Opposites, Attractions and the Circle of Inspiration

This weekend, I purchased two new pieces of art for my growing collection of small figurative paintings. I thought I might group them with another piece I bought last month. Of course I have to wait for the new pieces to arrive to really be able to tell if the three will look good together… My plan is to hang them on the very small section of wall just left of the tiny window in my guest bathroom, which is so small, only something the size of these exquisite small works will fit. My guest bathroom is turning into a little art galley! I put them together in Photoshop just to see how they might look and then simulated the wall color, which is a mid-tone muted green:

from top to bottom:

Daniel Moreira (Portugal) from “The Human Face” series, 6" x 6"

acrylic, watercolor and pencil on board mounted to balsa wood

“Graceful” by Micki Wilde (England), 8" x 8"

acrylic paint, caran d’ache, charcoal and pen on cradled wood

“The Natural Environment of Man”, 6" x 6" by Angela Petsis (PA)

mixd media on cradled wood panel

Anyway, the reason I bring this up is because I was so inspired by browsing through all of the figurative pieces from some of my favorite artists while trying to decide what to spend my June art allowance on, that I had the uncontrollable urge to create a figurative work of my own yesterday, and so I did. I wanted to do a neutral face painting as I was very inspired by these and similar pieces I had been looking at. And of course, I got the last-minute urge to do something colorful and out of my comfort zone. So here is my latest painting, which is very small.

Colorful, 8" x 8"

acrylic on canvas board

The point of this long-winded post is that this painting would never have been created had I not seen the work of other artists and felt that inspiration. Not that mine is a great painting by any stretch, in fact it’s so far out of my usual color palette I’m not sure how I feel about this one. But it’s mere existence is a tribute to my appreciation of the work of other artists. The “circle” always kind of amazes me.

My own art collection

After my post yesterday it got me thinking… perhaps people would be interested to know that I also collect art and have for several years. So I think that from time to time I will talk about my art purchases and show pictures of them hanging in my house. This first piece that I will share is a piece I bought about eight or nine years ago. The artist is Sunstone Maria. At one time, she sold her work on eBay and that is where I purchased this piece. The painting is entitled “Saturday Morning” and it measures 24" square. I remember she listed this piece a few times and to my complete surprise, it did not sell. But every time she relisted it, I would watch it. Then one day, she put it on an extreme sale and it was a “Buy It Now”. At this point, I could not pass it up, so I immediately “bought it then”. It’s always a little bit of a gamble with art on eBay. A lot of the artists (at least then) did not know how to color-balance their painting images and I have to admit that a few times an art piece would arrive and I would be very disappointed as the color was no where near what I was expecting. But this piece arrived and was exactly as it had been depicted. I have been happy with it for the past several years and it hangs in my living room above the fake fireplace. Below is a photo of my living room in its entirety, taken a few years ago. I've added a few things, but the art is still the same.

Full view of the living room. Sunstone Maria’s “Saturday Morning” is in the center above the fireplace. The piece on the left is a reproduction (the only reproduction I own) and the three pieces on the right are paintings that I have done.

A closer image of “Saturday Morning”.

I recently did a Google search for Sunstone Maria and was pleased to find that she is still creating art and has a website:
http://sunstonemaria.com/