Express yourself! Paint something!

My paintings, “Pink Fantasy” and “Purple Fantasy” are examples of how art can reflect the painter’s personality, character, and whims—or responses to his/her present emotional state. Recovering from a difficult day, I set my mind to concentrate on putting myself into a more attractive zone. I sat down to paint. I thought, “red? No, too hot.” Then yellows, but, “No, too big!”, and so on with green? blue? No, to out-doorsy and open to the world. Absentmindedly, I reached for pink, white and purple. After applying some purple to my format, I began to relax, or at least to move out of the effects of my difficult day. I moved purple and pink around on my format for a bit, and then came out of my “dream-like” state. I started to concentrate on motive, aim and goal. I was actually able to arrive at a place in which I could paint with some degree of conviction; a painting worthy of my time, efforts, and costs of paints. Studying what was in front of me, the shapes and hues I had created with purple and white, I began to see the beauty of a garden of flowers, and from that point, I began to shift and shove (gently) the painted areas into shapes that would develop into semi-realistic blossoms. I brought these two paintings as deep into realism as my emotional state at that time would allow.

Art becomes a tool for expressing certain feelings, and, therefore, helps to clarify and put into perspective the effects of real life experiences. On the evening that I worked on those two paintings, the cause of my not-so-great feeling diminished, as the existence of the paintings became of greater importance to me. I really like “Pink Fantasy” and “Purple Fantasy”, and the events causing the difficulties of that day have long been forgotten along with the emotions I felt at that time. The difficulties are no longer important, but the paintings remain a reminder that to me that painting is a great way of expressing one’s feelings at any given time. I know that the same is true for music, as I play the Appalachian dulcimer (great therapy) when I feel a need to put my mind and heart at ease. Writing a blog works, also.