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I am keenly interested in portraying the human condition and our connection to each other, our similarities, the struggles and joys we all share. Women's and children’s issues are of special interest to me and some of my work has expanded to social commentary. I like to create images that tell a story with multiple layers of meaning to draw in the viewer and elicit a strong emotional response.

About a year and a half ago my work took a turn and became much more personal. I wanted to overcome personal fears of exposing myself too much to others by telling more of my own personal story. This work resulted in my current solo exhibition at TAG Gallery titled Wende/Transformation (see my event page here or on Facebook here).

I was born in 1962’s West-Berlin, in close proximity to the Berlin Wall and spent my formative years there among a people that in general are very reserved. Within my own family there were walls built up and torn down which shouldn’t have been. I realized walls were a major theme running throughout my life and for the first time I wanted to explore something so personal through my work. Making the resulting paintings public was one way of my breaking down an internal wall I had built up myself. All my life I had erected my own walls of protection and fears but since moving to the wide open spaces of the American Southwest I had been learning to tear them down.

With this continuing series I am using the Berlin Wall as metaphor for all of the walls in our lives. Little did I know when I started this series last year just how politically timely it would be now with the current talk of division and building walls!

The paintings examine the endless contradiction and effects of walls.  Walls are real and physical, imagined and psychological. They make visible one’s fears, anxieties and insecurities. They separate and yet offer a common purpose. They divide us yet invite us to scale them and tear them down, to come together again. They offer comfort, though false, yet feed hate and fear. They isolate and protect. Walls keep people out AND in. They shelter us and yet make us want to break free. They repel and tempt. They control and we rebel. They are a prison and a freedom. We can choose to erect them or tear them down.

One example of the contradictory nature of walls is Schutzengel (Guardian Angel):

Schutzengel (Guardian Angel), 40”x60” pastel

When I spotted the graffiti of the angel on an actual left over piece of the Berlin wall still standing I knew it would perfectly illustrate my point of actually having felt protected by this ugly horrible wall as a child. “Schutzengel” literally translates to “protection angel”. Since I lived on the West side I never felt oppressed or locked in as a child in Berlin, but actually saw the wall as protecting us from the Russians.  Only when we ventured over into East Germany, either to visit or travel through, did I feel the oppression. The piece had to be very large in scale (40”x60”) and the figure about life size so the viewer might feel the oppression of the wall on one hand and the sense of protection from the large angel on the other.

Home is a similar example:

Home, 20”x20” pastel

The model stands in front of a steel wall (the original was made out of concrete), a memorial to the division of the city from August 13, 1961 to November 9, 1989 and in commemoration of the victims of Communist tyranny. During the photo shoot the light above the model's head appeared spontaneously and immediately gave me the title for this painting, referring not only to my hometown but our true spiritual home which is always present even in the darkest moments.

As you can see titles are very important to me. They add yet another layer of meaning and accentuate the content of each piece. Some of these paintings’ titles are inspired by Pink Floyd. Their music (the “Wall” album of course, but others as well) has always been among my most played in the studio but became instrumental in the creation of these works for obvious reasons.

Mother, Did It Have To Be So High and Daddy, What D’Ya Leave Behind For Me are taken directly from Pink Floyd lyrics.

Daddy, What D’Ya Leave Behind For Me? 20”x40” pastel

Both paintings and their titles refer not only to the Berlin wall but to my own upbringing. There are several small personal references "hidden in open view" in Daddy…, but the main theme of what our ancestors and families leave behind for us through our personal as well as the world's history is obvious. Personal references such as names and dates are also hidden in other pieces of this series.

Borders and Boundaries, 28”x28” pastel

Borders and Boundaries again refers to external political and internal personal restrictions and/or lack of them. By adding text and what I hope are intriguing titles the viewer is invited to venture beyond the obvious realistic image and explore the content of the work further.

The title for the next piece is from Leonard Cohen’s song Anthem which lyrics have had a profound impact on me. Here I used the addition of metal leaf to emphasize them.

There Is A Crack In Everything, That’s How The Light Gets In, 20”30” pastel and metal leaf

Someone To Watch Over Me (Self Portrait At Age Three) is my most personal work yet:

Someone To Watch Over Me (Self Portrait At Age Three), 24”x24” mixed media

While I used models as stand-ins for myself in the previous paintings here I used a reference photo of myself at age three. Wanting to add even more content I used mixed media including collage from old newspaper images depicting the signs and watch towers I used to see along the wall. I used heavily applied red acrylic in the background dripping over an outline of West and East Berlin to emphasize the communist threat around my city. The piece is a reference to my having felt watched all the time but also wishing to have had someone to watch over me MORE at other times.

This series continues into my figures in water paintings which on the surface appear to be nothing but pretty women in swimming pools but actually tell the story of how my emigration to America helped me step out from behind my walls and dive more freely into the deep end of life.

Body. Mind. Spirit. These are my three new words that I chose for this year. As I wrote in a blog last year, I choose three words at the beginning of each year that will guide my thoughts and actions for those next 12 months. Last year's were: Clarity. Do. Faith. That was my first year doing this little exercise and it worked very well! I wanted to be more clear and focused about where my work was going, I wanted to procrastinate less and "just do it" and I wanted to have faith that all will work out just fine. Well, my work became much more personal as I took a trip to Berlin (my hometown) and started a series of paintings inspired by having grown up in the city. I'm keeping those paintings under wraps for now on the advice of my art coach as we're working towards an exhibition of them.

That was another action step I took in 2014: hiring an art coach (you can read about it on this blog post). Making that financial investment in myself and baring myself more in this somewhat autobiographical series certainly took a lot of faith that it's a worthwhile endeavor!

Looking back at the end of 2014 I can see a clear shift in my studio practice and it has paid off in paintings that I'm proud of as well as financial rewards. I had written down my income goal for the year, broken down into 12 increments so each month I knew what I would need to reach that goal. It helped me see when I might need to make that phone call to a client and get that commission going or where I could step up my marketing to reach more people. While I did not quite make my goal, I was short by only a few hundred dollars and I had the most income from my art ever!

So, this year I didn't even have to think about the words, they came to me on their own and immediately resonated. This is what they mean to me:

• Body (I put this first because I have neglected it in order to make more time for art, which was a huge mistake): regular time for exercise, maintenance (doctor's visits, chiropractor, massage, haircuts, etc.), sleep
• Mind: filling my creative and intellectual well (going to art exhibits, cultural events, reading non-fiction books), continuing to learn and expand my horizons and knowledge, paying attention to what I spend my time thinking about, watching on TV, reading
• Spirit: meditating, practicing mindfulness, prayer, spending time in nature and with family and friends, becoming more authentic in my work and private life

I had some health issues last year and found myself feeling tired, old and sluggish. I have had ups and downs with my weight all my life. Never anything major, but enough to not have me feel my best. It affects my mood and energy level so I am determined to get my body, mind and spirit back in alignment of where I want to be and how I want to feel. The problem in the past has been that I tend to overdo things. I get excited, bursting with good intentions and enthusiasm and while it has resulted in a couple of marathons and a very trimmed down figure at one time, it also took way too much of my time away from art. I'm currently reading a great book, The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. He mentions resistance to our work and the many forms it can take (drugs, sex, internet browsing, you name it) and I know I have used working out as a form of resistance to going into the studio. It's a great excuse, too, isn't it? I gotta work out to be healthy! Who would ever say time for exercise is a bad thing? Well, it is if it takes too much time! If it becomes an excuse for not doing your work. For me it means I have to be very careful about balance. Ah, there is that magic word again that we all try to achieve in our daily lives! In order to nurture my mind, body AND spirit this year, I have started new routines of exercise, meditation and healthier eating without overdoing it and sacrificing painting time.

For example, I keep my morning run to just 30 minutes, no matter how much I may want to go longer! I am not a morning person and much prefer running in the evening, but even with a running buddy I would find myself not always sticking to those plans because the day would get filled up with other tasks and before I knew it I did not get  my exercise in. Now, I'm forcing myself to do some exercise first thing in the morning!

I start with a 10 minute yoga routine right out of bed, which I had to FORCE myself to do every morning for the first month! I'm a very slow starter, not only with my body but my mind (try not to talk to me for at least the first hour of my day!). Even during my evening runs I start slowly and get faster as the miles go by. So, to turn from a morning sloth to someone who actually moves her body 2 minutes after getting up was no small feat for me! But oh, how that short routine wakes me up and energizes my body AND mind! Then I meditate for at least 10-15 minutes. Without that yoga routine I would fall right back to sleep while meditating! But now I'm wide awake, I can fully enter the meditation and have a great start to my day. This is followed by a small breakfast snack before heading out the door for 30 minutes. My purpose there is not to count the miles I'm walking or running, but to get my body moving to jump-start my metabolism, to get fresh air and connect to nature. so no matter if the rest of the day finds me stuck inside standing still at my easel, I got in this 30 minutes of movement and time outdoors. For me these 30 minutes are also another form of meditation and prayer and often I get insights, inspiration, ideas and solve problems. But again, I force myself to stick to 30 minutes so I will not take too much time away from my studio. This is crucial! I do not want to spend 2 hours a day on getting back into shape! Being good to my body is a priority this year in many ways, and this will undoubtedly also benefit my mind and spirit greatly, but so does painting, reading, spending time with loved ones. Meditating and taking a mindfulness class are all helping my studio practice, are clarifying my mind and art focus, but only when they don't take over too much time. I have to be careful not to use them as excuses not to get my work done because neglecting my work will only create a downward spiral of mind and spirit into dark places where I do not want to go.

Body. Mind. Spirit. I will write those three words in a circle before posting them on my mirror at home and in the studio where they will remind me each day that one feeds the other, each one needs the other to be healthy and in balance, without one overpowering the others. I do not want to spend hours meditating, while my studio sits empty, nor do I want to spend hours on end at the easel neglecting to move my body. Creating art does my spirit and mind good which in turn boosts my immune system. Exercise keeps me healthy and gives me energy so I can stand at the easel for hours and paint. It floods my brain with all those good chemicals that allow me to feel good, be optimistic about my work and future. Meditation and prayer calm my monkey mind which can run amok in too many different directions, which focuses my creative path, opens me up to whatever wants to come through my hand onto the paper and lowers my blood pressure.

Here are some tips that you may find helpful in adopting a more well-rounded routine yourself:

• Create a new Habit

We break old habits by breaking up routines: take a different route to work, fix your hair and make up in the other bathroom, sit in a different chair at the table, etc. We create new habits by doing them every day for at least 21 days (so the wisdom goes, although it usually takes me much longer!), so no matter what don't use excuses not to stick to your new routine. If I get a late start I have been forcing myself to still do my morning routine of exercise and meditation anyway even if it gets me to the studio late. I just don't want to use my art as an excuse not to take care of my body and vice versa!

