buying my art right now, but support what I’m doing, you can help me through Patreon.  You can make donations of as little as a dollar a month, and every dollar truly helps, believe me.  At higher levels of donation, you get benefits like free prints, if you want, and are entered into raffles for free original art.

And, of course, you’ll have my deep gratitude for the help and support.  I always hope that this blog brings a bit of brightness and thoughtfulness into the lives of others.  I hope you agree.

People often think that those of us who live “off the government” don’t contribute much to society (I did work and pay taxes whenever I was able), but I have found that those of us who can do volunteer work when possible, we contribute to political dialogue, we help define what it means to be human.  And I personally do all I can to make the most of what I have.  I try to work with with children in strife.   I hope to write more about those on the margins of society.  I review and share the good books I read.  All of these things have value, even if money isn’t attached to it.

So if you’re interested, please check out my Patreon page and consider a donation:

https://www.patreon.com/user

Or check out the cards, prints, canvas bags and other things you can buy from my designs at Redbubble.

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

And thanks again for all your support and for helping sustain this blog.

While I was reading about the separation of children from their families at the border this week, I worked on a painting in my cardboard cathedral series.

A few weeks earlier, I’d experimented with using pencil and paint as a way of expressing the fragile and temporary nature of childhood.

All of our childhoods are erased somewhat when we grow into adults.  It’s one of the reasons I enjoy working with kids.  They change daily, the 5 year old child suddenly becomes the 7 year old, with new personality growing from the old.  And they are always in a hurry to shed their childhood, so I try to enjoy them in the moment.

I worked with foster children, though, and their childhoods have been sidelined by the trauma they had to go through.

But this separation of families brought up a lot of thought on how so many children’s entire cultures have been taken from them.  Children of native Americans, children of slaves.  We have at times in our history tried to destroy cultures wholly and completely.  And it’s often worked.

But in a few children, I have seen an innate and ancient kind of wisdom that comes to the surface.  Their stories about animals, the things they draw and paint.  I see glimpses of a deeper identity that can’t be so easily erased.  I worked with one young boy who especially seemed in touch with nature, who never wanted his hair cut, who couldn’t bear to have shoes between him and the ground, who told me he was a cheetah boy.

He planted the seeds of this painting I call St. Foster:  Keeper of Stolen Wisdom.

I got the pose from a picture of him his mom took of him holding an Easter egg with a delicate and delighted touch.

The egg is such a potent symbol.  I just went from there and created an homage to the gifts children innately bring with them.

I slashed the canvas for his halo, and attached painted yellow canvas to the back.

I used a lot of gold paint and paper, as well as gold flakes.

All children belong to all of us, they are our gold, they are our future.  They need us to keep them safe.

Here are some of the other pieces in this series — using the gold painted cardboard to represent both the sacredness of life, and how easily we turn away from each other and don’t see the value that lies in each person.  I started using cardboard in this way when I saw a homeless woman who I’m pretty sure was a saint — she just glowed — sheltering in a makeshift cardboard box.

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Thanks for reading my post.  If you like it share it.  

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.  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.

I’ve been experimenting with acrylic paint and ink in my latest journal.  I’m using my usual Canson XL multimedia sketchbook.  I started this in pencil and watercolor, then layered it with acrylic and then inked it in with a combination of Sharpie pens and Microns of different nib sizes.

I have a pretty vibrant front porch garden growing now.  It’s amazing what can happen when a small seed gets planted, watered and the sun shines down on it — although the elephant ears are grown from a bulb about the size of a baseball.

I’m trying different background techniques.  After I finished the elephant ear, I covered it with wax paper then squirted around the left side and top with thinned down alizarin crimson acrylic.  Some of the paint bled through.  I then sponged very thin layer of crimson over the blue background to make it all flow better together.  I’m not sure it’s entirely successful, but it’s done.

Expect lots more drawings of plants as the summer comes bearing down upon us.

Thanks for reading my post.  If you like it share it.  

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:

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.