multi tasking

Over the long holiday weekend, we watched “Words and Pictures.” It has been a while since I have seen a good movie (or one that I actually watched completely without multi-tasking). This one sucked me in. Maybe it was the subject matter. Words, writing, ideas and art, painting, pictures. Plus it had a bit of the indie film feel to it. It was a mellow movie, not too much drama, but just the right amount of depth.

Juliette Binoche and Clive Davis are the main characters and they do not disappoint. Owen is an alcoholic, yet endearing English professor at a college prep school, and Binoche an artist/painter who cannot do what she used to after rheumatoid arthritis effects her. They begin a personal and professional war that moves both their students and their own worlds. It was not an amazing movie, but enough to keep me engaged and make me think. I was enamored watching her paint. Who knows if Binoche had any idea what she was doing at the craft of painting, watching her awakened a dormant vein inside me. I have not painted for a while. She painted large pieces, a size I do not have a space for, yet it brought back a craving for me to continue to paint. It brought back the desire to dust off my brushes and get busy painting.

As far as the movie goes, I could speak to either side of the debate (words or pictures) as the movie debates. I am a word fanatic. I love writing, find that I process my world with words. Yet, I also love art. It calms me, is therapeutic, and truly allows me to be in the moment. Some of my paintings have no words to describe them, they are just something I feel. Sometimes my words still do not do justice to what I am feeling. The debate continues, but both are just as important to me.

Check out the trailer below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehQimFhQmQg

Each year a few days away from our anniversary, we venture to the Lake Oswego Festival of the Arts. We try to go on Friday so that if we fall in love with a piece of artwork, there is still the possibility that it has not been sold. We have had this tradition for quite a few years, and sometimes we do not find or purchase anything and other years we come home with grins and excitement to go back on Sunday to pick up our new piece.

This year we came home with smiles across our face. Karl Kaiser’s talented encaustic work has come home to hang on our walls, and we also got to meet him at the Festival of the Arts. I am enamored with his work. If you are not familiar with encaustic, I encourage you to check out his blog as he will show you how he does some of his pieces. Encaustic is a form of painting using hot beeswax. Many encaustic artists mix their own colors, and you will find that each artist has a very different finished piece of work.

I have been wanting to start doing my own pieces, and had always been told that I would need a blow torch. Based on my multi-tasking and often dream world thinking Chris has not wanted me to have a blow torch in the house. To my excitement, Karl let us know that I could use butane to start out.

The piece you see is many, many layers of wax cut down and embedded into another piece. I love the rich color that he has brought into this piece. If you want to follow Karl’s work, you can like him on Facebook, check out his website, or his blog.