• Limit your time

If I immerse myself too much in any one thing it may feel great for a while but sooner or later I will get burnt out and stop. If my exercise routine takes too much time out of my day I will stop doing it altogether, so I limit it to 30 minutes in the morning and leave more time 2-3 times a week when it won't interfere with my work day (evenings or weekends). Same with painting time. If I spend days on end holed up in my studio I may get a lot of work accomplished but I can start to feel too isolated. I have to drag myself away and spend time with people, get outdoors, have some non-art related fun.

• Write it down

It's a well-known fact that writing down our goals helps us to actually accomplish them. You can share some or keep them for yourself, but getting them out of your head and onto a screen or paper just activates the whole process and starts the wheels turning. Making lists and checking them off can feel quite wonderful as does looking back at the end of the week, month or year to see how close you came to your goals. Even writing this blog helps me stay more accountable.

• Get an accountability buddy

Not only  do I have a great running buddy who makes the longer runs fun and entertaining (we NEVER run out of things to talk about, no matter how many miles we do!), my daughter Alex, who lives in Texas and has completely turned her health around in the last year and I text each other every day asking if we stuck to our morning routines. Just like Facebook has motivated me to create new work so I can post regularly, it makes me feel good texting Alex that yes, indeed, her mom has done her yoga, running and meditation this morning!

And of course, my running buddy makes me show up for our runs when I might have skipped it on my own.

• Vary things up

I get bored easily, so to keep myself motivated I vary my running route or type of exercise I do (walking with hand weights, running hills or running longer on flat areas, hiking, biking, tennis, racquet ball, yoga). Meditation is great but so is reading a good book, hearing an inspirational talk, going to the theater. In the studio, if most of my work is commissioned portraits I need to take a break and create a non-commissioned piece. I do some abstracts after a lot of realistic images, or lately I started working in black and white again to take a break from color. Anything to keep me from getting stuck in a rut which can often lead to creative block, boredom and burn out.

• Cut yourself some slack

Don't beat yourself up for slacking off at times. Take notice why it happened (are you burnt out, genuinely tired or ill, bored?) and do better the next day or the next hour. Guilt only drags us back into the hole we're trying to get out of.

• Treat yourself like your best friend

Observe your daily activities like an outsider. If you saw your best friend avoiding her work what would you tell her? If you saw her drinking too much or spending hours on end at the gym while her creative work is left undone, how would you steer her back onto her path? Alternately, if you saw her finish her novel or that series of paintings, would you congratulate her and celebrate her achievement or tell her it's not good enough, that people may not like it?

So, here's to a healthier AND more creative 2015!

I'd love to hear your daily practices that keep your life in balance and your work flowing!

How do you paint a portrait not of people but of their relationship to each other?

Lately I have been taking on more and more commissions for portraits of couples, either for wedding anniversaries or birthdays. On the top of this post is the latest one for the occasion of a 51st wedding anniversary.

It all started with this painting of me kissing my "almost-husband", Rich:

BJ and Jerry  14" x 14"

Another amazing artist, BJ, and his partner chose this image from the many reference photos we shot even though neither is looking straight ahead and we are even looking up BJ's nose! But what it clearly shows is pure joy, fun and the love between them. This was not staged but rather was a shot I caught between the posing. Often these are the best ones!

This  next one was taken a step further still:

Howard and Rachel, For a Thousand Years More 16 x 16"

Rachel wanted an Up Close & Personal portrait of her husband and herself for his birthday but I suggested we add another layer of meaning and personal touch. They picked a song with special significance to them and I had Rachel come into the studio to hand letter the lyrics herself! The wave at the bottom not only underscores the song's theme of timelessness but also refers to their love of the ocean and their beach side home. I love that the client had an actual hand in the creation of this very special gift of art for her husband!

Even in these earlier pieces below the couples were open to a more unconventional approach to maternity portraiture. In one you don't even see the woman's face but the focus is on the Dad and his feelings waiting for his son's arrival. The other has a touch of traditionalism with the man's protective arms around his wife but also shows off her tattoo, the Chinese symbol for Tao, inspiring the title.

Yesterday I was inspired by great art AND Hollywood in the same day! Let me explain:

This past weekend I attended part of The Representational Art Conference TRAC 2014 in Ventura, CA, not far from my home. While there I saw some wonderful art displayed, met some nice artists who have been Facebook friends but whom I had never met in person and watched some great demos.

Going to these large art conferences can be both inspiring and deflating, encouraging and overwhelming. As artists we love looking at other artists' work but depending on our own state of mind at the time it can propel us forward or stop us dead in our tracks. We end up comparing ourselves to others and wonder if we'll ever measure up. We admire their skills and techniques, ideas and innovations and doubt our own creativity. The eyes with which we view other artists are often wearing rose colored glasses while when looking at ourselves they are eagle eyes with spotlights which zero right in on every one of our shortcomings and mistakes. No matter how old or accomplished we may get we have a certain perception of other artists, especially ones we've been following a long time, that places them wayyyy above us on that ladder we're all climbing. When we then meet them in person it can be such a surprise to see their humanity in all its nervous, anxious and insecure glory! Seeing that I'm not the only one who is nervous doing a demo or flustered because I can't find a tool I need as the crowd watches is such a gift those "famous" artists bestow upon me! It reminds me that we need to see ourselves more as others see us. No, that the way we always THINK they see us, with judgmental and critical eyes, but so often with kindness and even admiration. Maybe YOU are one of those artists others look up to and are aspiring to be like one day and just don't know it yet?

I'm trying this year to put a limit on the time I spend looking at other people's work and spend more time looking at mine and envisioning where I want to go. This can be hard with those eagle eyes, but I will temper the criticism with an occasional pat on the back and then an optimistic view forward. Where do I want to take my work? What do I truly want to say? Leave behind?

When I came home from the conference the Oscars ceremony was already over but I had heard how great Matthew McConnaughey's acceptance speech was upon winning the Best Actor award. I watched it on youtube and was inspired for the second time that evening. He summed it up by saying that he needs three things in his life: Someone to look up to, someone to look forward to and someone to chase. I had a pretty good idea where he was going with the first two (in his case it was God for the former and his family for the latter) but was perplexed by who he wants to chase. After all, he's a happily married man now, so it couldn't be a woman! My second thought was it must be some great actor or director whose accomplishments he took as inspiration. His answer was much more profound: he wants to chase himself, 10 years down the road! At 25 he was chasing the Matthew he wanted to be at 35, at 35 the one he aspired to be at 45 and so on, realizing he could never truly arrive, but always strive. Comparing himself to no one, but only improving himself.

I learned this when training for a marathon or any other race. I didn't look to beat any body else's time but only to better my own time. My life, training, experience and ambition were all very different from other runners, so why would I compare myself to someone who finishes a marathon in 3.5 hours?? I wanted to know I could do it and set a certain time in my mind and I ended up beating it by two minutes!

With my art one of my goals had been to get signature membership in the PSA (Pastel Society of America). I received this upon my first application to them when I was still afraid I would not even be given ANY kind of membership, let alone signature status! It was proof that others saw me quite differently than I saw myself. Then the goal was to reach Master level, which I reached and now the goal will be to become a Hall of Fame Honoree before I die:) In no way will these goals be affected by anybody else reaching those milestones first. It does not take away from my own journey and I am free to be truly happy for them.

Setting goals and reaching them only to set higher ones next WITHOUT comparing ourselves to others is empowering and sets us up for success instead of failure. Don't assume everyone else has their s..t together and you're the only one floundering. Everyone puts on their matching socks in public but who knows what their sock drawer looks like at home...or if their insides match their confident outsides!

Here are a few images from that first evening of TRAC 2014:

This painting by Mia Tavonatti just blew me away!!

Another stunner, this one by Kathiucia Dias

Steven DaLuz's work is always amazing! I wish I had atken a picture of his gilded door (yes, an actual door) with abstract painting which I also loved!

Felicia Forte, oh, those lovely grey tones!

The incomparable Pam Hawkes giving a demo on her very time consuming gilding and intuitive painting process. I could listen to her accent for hours! Lovely personality and amazing work!

Graydon Parrish explaining the Munsell Color Wheel and Theory he uses in his incredible paintings, which I have to admit left me quite lost. I just don't know if I want to be that analytical about color!

Tony Pro painting Virgil Elliott

Peter Adams' plein air pastel painting of a rare overcast Ventura beach.

So, how exactly did my art end up at a film festival in NYC??? You just never know where your art will end up if you are open to new and different opportunities. Mine started way back in 2007 when I first met Trevor and Brittany, a wonderful couple who have become dear friends, on a mission trip to El Salvador with the non profit Airline Ambassadors. We were all airline employees at the time (they still are, Trevor as a pilot for American and Brittany as a flight attendant for Southwest) and visiting orphanages during Christmas time. I was painting murals with the kids and Trevor was distributing soccer balls and playing the "beautiful game" with them. We have stayed in touch ever since and both have started our own non profit projects. Mine is Moni's Kids, as some of you may already know (more updates on that in a future post) and theirs is Little Feet, a one-for-one company (think TOMS shoes) through which he donates one soccer ball for each one bought to needy children worldwide. Purchasing soccer uniforms through Little Feet also allows them to build soccer fields in communities and distribute uniforms to start soccer leagues. Trevor and Brittany started Little Feet after he kept seeing kids in poverty stricken areas using things like balled up plastic bags and t-shirts as balls and playing on dirt fields or trash filled alleys. They are now on a mission to spread peace and hope through soccer. Check out their facebook page.

But flying full time, starting Little Feet and now raising two kids was not enough for them. They also love art and artists and have started another business combining it all: Futbol Artist Network. It features art inspired by soccer and is a platform for artists who love both! I have to admit that I'm not actually a big soccer fan (I know, it's almost sacrilege as a German!), but when Trevor asked me to paint some of the kids who have received their Little Feet balls and showcase them on the Futbol Artist Network website I immediately said yes! Part of the proceeds help to support the programs of Little Feet. You can purchase the original painting or prints in several sizes on their site or mine.

So, what does this have to do with a film festival in NYC? Well, Futbol Artist Network was invited to have a showing of their work at the Kicking and Screening Soccer Film Festival at the Tribeca Cinemas this week (who even knew there was such a thing??) and Trevor asked me to participate. So, there is my pastel portrait of a young Kenyan boy smiling broadly after receiving a Little Feet soccer ball next to all the cool graphic paintings depicting soccer legends! I could not have foreseen this venue but am always open to new ideas to show my work and help children in the process. 

If you are an artist, check out their facebook page for new calls to artists. You never know where it may lead! 

I was too worn out each evening of the convention of the International Association of Pastel Societies to write a blog post about my impressions and the many things I learned, but I do want to share them with you. Since it would be too long to include everything into one post, I will break it up into smaller more easily digestible bits.

