Self-Portrait with a Fascinator 2016

On Monday, I walked, buying frames from two stores in different parts of the city, then went to the Art Bar Poetry Series in the evening, about 16,000 steps/13.1km. 

Part of a group art show and poetry reading on Sunday. 

I spent the morning searching for a few paintings. All I’ve done, really, is some self portraits because I belonged to a self portrait group on Facebook for a few years. We could only use reflective surfaces, not photographs.

Anyway, I did locate a few of them. Then, I decided to paint a yellow background on an earlier one (that I did use a reference photo for). So I researched what you can use to dry oil paint real fast, and added liquin to the paint. That was late afternoon. 

I came home from the art bar early, about 9pm, and repainted another one’s background red with a real nice, rich oil paint that I purchased a few years ago. I used water mixable oil paints for a number of years, but have gone back to traditional oils for the richness of color.

This one is from a still from a video reading of a poem in 2013 with two other poets that I did to promote our LyricslMyrical chapbooks when we launched together that year at a poetry cafe. The painting was done in 2016 for an art show, but I didn’t use it that time. 

Yellow background still wet. I’m amazed it works. I tried different colours in PhotoShop before deciding on a Medium Cadmium Yellow with some Yellow Ochre. 

Fingers crossed it’s dry by Friday when I’m hanging my 5 paintings. 

Here's the 2013 video of  'This Cabin,' by Lisa Young; 'the luminist poems,' by Brenda Clews; and 'Scarborough Songs,' by Pat Connors.

But the video I took inspiration from for this self portrait painting was this one, it turns out:

(I buried it, despite my daughter liking it, embarrassed that I was so poor I made the fascinator out of a black bra cup and a bit of netting from a fabric store and some Halloween feathers - life of a single mother.)

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A Pulsing Imagination - Ray Clews' Paintings

A video of some of my late brother Ray's paintings and poems I wrote for them.

Direct link: https://youtu.be/V8iZyORoU9E
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On the Unity of Assemblage and Poem

In Split Mask and UnfurlFlowerring, the mask came first. A weltanschauung grew around it, accoutrements, fabrics, a ‘look’ enmeshed with the theme, and I felt a nascent poem emerging. When I write an afterpoem to perform in an assemblage, mask, persona, it is always about the topic that the ensemble is presenting, and there is also reference to my being inside the guise, what it’s like to be the hidden self inside the poem being performed. This double subjectivity, then. The doppelgänger being the everyday self, and the masked poet performing the spirit, the message.

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Halloween Assemblage -Getting there

What I started with. Where I got to was like painting with photo programs. Two lights set up, one to the right and one on the table. Look forward to clearing the chaos of my living room and putting all this stuff away. But I still want to try long black boots and a leather corset I bought at maybe 63, my first one! Those shiny catches on the cheap Amazon one need black nail polish or something.

Actually, both paintings might work as backdrop in a performance videopoem. I'd tape black fabric to the wall behind them. Something to think about.

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Between 3 photo programs, approaching what I sought

From yesterday's shoot. The lighting was all wrong, but, with time and patience and a willingness to use different photo programs, I was able to get the darkness I wanted.

Basically, I am trying to get some images of this assemblage so I can see what I've composed and write of the 'being' who's emerging, if that's possible. Also, it is helping to see how to tweak things - like, I'll wear black boots, the sneakers didn't work with my body type. I have to get floral tape to do the flowers that I stick into the (cheap Amazon) corset (only solution I could think of to hold the flowers) and figure out how to attach the trailing leaves on my arm, perhaps hot-glued to elastic (if I have any wide black elastic), who knows. It should be an assemblage that doesn't slide off over an evening's movements. Also, I'll likely be moving in a videopoem, and then certainly could have leaves falling, trailing, whenever I get around to that.

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Oh, my Halloween Assemblage!

I've had what seems negative reactions to the assemblage I am creating for my Halloween poetry and music event. It's been a huge amount of work, attempting to video (tons of problems spread over days) and finally I got some clips in focus - though the light wasn't right - and one person who looked at these images seemed very ticked off when she saw them, saying only, We're supposed to wear costumes? and another person who is also coming that I shared the images with in a message had no reaction, said nothing. What's wrong with what I'm creating? I think it's quite striking, even lovely.

Because there was no sun, once again, which would give me the contrast I'd like, I set up two lights. Man, it was a lot of work. The camera app took forever to connect and then kept cutting out so it was pretty much useless. On the computer after, I was so happy to see the image in focus, however, the lighting isn't right. So I did quick colour replacement in PSE, turning the background blue. I wanted a dark background, but wasn't able to do it. I think the blue is interesting, and makes for unique, rather theatrical photos.

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Test

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