 First of all, I'd like to make a comment about the juror of awards for the 22nd Juried Exhibition Fred Somers (Terri Ford juried the Master Circle Show). This genuinely nice man and incredibly talented artist was the best juror I have ever seen! The awards ceremony took quite a bit of time because he made personal comments about each and every winning painting. And not just a few words, either. He explained why he chose to give an award to a piece, teaching all of us something in the process, and even told personal stories behind his decisions. The winning artists were beaming and rightly so. Every artist I know would have loved to hear the juror rave about their work the way Fred did! And he did it in person, live at the event. What a gentleman and inspiration.

The second day artist Duane Wakeham conducted a tour through both exhibits pointing out even more things to look for in great art and what artists should strive for in ceating it. Here are a few pointers I learned from Duane:

• Definition of a landscape: an arrangement of colors and shapes that represent a scene in a landscape (so always keep design and composition in mind).
• Make every square inch of the painting interesting by variations of color and strokes but without distracting from the focal area.
• Color has to keep its place in space. Pay attention to where you place a color. Does it make sense to be intense if it's in the background? Should it be warm or cool?
• The painting has to make sense to the viewer who may not be familiar with the scene or sees your reference photo. The piece has to have its own reality. Just because something was in the scene when you saw it, leave it out if it does not make sense to a viewer who has never been there.
• Don't just paint a picture, CREATE A PAINTING, make it YOUR interpretation, change things around, don't just copy nature.

With those points in mind Duane pointed out a few of his favorite pieces in the shows, sometimes contrasting two paintings of similar scenes but handled completely differently. For instance, comparing Marsha Savage's "Water Oak" (left) with Jane McGraw-Teubner's "The Mystical Tree" (right): they are both essentially paintings of a tree with a green/red color dominance, yet were interpreted completely differently by each artist.

Duane especially loved paintings with strong color (like Jennifer Evenhus' "Summer Pasture"):

and a confident hand, meaning paintings where the strokes were laid down and left alone, not overworked, where the artist added spots of color in just the right places.

He pointed out strong composition and emotional content, like Diane Rappisi's award-winning self-portrait "Time" (to which I related on a very personal level because Diane tackled the subject of making major life changes as we age and our children leave the nest):

Duane's talk lasted over an hour so there is no way I can show all of the wonderful art he selected for special attention here, so please forgive me for not doing so.

I will also not list all of the award winners here because you can look them up yourself on the IAPS website as soon as it is updated.

However, I would like to share one more thing I learned from the Gold Medal Winner Christine Swann. Her painting "Cold" of her son blew me away the first time I ever saw it on Facebook and was even better viewed in person (as mentioned in my previous post).

I could not figure out how she got such intensely bright highlights in his hair and shoulders, let alone those backlit red orange ears! On the second day I had the chance to chat with her and  Christine was kind enough to share her tip with me and others: she underpaints with concentrated watercolor dyes! My efforts at producing such intense brights always fell a little short using regular watercolor or even leaving the white of the paper and laying pastel on top hoping it would glow. I didn't know anything about such dyes and immediately went out and bought some when I got home. I cannot wait to try them out!

All in all, those two exhibitions at the convention left me humbled but oh, so inspired to get back to my studio and keep practicing my craft, because practice is what artists actually do, because we always consider ourselves to still be students, eager to learn more, to stretch beyond what we already know, to reach new heights and keep improving our skills. Conventions like the IAPS 2013 inspire us to do just that.

In my next post, I'll share with you what I learned in Margaret Dyer's demo about painting the figure in a much looser way than I'm used to.

Yesterday, Rich and I arrived in Albuquerque for the International Association of Pastel Societies bi-annual convention. I had neglected to reserve a room at the Hotel Albuquerque where the exhibits and convention are actually held so we ended up in a little casita which I found through airbnb.com. I can highly recommend Laura White's place to anyone! It's larger than we expected and very close to Old Town and the convention. I regretted not being around the other artists 24/7 but I also enjoy getting away from the crowds to a very quiet and quaint place. As an introvert (yes, I hide it well!) I get exhausted after hours of mingling and talking. Add to that the overwhelming visual stimulation by so many great pastel paintings all in one place...I need time and space to process!

There are two exhibits on display: one is the 22nd Juried Exhibition and the other one is the Master Circle Juried Exhibition. They had asked all the artists with Master Circle status to enter the latter one only. I was thrilled to have my piece "Choices" accepted. Once I saw all the other entries I knew I was not going to receive an award that night! That's not knocking my own work, but the other work was just amazing and made me realize just how much I have yet to learn! I was not the only artist to feel this way as I overheard several others voice the same sentiment. They said they just can't wait to run home and practice, practice, practice!

When I see work like Andrew McDermott's that is loaded with intense color where most people would never think to put it, or Deborah Stewart's popping abstracts (I wish I had signed up for her workshop!) or many of the other painters who have  a much more daring approach to their work I itch to go back to the studio and experiment with bolder strokes and color. I'm also itching to take more workshops with a select group of artists. I will make a list of my favorites and whittle away at it over the next few years.

There are simply too many artists and their paintings that I truly loved to list here, but I do want to show you the one piece that left me in awe, my jaw on the floor, the one piece I could study for days on end and still discover new things about it. I'm referring to Christine Swann's painting "Cold", which you see at the top of this post, but be sure to check it out on her website, too, for a better image. I had seen it online and loved it then, but there is nothing like seeing this masterpiece in person! The colors in the shadows, the greens and reds bouncing off each other, the INTENSE lights....all I can say is WOW! She won an award for both of the peices she has in the show and "Cold" won the Gold Medal Award! 

William Schneider won the Prix de Pastel, the top honors, for "Queen of Hearts" and I'm thrilled that I get to see his demo on Saturday!

Ok, back to the convention now!

Ah, what great intentions I had for a whole weekend of painting en plein air during the paint out/retreat at the Mission San Antonio de Padua in Monterey County, CA! This event was hosted by the California Art Club, a very prestigious art organization whose very accomplished members include the top plein air painters in the U.S. I have always wanted to go on a painting retreat where everything is provided from the bed to the meals along with gorgeous scenery. Being surrounded by other artists all doing their creative thing is inspiring yet intimidating to me. I like to think of all of us in a giant creative bubble, our blissful zones stretching across the fields to bump up against each other, to nudge each other along. Like the stream of consciousness which I believe runs through everything and everyone around us and helps carry everyone along on their journey. Then why, oh why, is it so scary to paint on location with lots of other people around?

Here's a recap of the weekend:

My friend and fellow Studio Channel Islands Artist-in-Residence Anette Power and I headed out mid morning on a Friday for the 4-5 hour drive north. We stopped in Avila Beach, a picturesque little beach town with brightly colored shops, for a delicious lunch. Next, we stopped in Paso Robles so I could introduce Anette to Anne Laddon, founder of Studios on the Park, an art center similar to ours. I knew the two would hit it off and they did! Anette was invited to participate in an upcoming plein air "Quick Draw" event in Paso Robles.

That made it worth us getting to the mission pretty late in the day, with just enough time to check in to our rooms and meet the other 40something artists in the dining room. Some of the artists had been at the mission all day painting and had already produced some nice work. I felt my usual guilt at not having been more productive that first day. It's something I wrestle with all the time, never quite allowing myself to enjoy some down time. I was determined to get at least 3-4 paintings done on Saturday!

After dinner Joan, our wonderful mission guide, gave us a tour of the grounds. She is quite the storyteller and we loved the tales about Rosario, the Holy Cat of the mission and how he came to his name, the history of the Salinan Indians of the area and Padre Serra who founded the mission in 1771, and the little girl Gigi who is the only person buried inside the mission. This mission is the only one in California not to be in a town or surrounded by farm fields. The location is remote and pretty much the way it was when it was founded except for the large Army base all around.

If you'd like to learn more about the mission and even plan a trip there (whether to paint or just relax), check out their link here. The mission was ordered by the State of California to be retrofit for earthquake safety and needs to raise $15 million to avoid being shut down. They love visitors, either groups, families or individuals for day trips or lodging. If you are a painter they also have 65 artists' work for sale in their gift shop, so you might want to consider joining those ranks or even donating a piece to their fundraisers. The rooms are sparse with just two beds and a sink, the showers and toilets are communal, but I loved that simplicity. Since there was no TV and no internet we went to bed early every night and were ready for a full day of painting after breakfast at eight. 

Knowing that I would be able to concentrate better on that first scary painting of the day if I was not surrounded by a lot of people, I headed out into the field close to the Grist Mill. I worried a bit about the rattle snakes which were already coming awake in the warm spring air (and Joan had filled our heads with lots of tales about them coming out of the rafters of the mill, living in the adobe walls all over the grounds, etc.), but I liked the simple design created by the shape of the building, the low wall of the auqa duct connected to it and the field around it enough to put those thoughts aside. But to be honest, it was mostly the fear of having someone look over my shouder that was greater than the fear of snakes! Why, after all this time, is it still so hard to tune out other people and their opinions?

That first painting did nothing to easy my trepidations. Simply put, I hated it. It looked amateurish and sloppy instead of fresh and lively. I didn't like the surface I used even though it was not a new one. I wrestled with my demons of insecurity and used all of the positive affirmations I could think of to not beat myself up and pack it all in! One person did stop by and wanted to see what I had done, but fortunately I had already packed it in my backpack. (Back in the studio, I have rinsed the painting off and will try again but this time with more oomph!)

It was time for lunch and I was slogging my way to the dining room, shoulders drooping from the heavy backpack and somber thoughts. As I passed a few rusted old tools and wagons scattered throughout the many acres of the mission I took out my camera to shoot close ups, composing closely cropped abstracts in my viewfinder and getting more and more excited. Dropping all my gear to the ground I spent the next 30 minutes in a flurry of excitement shooting more than a hundred images of rust and dust, wood and crevices. I was late for lunch but had made a decision: I would paint what really excited me, not what was expected of me or what everyone else was painting! I had felt that I was SUPPOSED to paint the mission, its buildings and surrounding landscape, but WHO exactly was telling me to do that? I felt an obligation to even you, my dear two or three readers (and a few more on Facebook), to show the finished paintings that I thought you expected to see. And you may well be expecting to see familiar images of missions and may be disappointed but I am learning to listen more to my own voice and quieting those outside voices of others. Although I loved the mission, I just did not feel excited to actually paint it in the traditional way and did not feel like I had anything new to say about it. Once I tuned in more about what really gets my mojo going (and for me that seems to be more abstract design and closely cropped, zoomed in images) I was on a roll!

I spent the afternoon creating three paintings in the courtyard in close proximity to the other painters. The dark windows against the light adobe walls had really captured my attention and I wanted to practice getting all those colors in that seemingly off-white wall down. I could finally see them, all the peaches, blues, pinks and yellows and I was itching to paint them! Part of me still felt that I owed an explanation to why I was painting just one window or just a small part of a wagon wheel, and sometimes I did say something to passersby, but after a while, I just let go off justifying myself to anyone. 

Here are the resulting paintings from that afternoon:

 Mission San Antonio Window I, 8x6"        

  Mission San Antonio Window II,6 x 8     

    Mission San Antonio Wagon Wheel, 8 x 6

I felt good about my productivity after such a sluggish start. I also felt that I learned a lot that day. I have painted adobe walls before but always struggled with the nuances of colors found in them. I really could not see all the colors I saw other artists put into their paintings of these types of walls. I don't know if it's just a matter of experience, of putting in the hours of direct observation and painting or the meditating I did in the chapel in the mornings while Gregorian Chants played in the background 24/7...but I was finally able to see what they see! AND I was able to put it down on paper! I knew I had to just be careful to use the same value, then any color would work, but I was thrilled to finally have reached another level that had been difficult for me.

The next morning we debated whether to paint more onsite at the mission or head back south and paint along the way. We chose the latter, because we wanted to make a stop at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art and a few galleries. We were exhausted and eager to get home (why is it that standing still at an easel can be so tiring??) but determined to get at least one more painting in. That afternoon we found Loon Point Beach in Summerland, lugged our gear from the parking lot to the beach and scoped out the location. Immediately I saw a scene with Eucalyptus trees, which I love, and was inspired, but once again, my shyness got the better of me. I decided to head down further along the beach where I saw less people. I dragged poor Anette along, over a long stretch of nothing but boulders and rocks until we gave up and headed back to our original point. Well, at least we got our exercise for the day! By the time we got started there was very little good light left and we literally raced through our set-up, composition sketch and painting, but oh, what fun I had! It forced me to very quickly lay down the important shapes and values without being able to get distracted by details. I didn't have time to take pictures of the sketch and underpainting but believe me it was very simple. I then threw on colors with abandon and was actually giddy with joy and excitement! I didn't even care about the couple looking over our shoulder for a few minutes, I was just having a blast! Below, you can see the finished piece, with VERY little touch up in the studio. I wanted to leave it as loose and fresh as it was at the scene. The colors in reality are actually a bit brighter then you see in the photo especially the lighter blues in the foreground bushes.

Loon Point Beach, 8 x 6

We arrived home spent but happy. In the end we did do a lot of painting, networked and made new friends, filled our creative wells by visiting exhibitions at a museum and galleries, had some much needed down time away from all other responsibilities at home, had some "car seat counseling" while driving and learned a WHOLE LOT about each other, but most of all I learned this:

Tune out everybody else's voice, let go of any expectations you think others have of you and just follow your bliss! We can paint a variety of subject matter if we want, but let's always bring ourselves to it. I love looking at traditional paintings, especially the many plein air paintings done by California Artists, but I'm not always happy with my own results. Whether that's a lack of skills (I'm sure that has something to do with it) or the feeling that I just have nothing new to add unless I focus on the things that truly appeal to me, and paint them MY way, who knows. For now, I'll keep painting en plein air as much as I can and I have faith that through those many hours of practicing my own style will emerge.

Here are some more photos from the mission along with a couple that got me so excited and will turn into small paintings later:

  Anette in front of the mission

   Artists painting in the courtyard   

     The mission halls at dusk  

 The Grist Mill   

   Our group of artists

Rusted tools and wagons scattered throughout:

I didn't realize that so much time has passed since my last blog post! So much for making it a weekly thing...hhhmmm. Well, I could use the holidays as an excuse, so I will:), but now it's the end of January! I said I'd share my struggles as a full time artist with you, so this balancing act of painting and the business side of art (which includes blogging, sending out my newsletter which I finally did, entering shows, marketing, research, bookkeeping) continues to be a big challenge for me.

I have also joined the Board fo Directors of the Studio Channels Islands Art Center where my studio is located, which takes up some time but is worth it. I wanted to get involved to learn all I could about our art organization and to help make it grow. To that end, I also started posting regular Facebook posts called "Live from the Studios" featuring one artist each weekday creating their work. Yes, it requires some time, but I have also very much enjoyed getting to know each of our many artists and learn about their work. I want to give my friends and fans great art to view and if that happens to be by someone other than me, that's okay. I stopped viewing other artists as competition a long time ago, because it can make one crazy and only diminishes our self esteem even more. I do my best to think of it as a comraderie and that there is enough room in the world for all of our art. The more people start seeing art and realizing how much value it adds to their environment, the more they lose their intimidation by it and understand that yes, even a person with an average income can afford to buy original art, the better it is for all of us in the creative fields. I also believe in the whole karma thing "What goes around, comes around", "What you put out, you will get in return", so I'd rather help promote my fellow artists than view them as the competition. I'd honestly love it if one of my peeps bought one of their creations! Maybe one of their collectors will purchase one of mine in the future, who knows, and if they don't that's ok, too.

On the creating side, it's been a bit of a struggle lately. I was busy for quite a while with a large traditional commissioned portrait of three half figures. I find these difficult because I don't feel as free to put more emphasis on one person over the next, like I would do in my personal work to create a dynamic composition. I'd bring out one person as a focal point and push the others back more, but I just can't do that when it comes to three siblings! Wouldn't want to create any kind of sibling rivalry and want to keep my client (their father) happy. Well, he is very happy with the piece and I'm now working on some new personal pieces before starting the next commission.

And that's where I really started to struggle. One can get paralyzed facing a new sheet of paper or canvas...the possibilities are so endless. I could work on some more Small Treasures, maybe some sea- and landscapes from my recent trip up the coast through Big Sur, or I could add to my series on teen issues. I worked my way through hundreds of reference photos, printed out a bunch, painted a few small ones only to become more and more unsatisfied. This in turn affected my confidence even more and I started to seriously doubt myself. Here I was making this major life transition from a full time job with benefits to being a full time artist with studio rent to pay and I couldn't come up with anything exciting? I could feel panic rising in me, and it took all I had to just KEEP THE FAITH. I have been through these valleys before and I KNOW there is always a mountaintop coming up in the near future.

Julia Cameron, the author of the classic "The Artist's Way" had this to say: "CHOP is necessary. Chop means you're growing, chop is a period of creative vulnerability in which your style shifts, becomes malleable and porous...in other words: open to inspiration!"

I have this quote written in my sketchbook and refer to it whenever I feel unsure of where I'm going. 

So, the only thing to do, no matter how hard, is to keep working, keep showing up whether we feel like it or not, whether we have an idea for the next piece or not. In the doing of it, those automatic actions of taking out the sketchpad and pencil, stretching that canvas, mixing up some paint, applying a few strokes on the paper...it starts to flow. And even if the flow creates nothing we are happy with, keep going, take out that next sheet of paper and start anew. I like to repeat this mantra to myself whenever I am attempting something new and scary: "Just do it, don't judge it". I believe this is also Julia Cameron's advice. The judging is reserved for later, if you do it while in the process of creating it will paralyze you with fear and doubt.

After another small piece failed to meet my standards I decided to do some life drawing and asked my daughter Sam to come model for me. I figured I can always hone my skills that way and it doesn't have to end up for sale. Well, she was tired and kept yawning and fidgeting, so after an hour I gave up. It was very hard to get into the zone this way. I don't blame her, it was the end of the day for her and sitting as a model is not easy. But even in that one hour, I learned a lot, was reminded to look for those lost edges, where the subject blurs into the background, to check angles, etc. It was NOT wasted time even though it did not produce a finished drawing.

The next day, I visited with other artists and shared my frustrations. I got advice about surfaces and framing (my materials and out of pocket costs having been part of my recent misgivings) and went back to work with renewd energy. I love being at an art center with so many other artists for this reason alone!

And all of a sudden I had a vision of what I wanted to do next which is to produce some small paintings along the lines of my Small Treasures series, meaning they are very budget friendly because they are so small and I'm selling them unframed, but still feature people. I saw the first piece clearly in my mind, and you can see here. I wanted to explore leaving a large area of the painting light, to achieve a more graphic look, and I quite like it. The title Angel in Waiting presented itself before I even started. It's a reference to the wing shape of the steam in the mirror, but also refers to the girl herself. So often young women do not see the angels they truly are, just waiting to be let out of hiding. 

Once I post this, I'm off to the studio. There are two meetings to attend and a new client to photograph, but I already have the next painting started and am excited to get to it. I'm climbing my way out of the valley!

 In art as in life it’s important to cherish and savor each progress made, every tiny step toward growth taken, every blessing, opportunity, and sign of beauty that is plopped in our path, all of the small treasures that we so often overlook in our busy-ness, our race to the next big goal.

I have been practicing gratitude in my life for a number of years now and it has made all the difference. As a natural skeptic and cynic it was always easier for me to see the things that were going wrong, to doubt, to worry, to feel not good enough. It has taken a lot of conscious work to switch my thinking to recognize all of the good in life and in people (including myself) and even more work to start believing that things can and do work out just fine, to believe in the impossible, the formerly unimaginable. Once I let go and started having faith, to enjoy the little things more, and be truly appreciative, life became much richer and I felt much less pressure.

Since my time in the studio was so limited while raising kids and working a day job, I felt enormous pressure to produce a successful painting when I did have time at the easel. Either that commission had to turn out well quickly or the painting had to be good enough for the next big show to enter. I am mostly self-taught, other than taking workshops, and was building my resume by winning awards and gaining signature or master level memberships in prestigious art organizations. There was very little time for just having fun in the studio, experimenting, trying something new and different.

Now, that I have achieved some of those earlier goals, have a resume I am proud of, and have more time to paint, I am taking time in between the commissions and other portrait and figure work to create a new series of very small pastels. One added bonus is that I am able to offer them to a broader audience because of their very low prices (I am selling them unframed to keep the cost down).

 I love seeing abstract design in nature or man made structures and have been photographing bridges, textured walls, rocks, etc., while at the beach watching Rich’s attempts at surfing (he’s actually doing really well for a novice!). The complementary color scheme in the first batch of these paintings, plus the shapes and patterns the structures created were just so beautiful to me. You can view the first six pieces in my new category of “Small Treasures” on my website here. I titled them “Under the Boardwalk” and yes, there will be an accompanying series titled “Down by the Sea”, featuring the beautiful compositions that rocks and waves can produce (that song has been stuck in my head ever since I started working on this series!). I will also throw in a more typical landscape every now and then, especially the ones done en plein air, and whatever else tickles my fancy. The main idea is to create these tiny morsels for fun!

But besides that fun, and being able to offer my paintings to those people who have wanted to add one to their home but could not afford to do so before, I had one more motive for the series: to create more work in general. Going into the studio in the morning with several of these small pieces all laid out, the surfaces prepped and ready to take on that first wild wash of watercolor, is motivating and energizing. It’s a nice break between the more pressure filled work of commissions and helps me feel like I’m getting stuff done! I had been aware of the Daily Painters phenomenon for quite a while and envied the artists who could be so prolific and disciplined to complete one small painting a day and still work on larger things. This is my way of joining their ranks, maybe not on a daily basis yet, but who knows, I may get there one day. In the meantime, I am going to enjoy creating each one of these small treasures, just for the pure joy of noticing something beautiful in the ordinary, putting it down on paper quickly and sharing it with others.

Here is an example of two paintings with just the watercolor underpainting done and the resulting finished pieces.

Click here to see all six. I’d love to hear what you think of these new paintings in the comments below.

If you'd like to purchase one, you can do so securely through paypal by clicking the "Buy Now" button on each image or by contacting me directly.

Thank you for reading my blog and remember to savor the small things in life!

I have been going to my studio every day Monday through Friday for a couple of weeks now and it feels amazing! There is a shift in my view of myself, my attitude about my work and the value it may have in the world.

One of my fellow resident artists at Studio Channel Islands is the actor Daniel Stern (you may know him from the "Home Alone" movies) who is also a sculptor who creates bronze figures full of life, action and humor. He was kind enough to give a talk in his studio last night (on his wedding anniversary, no less!) and what he said resonated so much with me that I'd like to share it here.

He talked about the value of artists in our society, the stereotype of being considered lazy, no good for nothing else, certainly not good business people. He reminded us that artists are essentially storytellers and therefore the connection between people and generations in our culture, the very glue of our culture that holds everything together. He also pointed out that artists are probably the LEAST lazy people he knows, the hardest working actually, because we have to be completely self-motivated and innovative. Nobody tells us when we have to be at work or what project we should work on. We have to make ourselves get up, go to the studio, pick up that brush, pen, or guitar and get to work! WE are the ones that have to figure out first just exactly what that work IS. We have to come up with ideas, learn about the process and how to bring that idea to life, the technique behind the painting or sculpture. We have to learn about the craft and processes.

And then....here comes the hardest part of all...once our creation is born we have to launch it into the world! Not only do we have to learn to be vulnerable by putting our very personal creations out there for others to see and therefore be open to criticsim and rejection, but we also have to learn about marketing and promotion in order to get it out there in the first place. There are so many skill sets a professional artist has to have, very few other jobs compare. It can be a 24/7 job, be on your mind constantly.

That is why I have made a schedule for myself that, so far, I have been following pretty faithfully. My goal with this new studio and life is to have more of a balance between my work and family. Having a place to work away from my home has made it so much easier to do this. I get up at the same time each morning, answer emails and do a little bit of administrative stuff at home because I don't have wifi at the studio (and will try to keep it that way for as long as possible in order to not get distracted and focus on painting). I get to the studio by around ten and work until 4-5pm. I do stop and check emails and facebook on my iphone at times (a very hard habit to break!), but I try to keep it to a minimum. I have one day a week allocated for plein air painting (outdoors, on site) and one day for more admin stuff, whether in the office doing paperwork, entering shows, updating my website, writing blog posts, sending out proposals, etc. That day was yesterday, but there was so much to do that I am just now writing the weekly blog post (another goal: to post on a regular basis). I am way behind my newsletter, but it will have to wait a little longer. I am itching to finish a painting today and then I have a date with Rich!

Part of living a balanced life is to STOP WORKING before nightfall! It is very, very hard and I always feel like I did not get enough done and want to tweak that piece just a little more or work out some ideas for the next one. But...I value my personal relationships and must nurture them. If I was single it would be so easy to become a hermit in my studio, totally immersed in art. I may get frustrated at times having to stop working, but then I also appreciate that it forces me out of the studio and back into the "real world", to get outside (which I love), to exercise or go do something non art related or to just relax in the hammock even. Knowing that I will be back first thing in the morning helps me to let go of that pastel stick clutched in my tired hand.

Most Saturdays are taken up with art again, either by being present for the Open Studio events or attending exhibits. I am determined to leave Sunday open for family, but I have to admit, I could easily go back to work in the studio if there is a project on the easel that I love working on.

One more thing that Daniel mentioned was that our own attitude towards our work changes once we start paying rent for a place to work. So true! Now that I have to pay for the studio every month, I can't slack off, I have to come to work and GET STUFF DONE. When I worked at home, I would piddle around, get distracted and wasted way too much time not putting pastel on paper. I also believe that the way others view us changes when you're no longer working at home. I love inviting clients to my studio now, knowing that it's easier for them to see me as a professional.

Renting a studio outside of the home may not be possible for many of you, but whatever you can do to create a private space to do your work, to close it off and have it respected by you and those you live with as a place where a serious artist is creating, will help you take yourself and your work more seriously.

Daniel's speech had perfect timing for me. He emphasized the value of what we do and how we need to pass that belief on to the next generation. Let the aspiring young artists in your family know that they can indeed live a life in the arts, that it is a worthwhile contribution to society, but that they must prepare for the hard work it demands. They must learn the skills to make their creations, need to be knowledgable about the history of their particular art, be profficient as their own manager and agent, learn how to use a computer (something that will surely come more easily to them than me), write proposals and presentations and become comfortable talking about your work and handling rejection as well as accolades.

Art is a calling, a way of life but if we want to keep doing it as much as possible we have to treat it as a business. Now, let's hope that society in general and the average person in particular can also see the benefits of what we do and how much it can add to their daily life.

No, back to the easel!

With perfect timing, I moved into my new space at Studio Channel Islands Art Center in Camarillo, CA, this past week! It's huge, has a separate area for "gallery" space, working space and even a semi-private toilet (I just have to share it with one other artist once the adjoining space gets rented). Here are a few photos:

I'd like to backtrack to the timing of when this became available and fill you in on some background info that many of you don't know. Part of turning 50 this year and becoming a full time artist means more blogging and being more open and personal with those posts, which does NOT come easily to me. So, here is a bit of a coming-out for me: while I have mentioned having a "day job" before, many of my artist colleagues do not know that I was (uh, still am for a few more months) a flight attendant for American Airlines for 27 years, flying internationally (plus two more years of flying domestically with a smaller carrier before that). Part of the reason for keeping that quiet was the fact that I wanted to be taken seriously as an artist and let’s face it, flight attendants  are not always taken seriously! There is a certain stigma attached to the job, which I would like you to consider for a bit right now. Yes, there are some bad apples, some that fit the stereotype, but the public would be shocked if they knew just a little more about the person behind the beverage cart. Many, many of us, especially on international, have second jobs and careers that would blow your mind! Would you ever guess that we have doctors, lawyers, accountants, business owners, actors, pilots, teachers, real estate agents and LOTS of artists of all kinds among our ranks? Would the soldier going off to Iraq ever guess that the flight attendant serving him a coke is head of the National Guard in one state? Yep, true facts. The job does lend itself to pursuing other goals, having a complete other life "on the side" (and I'm not referring to the ones in the B movies), or at least it used to.  But over the last few years the airline industry has changed too much for me to continue working in it and be a painter at the same time. It was never a childhood dream of mine to become a "stewardess". As a matter of fact, it ranked 99 out of 100 as a suitable job for me on an aptitude test I took in high school. I fell into flying out of necessity after moving to the US from Germany and not being able to afford the tickets home to see my family. I started flying for the flight passes, period. Many blessings came along with the job and I truly am eternally grateful. Besides being able to provide for my family, have flexibility with my time in order to be home with my kids more than other working moms, I have also seen places I never would have seen otherwise. I've lost count how many times I've been to Paris or Hawaii, London feels like a second home to me, not to mention seeing family on layovers in Germany and Switzerland. I have made many life long friends, spent countless hours in world class museums, painted and sketched in locations I would not have visited otherwise. The job allowed me to enter art shows in Europe, hand deliver my paintings and attend openings. There were many times when I absolutely hated to go to work, especially when my kids were small, but I made it work for me and my artistic goals.

 I was never afraid of flying until I became a mother.  9/11 was tough beyond words and it is still hard to view any coverage of it. Those events changed our job forever. Many people don't think about the fact that it was the flight crews who were the true first responders, the very first victims of that day. Going back to work was not easy and many of us thought of quitting, including me. But I still needed the income, the insurance, the flying benefits, so I stayed, all the while working on my art on my days off. We took a huge paycut after that (about a third of our income!), but it turned out to be another blessing in disguise for me.  Because I now made much less for each trip I flew it became easier to substitute that income with a portrait commission. This allowed me to drop trips (one of the great benefits of the job) to someone else and stay home to work on a painting when I had an order.

There were many down sides to flying and they have steadily grown in the last couple of years. When American Airlines filed for bankruptcy last year, it was hard not to be scared about the future. But as Rich, my Significant Other, says, it was the best thing that could have happened to me. It was the catalyst to finally devote myself to what that aptitude test said I am most suited for: working  in a quiet environment, in solitude, in a creative field, the exact description of what I now get to do in my studio every day! Things had changed so much at my "day job" that they have become unbearable for me. The negatives that I could overlook all those years far outweigh any positives now.

The hard part was switching my mind set. In a post on facebook in a closed airline group I equated this process with being in an abusive relationship (speaking from past experience). At first, things are great and the change for the worse comes on so subtly that you can excuse it and tolerate it for years. You become used to certain conditions and accept them as normal. You are told you are lucky to have what you have, can't get anything better and you start believing it. The working conditions on the plane, the bad treatment and total disrespect that were no longer just coming from the odd passenger here and there but my own employer as well...it became a daily thing. I think this is true for a lot of us. We end up in a life that really is far removed from what we had planned or imagined, but we accept it as "our lot". It is hard to go back to our old dreams and think of them as possible, still. So maybe we got derailed, took a detour or two, but that doesn't mean we can't get back on the path we originally set out on. When I first saw the studios at the art center I never considered one for myself. My "poverty mind" (another insight from Rich) immediately kicked in: I can't afford that, that is for REAL artists, not me. But why not me? Why are certain things only for others? When AA offered an early out retirement package, I struggled with the decision whether to accept it or not. Can I really give up a job with benefits in this day and age? Am I nuts?? Also, as much as I have resisted and denied it over the years, the job of flying and constant travel does get in your blood. It's a lifestyle and a family. And one more thing that lurked in the back of my mind: I had been struggling for decades to make time for art, always working two jobs (or one job plus running the business of art). As frustrating as it was to keep getting yanked out of that creative zone every few days to go fly another trip, it also allowed me to have it as an excuse for why I have not made it further on that ladder. What would happen if I now have no more excuses? I have a great studio with more space than I have ever had, plus no more distractions from the day job (in a few more months, at least). No excuses. Now what would I make of that life long dream of being a working full-time artist? What if I still can't cut it? Nobody to blame but myself! Now THAT's a scary thought, and I can't believe I am sharing it here. I am doing so partly to be held accountable and to be completely honest in the hopes that it may ring true for someone else.

The call that there is studio space available came the night before the retirement deadline with AA. Another knock on the head by the Great One up above:) I had to really get out of my own way, get past the fear of the unknown and jump before seeing the net at the bottom. I have done so before and the net always appears. So after much, much planning, consideration, crunching of numbers and talking it over with Rich (getting his full support) I put in for the early out. It is not revocable. I will know by the end of October when my exit date is (sometime between December and September). I was afraid of regretting it the day after when I flew a trip to London. Maybe it wasn't so bad after all? But as soon as I walked onto the plane, I knew without a doubt that I had made the right decision. I felt out of place, even more so than in the past. Yes, I will miss my colleagues, miss the great cities that have become so familiar to me, but I can stay in touch with friends and travel to those places on my own! People are ready for change only when the current situation becomes worse than the fear of the unknown, and I am ready. Ready for a life of a daily routine of driving to the studio, immersing myself in a creative project, without being disconnected from it every few days. Ready to have my body on a regular schedule, too.  Ready to have time for loved ones, set dates and make plans way in advance without fear of a trip getting in the way. Ready to see what can happen if I can stick with an idea for a series of paintings and carry it to fruition without constant interruption, to be surrounded by other artists and their creative energy and ideas. Ready to work only one job and have some downtime, too.

There have been so many changes this year. If you had told me in January that I'd be living in Southern California, having a studio and no longer being a flight attendant....I would have called you crazy. It was so far out of the realm of possibilities and yet, here I am.  Once we are truly ready and take the first step, doors open and opportunities line up that we never foresaw.

So for me, 2013 means no more double life, no more secrets. I will share my struggles, internal and otherwise, as I embark on this new chapter in my journey and hope that maybe one or two of you get inspired to resurrect old dreams, or to keep persevering  with current ones and to see yourself with new eyes. If we can see ourselves as others see us (good and bad) it opens up whole new worlds to us. It quiets those voices that have been sabotaging us for years, voices that crept in on their own or were pushed in by others, on purpose or not, voices that told us to go in one direction when we were so wishing to go in another...I'm ready to drown out the limiting voices with the empowering ones and to make my own, original, true, voice speak the loudest. When I drive each morning through the valleys, hills and fields of my Southern California home and walk into my new studio every morning to enjoy a quiet day of painting I feel like I am finally in the right place. I am home.  

You are invited to an open studio event at Daggi Wallace Studio. This is a rare and exclusive opportunity just for you.

As many of you know I am moving to California in July and am clearing out studio space for new work. I would like you - my friends, fans, and collectors - have the opportunity to add some of my earlier work to your collection at greatly discounted prices.

I am doing this for several reasons:

1. To get to visit with those of you close by before I leave for California.

2. To give you the opportunity to find that special painting to give as a gift or keep for yourself. Art is a wonderful gift that uplifts and enriches for many years to come.

       3. To make room for new work in my studio and have less boxes for the movers!

                     4. To make my art affordable to everyone.

What: Open Studio / California Dreamin’ Event
When: June 29, 2012 (Friday)
Time: 6pm -10pm
Where: My Home and Studio
835 Lockhaven Ln.
Coppell TX 75019

Phone: 972-741-3018

Questions, comments, directions? Send me an email!

One more thing: If you come to my open studio, you will be entered into a drawing to receive a $200 gift certificate to use on future purchases or commissions! But you cannot win if you don't come visit me at my studio.

AND…If you bring a friend who shares our passion for collecting art you will both receive another 10% off!

For those of you who cannot attend but are interested in the art for sale, email me and I can send you a PDF with images and prices.

It's been much longer than I ever wanted to wait between blog posts, but life has been very busy with many challenges. I had a gut feeling that 2012 would be a year of change for many, and me in particular, and it's definitely turning out that way.

The biggest news: we are moving to California in July! We have dreamed about and planned for this move for years, had anticipated doing it in 2013, but things happen, minds change and I can say whole heartedly: IT IS TIME.

Time to go live where I have always felt at home from the first day of ever visiting that beautiful state many years ago.

Time for the next life phase, no longer putting others' needs ahead of myself, I am doing what the inflight announcements on a plane tell you to do: put the oxygen mask on yourself BEFORE putting it on children or anyone else who needs help. This is hard for me as a mom, but IT IS TIME.

Time to focus full time on painting and reduce the hours of flying.

Time to start my life with Rich. Sam will join us for a while, but she, too, will be an adult next month and the phase of my life where I was a full time mom is coming to a close.

This year I will turn 50 and it's time to live in a place that inspires me, gives me life and energy, lets me breathe, and to pursue long held dreams without excuses or distractions.

Some may say it's a crazy time to move to a more expensive state, to give up the "known" for the "unknown", to start all over. Yes, it's scary, but also very exciting! There have been other times in my life when I decided to jump without seeing the net first, but once I take that leap of faith the net has always appeared and I trust that it will again be there for me. There are many uncertainties in my life right now, such as my employer being in bankruptcy and not knowing what my job or pay will be like, but I refuse to live in fear and sit and wait until THEY decide what's next. I cannot control my day job, so instead I will focus more on what I really want to be doing anyway: painting.

After we are settled into the new house and studio, which is just north of LA, I will throw myself into my art work, focusing on building a body of work to present to new galleries, doing much more plein air painting (my set-up is already nicely organized in one backpack ready to head out the door and into the hills), pursuing commission work and connecting with the local art scene.

I will also continue to work on my non-profit foundation Moni's Kids. The trip to Ghana this summer had to be postponed because of the move, but we are sending about 8 boxes of books to the kids of Touch a Life Foundation ahead of visiting them. We plan to meet them in person early next year and start the new series of portraits.

The next few weeks, I am finishing up a couple of commissions, packing up two houses (Rich and I will finally take the big step of living together, yay!), having a garage sale, and an art sale of earlier work at great discounts (more details to follow), getting some remodeling done on the new house and then driving across the Southwest to our new home.

I plan on staying in touch with old friends and will be in and out of Texas frequently. We'd also love to have some visitors in Cali! If any of my artist friends would like to come and paint "en plein air" with me, come on out! My main focus will remain on portraits, but painting from life is a necessary practice no matter what one's usual subject matter may be. I look forward to doing it in such a gorgeous place with so many awesome spots to paint!

On a personal level, Rich, Sam and I are excited to get out of the Texas heat and into the ocean breezes of Southern California, to hike the hills and mountains, sit on the beach, walk by the lakes, surf, kayak, bike, run, ski, you name it...just enjoying the outdoors and exploring our new home!

Great News: I received an Honorable Mention award for my painting "Innocence Lost" at the Nineteenth Juried Exhibition of the International Association of Pastel Societies which now qualifies me for the Master Circle status!! The years of entering this show and collecting points from being accepted and awarded have paid off. I am overjoyed and humbled to receive this honor! The actual ceremony will take place at the 2013 convention in Albuquerque, NM. I cannot wait to go! It just really helps to receive affirmations like this that I am on the right track, painting what I love most. The fact that this particular painting of my daughter has had such great success makes it even more special.

Viladrin's portrait found a home this past weekend. A family in Dallas bought it as a Christmas present. This makes 17 of the 31 Moni's Kids portraits are sold! If you are looking for a Christmas gift that is out of the ordinary, please consider purchasing one of these paintings. You'd be gifting the recipient AND the children as well. To see which portraits are still available, please click here. You could also make a donation in any amount to Moni's Kids in someone's name and I will send them a card with an image of one of the paintings. And if you can spare a minute during this very busy time of year, please do share the Moni's Kids facebook page with your friends. Thank you!

We went back to Haiti last weekend and it was so great to see the kids again! Some of them had changed quite a bit in a year as kids will do and I was nervous. Would they remember us? Did they think we had forgotten about them? Would they recognize themselves in the portraits? My fears were soon quieted.

The presentation to the kids was a success! They loved their portraits and I LOVED seeing their faces when they saw them.  Each child was given a photocopy of their portrait which we framed in colorful frames and displayed on bright blue benches in the chapel where we held the event (see photo).  I also made personal thank you cards for each child with a photo of me in front of my easel, with the original reference photo I had taken of them and the painted finished portrait (like the photo seen here).

Some of the 31 children I painted were not able to be there but will receive theirs when they return.

In addition the kids got goodie bags filled by my daughter Sam. 

We were thrilled to present the kids with the start of the first library at New Life Children’s Home! Originally, we had planned on building shelves to hold the books, but the orphanage is currently in the process of acquiring new land adjacent to the current home, onto which they will erect new buildings. One of those will house a recreational area which will include a study hall/common room where the children can read, study and play board games as well as work on art and craft projects. This will be the perfect place for the library.

In the meantime we came up with a solution to house the books in a flexible way: mobile library carts! We brought three of these with us and filled them with books which we arranged in different categories such as English storybooks, books in French and Creole, flashcards, activity/puzzle books and DVDs.

We also brought along metal shelves and plastic containers with art and craft supplies.

These carts can be wheeled anywhere to make it convenient for the staff at New Life and will fit right into the permanent library later.

We had also collected a lot of stuffed toys, clothing, toiletries and more art and craft supplies to deliver, but were unable to do so due to a summer bag and box embargo imposed by the airline which greatly limited what we could bring along. They are ready to go next time, though!

The owner of the orphanage expressed to us a desperate need for storage of items such as medicine and school supplies. We will be buying dozens of large plastic containers online and shipping them to her within the next week or two.

I will now focus on selling more of the portraits, with the proceeds going to add to the collection of books and setting up the permanent library once the building is in place.

If you would like to help us achieve our goal, please visit the Moni’s Kids portraits page where you can read about each individual child and purchase a painting.

If you have no place on your home or office walls, consider donating the art to your local hospital and deducting it from your taxes. You may also simply donate to the project by clicking here. Any amount is appreciated.

To see the paintings in person please stop by the Lakewood Summer Arts Faire in Dallas the weekend of August 26-28, 2011, where I will have a booth. I would love to visit with you and tell you more about our plans for Moni’s Kids.

In October, there will be an exhibition of the paintings at Luminarte Design Gallery, also in Dallas. More details will follow.

Also, Moni’s Kids now has its own facebook page. I would love it if you “liked” it and help us spread the word. Thank you!

I feel like a year of very hard work has paid off and I've come full circle. Some of the pressure is off. The kids saw that there was a follow up, they were not forgotten. This was so important to me and added to the urgency I felt. Part of my intention with Moni’s Kids is to make the children feel worthy - worthy of having their portrait painted, worthy of an education, worthy of love and attention. I do believe they got a sense of that this past weekend and hope it lasts in their minds and hearts.

Here are some more photos from our trip:

Rich and Sam in front of New Life Children's Home, Port-au-Prince, Haiti

Our suitcases full of books

Sam and I had fun filling the library carts with our books!

After my speech Fabien was chosen to thank me on behalf of the kids. He gave a great little speech!

The kids had to find their portrait among all of the 31 on display. Jean sure seemed happy with his!

Getting these incredible hugs made it all worth it!

Playing with the kids

Moni's Kids is now formally a non-profit corporation in the state of Texas!

Thanks to the help of TALA (http://www.talarts.org ) who provide pro-bono legal and accounting services to artists and non-profit arts organizations in Texas. My wonderful lawyer Victoria is also helping me file the paperwork to gain official 501(c)3 tax-exempt status with the IRS which we hope to have approved by the end of the year. It's a ton of work to form a non-profit and I am so grateful to have found some help with this, so I can concentrate on creating the paintings and organizing our trip back to Haiti in just a couple of weeks.

 It can get overwhelming at times trying find the time to get it all done. From the painting of the portraits to the marketing and selling of them, promotion, exhibtions, shipping, staying organized in the office and studio (especially since I still have my other painting obligations and continue to enter a lot of shows). Then there is the whole social media aspect of it hat can be extremely valuable but time consuming. And right now, my spare bedroom/office is full of books and supplies we are delivering to the kids in Haiti soon. Add in my day job which takes up several days a week, plus family obligations....well, let's just say it's not always pleasant to be around me lately, watching me jump through all the hoops!

I am just trying to tackle one step at a time and plow ahead. I did not have all of the answers when I started this process last fall and I still don't. I am learning as I go along and love seeing the many doors open as I approach them. I leapt before I saw the net, and miraculously the net does appear! I followed my heart on this one, and while there have been stumbling blocks, there have also been many new insights and helping hands appearing out of nowhere. New ideas and plans for Moni's Kids are revealing themselves to me all the time and I have faith that I will figure out how to implement them when the time is right.

For now, it's just one baby step at a time, one foot in front of the other, following the path I believe I need to be on, crossing each bridge as I come to it and enjoying the unfolding of each event. All clichés, I know, but oh, so true!

We are returning to Haiti in about five weeks! 
We will use the funds raised so far from sales of the Moni's Kids portraits to build shelving for a small type of library. I have been buying French children's books while in Paris this month, but also had the great fortune to get free first and second grade reading textbooks from the Richardson Independent School District in Texas donated for FREE!
My goal for Moni's Kids is to make accessible to the children whose portraits I paint as many books and educational materials as possible.
I have loved books all my life and can still remember vividly certain stories that I would read over and over again and illustrations that sparked my interest in creating my own artistic images. I believe books can bring the whole world to us and open our hearts and minds. They teach us languages and about other cultures and let us escape our own situations for a little while.
We will be delivering books in the children's native languages, which in this case is Haitian Creole and French, as well as in English, because learning English will definitely help them with future job prospects. We are also bringing them board games and art and craft supplies. Thanks to Erin Maines for giving us such a good start on those by collecting left over art supplies from her teachers at the end of the school year.
DVDs of English language children's shows and movies are also needed. I know from personal experience how easily one can learn a second language by watching TV and movies. When I first came to the U.S. from Germany I learned more conversational English from "Happy Days" than any of my high school textbooks!
As more portraits are sold I plan to add computers to the list of things Moni's Kids will provide to children in developing countries. If you would like to donate any of the items listed, make a monetary contribution or purchase one of the children's portraits please contact me here or at [email protected].  I thank you for your support!

This is the latest commissioned portrait I just finished. Ella is a sweet little girl who is actually older than she appears here. The family had a portrait done of their firstborn years ago by one of the pastel atists who inspired me to start working in the medium myself. His name was Steve Grey and he passed away a few years ago at a relatively young age. Ella’s  family had wanted portraits done of their two daughters as well, but wanted to keep the ages of all the kids at about the same age. This meant that I had to work from older photos supplied by the family. This is always difficult, but I did get to meet Ella in person and photograph her to see the coloring of her eyes, skin and hair. I also got a glimpse of her personality which helped me create her likeness.

After completing the drawing I sent an image to the family for approval of the overall composition. I then painted Ella’s face almost to the finish and had it approved by the family before moving on the dress. I knew this would be a time consuming challenge because of the intricate floral pattern. Because of the many folds I had to make sure the value of each flower was correct so that the lighting on the dress would read accurately. The only way I could tackle this was by being very methodical. Each day I knew I would only get a small area done. I had to be mentally prepared so I would not be frustrated at the end of a working session about the lack of progress being made. One fold for the day was progress I had to be happy with!
While I normally prefer to stand while painting, for this task I sat on a stool and listened to talk radio. It took  almost a week, but the dress was finally finished. I was then ready to move on to the background which I had only underpainted with loose color washes up to then. I thought this part would be the easy part, but I was wrong. I struggled with every blade of grass and could not figure out why it was so difficult until I realized that I had trouble going from being so detailed and tight on the dress to being loose and impressionistic for the background!
Every day I entered the studio with dread, being unsure about how to commence. Finally, in utter frustration, I took the painting outside and brushed all but the figure completely off the paper. I use Wallis paper which is very forgiving and can be reworked easily. Pastel dust was flying everywhere on my back patio. It was extremely liberating!
Once I had the painting back up on the easel the tightness, the fear and dread were gone. I fired in with abandon and finally let loose with some strong colors and decisive strokes. I figured I had nothing to lose, since I had already brushed it off once and could do it again. This did the trick and the painting finally came together. The family was thrilled with the end result and I am currently working on Ella’s sister’s portrait. Yes, she is wearing a cute little dress with a flower pattern but not nearly as intricate as this one. But there ARE a lot of folds…

I just received some fantastic news in the mail a few days ago:

I was elected Signature Member of the Pastel Society of America!

Founded in 1972 by Flora B. Giffuni, the Pastel Society of America (PSA) is the oldest existing pastel society in America. The society's annual exhibitions at The National Arts Club in New York are the premier event for pastel artists in this country and abroad.

You can find out more about PSA here.

For a few years now I had procrastinated  about sending in my application. You have to be juried into the PSA as a member and there are tow kinds of memberships: associate and signature. I was afraid I would not get in at all and that would have been very deflating. I was hoping for associate membership, so when I saw that I got signature status…well, let’s just say I let out a few whoops!

Another reason I found it hard to fill out the application process was the fact that I could only send in three images. With so much at stake, I found myself paralyzed trying to pick just the right ones to wow the judges. Not that I have that many outstanding pieces, but some of my best pieces do not make a cohesive collection. I am actually working on that, focusing more on the types of painting I want to create and letting go of some other ideas. So for now, I will not be doing any landscapes, for instance, but only focusing on portraits and figures. There are only so many hours and days for me to paint while still holding down a full time job and raising a family. My long term goals will be achieved much quicker if I narrow my focus and create a cohesive body of work.

So the images I picked for my PSA application were only figures and portraits, resisting the temptation to show the judges my range of abilities, and choosing to show them my passion for painting people instead.

This is a well known strategy for any artist trying to get gallery representation as well and I highly recommend it. It worked for me!

I received a facebook post a week or so ago from the New Life Children's Home in Haiti. Turns out their power was cut off and they were in need of $3000 for new batteries for their generator.
Even though my focus with Moni's Kids will be on educational help, I felt I could not sit by idly while the kids sat in the dark, their food spoiled and the electric fans could not supply at least a little relief to the relentless heat, (not to mention the needs of the many disabled children), so I sent in $1500 from the first funds raised through the portraits' sale. It felt good to be of help!

I am planning a trip back to Haiti in the next few months. We will be setting up a small library for the kids. It may just be a corner in the classroom for now (they are hoping to move to new facilities soon where there will be more room).
We will provide portable bookshelves and fill them with books in Creole, French and English. If you can donate any children's books in those languages (especailly "early reader" types), please let me know! We also hope to add educational games, puzzles, art and craft supplies, a TV with educational DVDs and a computer in the future.  As more portraits sell it will be easy to add on to the library at any time.
If you can donate any of these itmes, please contact me. The kids are especially asking for canvases and paintings supplies right now (love that!), so any of my artist friends who can donate some things, I will gladly come pick them up.
Please, feel free to forward a link to this post to anyone who might be able to donate items for our library.
Thank you in advance for all of your help!

I finally have a moment to tell you about the event in Miami!

After shipping 25 paintings to the Doubletree Hotel in Biscayne Bay ahead of time (a huge thanks to Fox for storing them in his office and being so helpful throughout the whole process!), Sam and I arrived there on Thursday. This is after my boyfriend/project manager Rich had INSISTED that we be there on Thursday, not Friday, which I thought would be plenty of time. The poor man had put up with quite a bit of complaining from me about being so bossy and setting our itinerary without consulting me first (it's hard to let go of the German control freak in me). Well...there was a reason why he was so insistent, but I wouldn't find out till later.

The hotel and location were gorgeous. The event was held in the Grand Ballroom with a huge patio overlooking Biscayne Bay and out to South Beach along the horizon. Despite being busy doing last minute things for the show, we managed to be tourists as well.

On Friday, I got the biggest surprise of my life: my brother Andreas and his two kids, Lennart and Vivien, arrived all the way from Germany! Rich had planned this for months and had had a very tough time keeping the secret while putting up with my attitude about his conceived bossiness. The man truly deserves a medal! Everybody else around me (including the hotel staff and Nancy Rivard of Airline Ambassadors) knew about the surprise. I can't even describe my feelings when I found out. The fact that my brother and his family would travel so far for such a short time was an incredible show of love and support for me. They had originally planned on spending three and a half days in Miami, which is short enough as it is coming from Europe, but their first flight was cancelled and they ended up with only two and a half days! I have never felt so loved in my life. That the two most important men in my life, my brother and my boyfriend, went to such lengths to support my project, my dream, left me in tears and speechless. My project is named after our late mother, Monika, and I felt that she, too, was present in the ballroom that night with Andy and me.

After breakfast on South Beach and a dip in the ocean for the kids we spent several hours on Saturday hanging the paintings and setting up our display table. The Bon Voyage party for the Cruise 4 Haiti by AAI started at 7pm and even though not as many people attended as we had hoped, we had several sales! All together, seven portraits have been sold (and put on hold), and many good connections were made. And since I didn't mess up too badly during my little speech (will I EVER be comfortable with public speaking??), the evening was a wonderful success.

Sam put together a slideshow with music about our project. You can view it here. 
Be sure to turn up your speakers so you can hear one of my favorite songs that I thought was perfect to accompany the photos. (Update: I could not use the song we had chosen on this site, but you can see our intended version on my facebook page here.)

I received so many comments about the portraits and the idea behind the project came across exactly as intended. I watched so many people read the kids' stories displayed next to their paintings, point to the drawings the kids had created behind their faces and ask me about the children. I wish the kids themselves could have been there to see the reaction of the audience! It was heartwarming and reaffirming.
I have added the children's background stories (as much as I had) to the Moni's Kids page on this site instead of adding more on this blog. You can read them below each child's portrait here.

We ended up packing the paintings back into heir boxes and taking them to a 24hr FedEx, so we could spend the whole next day driving down to the Keys and snorkeling. After months of non-stop work it felt fantastic to do nothing but play! To get to do it with my family from Germany, which was so completely unexpected and almost surreal, was even better.

Monday morning started before dawn with all of us heading to two different airports to fly back to our respective homes. We were all exhausted, but so happy about a successful launch of this project.

Now, back home, I have a few commissions to do for Christmas, then I will finish the last 5 portraits in this series of 30 and continue to find homes for them. I will be talking to the New Life Children's Home soon to determine when I might travel back to Haiti and how we will distribute the funds raised. I will keep you posted!

Below are a few photos from our whirlwind weekend.

The three cousins Vivi, Sam and Lenny having a blast at South Beach

Hanging Wisben's portrait with Andy

The Grand Ballroom at the Doubletree Hotel, more paintings were hung in the bar and foyer area

Andy and Rich

with Nancy Rivard of Airline Ambassadors

with the Consul General of Haiti, Ralph Latortue

Sarah picked out Vanessa's portrait, which her mom, Leslie Sosnowski, bought. I think Sam was hoping to keep it for herself, it was her favorite!

Annette Tillemann-Dick of the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice and her son Zeke with their portraits of twins Fabien and Fabienne

We are back from Haiti, and what an experience it was! My 16 year old daughter, Sam, and I travelled from Dallas to Fort Lauderdale and on to Port-au-Prince. Even from the air you could see blue tarps everywhere. Port-au-Prince looks like the earthquake hit just last week. I knew it would be bad, but I had no idea how little (only 2%!) of the rubble had been cleared.We were fortunate to stay in a private home that had sustained very little damage but happened to be right across the street from one of the largest tent cities in the area. Tens of thousands of people living in tents, in stifling heat and humidity, tent "walls" only inches from each other, so crowded it boggles the mind. No human being should have to live under those conditions. I have no idea how they manage to keep hope and faith alive. We saw women with pretty dresses walking through the rubble-filled streets, looking beautiful and composed, proud and dignified, while I was dripping sweat 24/7 and trying not to get irritated about the temperature, constant honking of cars ( it seems to be the standard communication systems among all drivers) and the enormous amount of people on the streets.

Absolutely nothing is easy in Haiti and you take nothing for granted. Just because we had electricity at the house at one moment, didn't mean we'd have it in the next. The power went off frequently, our host Dave Rivard from Airline Ambassadors carried three cell phones at all times (I could text with mine but not make or receive any calls at all), in hopes that one might work, the car could hit one of the many, many potholes (huge, deep and everywhere!) and break the tie rod (as ours did one evening on our way to meeting two gentlemen from UNICEF) and getting anywhere through the congested streets always took much longer than anticipated.

I have been on other mission trips before, have seen poverty and chaos, but nothing like the city of Port-au-Prince. To be honest, I could not wait to come home. To my bed, air conditioning (it doesn't matter that it's a 106 in Texas today, we can always go inside and cool off!), to unlittered streets and (relatively) clean air.

But once we were actually on the plane back to Dallas a few days later something funny happened. Sam and I both started missing Haiti. The kindness of the Haitian people, their ability to laugh and joke and be so welcoming and hospitable; the children who lost parents or limbs or both, who still played and giggled and hugged and kissed us...well, they got under our skin and into our hearts and we found ourselves not wanting to leave them behind. 

As far as my project goes, well, one thing I learned from prior experiences is that something will always go wrong on a trip like this. And it did. The 30 children I was supposed to paint were not able to meet with me at all for a variety of reasons. Since I only had a couple of days to gather all of the reference material I needed to complete the 30 portraits back home, I quickly had to come up with an alternative. Sure, I could go out and meet thousands of kids in the tent cities, but how would I choose the 30 to portray? Furthermore, how would I find them again in a few months when I can hopefully return with the proceeds from the sale of the paintings? It is important to me that the kids I met would be the ones benefitting in the end. Since Airline Ambassadors had a visit planned at an orphanage the next day, I decided to see if I could work with the kids there. The place is called New Life Children's Home. You can read the amazing story of their founder (an American named Miriam Fredericks) on their web site at: http://newlife4kidz.org.

Miriam was enthusiastic about my project and with the help of her staff and her daughter, Sherry, we quickly rounded up 15 children that I could photograph. We were also so fortunate to have four other teenage girls there to help us work with the kids on providing the writing that will form the background to their portraits ( thank you so much, Dani, Chelsea, Kaitlin and Ashley!).  I thought I would get more written words, but the kids ended up drawing a whole lot more than writing! It's amazing how you can put a pen and paper into a child's hand and they will be happy drawing and doodling for hours. Some kids did share with us what they wanted to be when they grew up ( doctor was by far the most popular choice), and some drew what they wanted to be (a plane for a pilot, for instance), but most just expressed their love for their country. They drew palm trees and tropical flowers, beaches and boats. They wrote "I love Haiti" again and again. We had told them we wanted them to let the viewers and buyers of their portraits know who they were and it seemed to me they wanted us to know that they love their home country as much as we love ours, no matter what our impression of it may be. They see it as a beautiful place and are proud of it. To have that attitude after what they have been through, is definitely thought provoking.

As to the stories of the kids,  I will tell you much more about them as the paintings are finished one by one. Some are absolutely heartbreaking. I did meet with 15 more children the next day (the home has about 130 kids living there), but again things didn't quite worked out the way I planned and I did not get all of their stories yet. I do hope to have them to go along with the paintings.

As far as their needs, they are many and varied. The older ones are in need of tuition for vocational training soon so they may have a brighter looking future. There are also some that still need surgeries. How we will spend the funds raised will be determined by how much we end up with.

I need your help to spread the word, so each painting will find a home as soon as possible after its completion. Also, if you would like to help offset the cost of this mission such as the framing and materials, you may donate directly on this site or at Airline Ambassadors: http://airlineamb.org/TopLevel/3_Programs/Donate_To_A_Project_Template.htm.
Any amount is greatly appreciated and I thank you!

I will probably write more about our experience in Haiti, including the great people we met and worked with but for now I need to spend my time painting the portraits.

I am getting a late start on it, because I was sick from the day I got home! I don't get sick much, but this time I was laid out flat (and I didn't catch it in Haiti, but it was due to the overtime worked before leaving and burning the candle at both ends). After a reluctant trip to the doctor and some meds, I'm much better and finished the first portrait. Except...I will do it over!
I had received a very generous amount of paper from my friend and fellow artist Marie Maines, enough paper for the whole project!), but it's a different kind of texture than I usually use and I wasn't quite happy with the effects. Since I do not have much time to get these done before my day job comes calling, I did not want to spend too much time learning and experimenting with something new. So, today I started again with my beloved regular paper.

I invite you to sign up to receive regular blog posts as I upload images of the finished portraits of the awesome kids we met in Haiti. Thanks for your interest and look for the first image in a couple of days!

In the meantime, here are some photos of our trip (You can see more on my facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/pages/Daggi-Wallace-Studio/131014993590334).

sign for help in Haiti

tent city

showers

The Presidential Palace



The kids working in their classroom on their art assignment for the portraits

Sam and Vanessa

Sam and Jeremie

This boy was such a serious young artist, making one playdoh sculpture after another! When I asked him if he was an "artiste" (my highschool French came in handy) he never hesitated with a definite "Oui!" He knew exactly who he was.

Out of fear some of the kids still sleep outside

A dream come true: "Moni's Kids"!

For years I have sought ways to use my art "for the greater good", specifically how to combine my love of painting and my desire to help children in need. I have painted many kids' portraits for clients and visited orphanages with the non-profit group Airline Ambassadors (http://www.airlineamb.org/) in my spare time. But how to make them both work together?
I am so very excited to finally make the jump and start my own non-profit project! I am naming it after my late mother, operating it under the supportive umbrella of Airline Ambassadors and kicking it off next week with a trip to Haiti!

My youngest daughter, Sam, and I will be meeting 30 children who have lost one or both of their parents in the January earthquake. I will be photographing the kids and will paint a portrait of each one of them after I return home to my studio.
While we are there the children will be writing about their stories, hopes and dreams. These writings will be part of the finished artwork, the idea being to give the kids a face and a voice, to have them be "seen and heard".
The proceeds from the sale of the paintings will directly benefit the children portrayed. Sam and I will travel back to Haiti and deliver aid, such as school supplies, scholarships, food, clothing and books, with the funds raised. Each child will also receive a small print of their portrait, so they may see the finished product.
In addition, I hope that the children will gain a sense of dignity and pride by having helped create a piece of art which not only brings joy to the buyer of it but also improved living conditions for themselves. I plan to make this a yearly event, choosing different destinations for each series of portraits.

                       The Inspiration behind "Moni's Kids"

I started drawing at an early age growing up in Berlin, Germany. The first portrait I ever drew was the face of a little girl on a UNICEF brochure on our coffee table. This was my parents' charity of choice and my mother, Monika ( Moni to her friends and family), was instrumental in instilling a social conscience in her three children. She also was immensely interested in other countries. Documentaries of other cultures were the norm in our TV viewing habits. When I started going on Airline Ambassador mission trips years ago, my mother loved the idea but always said she wouldn't be able to go herself because her heart would break. She passed away in 2001 at the age of only 59. I'm naming my project in honor of her. Her sole purpose in life was children, her own and other people's. I love the idea that children will continue to be helped in her name.

                                          Interested in helping?

There are different ways you can help. You can make donations to help offset the cost of this project by clicking on the button above. Or you may make donations through Airline Ambassadors where you can receive a receipt for tax deductions:

http://airlineamb.org/TopLevel/3_Programs/Donate_To_A_Project_Template.htm

And, most importantly, you may help by purchasing a portrait of one of the kids!
All proceeds from this series will go directly back into the project. I will post each painting as I finish it, so be sure to sign up to receive the posts.

Please, join me on this exciting journey to make a long harbored dream come true! I invite all of you to sign up to receive regular blog posts and follow me along the process of creating the paintings. I will also post photos from our initial trip to Haiti and our return to the kids in a few months.

Look for the first pictures next weekend. Off to Haiti!