My Self-Portrait is

According to my roommate, "long pause... It is very Dickensian." According to a classmate, it is very "Norman Rockwell." I am not sure what it is but I sure did learn a lot staring at myself for a few days and trying to see myself. I see here and there where it does not resemble me, but when I stare at it, I still get the feeling that it is me staring back. I listened to the entire symphonies of Gustav Mahler, all nine of them, while painting it. Sometimes I was actually painting, sometimes I was wiping out everything I had just spent a good time painting, and sometimes I was just staring back at myself and listening to Mahler. Mahler holds a private meaning for me. But I think in this process, of forcing myself to listen again to his music, it slowly became simply music again; powerful, strange, and beautiful.

(me with my self-portrait, a bit redundant I know, took this for my mom!)

(our class paintings of the models, mine is a profile of Demetri, below the lovely painting of a woman reading)

Our show was a success. I know this by the crowd of people, thick enough that it was difficult to part one's way through and actually see the art. Also, the nice comments I received, from my peers and strangers alike, on my "honorable mention," blue stickered self-portrait. So many of the paintings were beautifully executed and all were so very different. I think one of the most interesting things about a class show is that everyone can have the same model but no one will have the same work. And Lastly I know it was a success because the wine was gone in five minutes.

Other People's Self-portraits. What can we learn from them?

Lucian Freud, Reflection (self portrait), 1985, 22X20, oil on canvas.

I've been painting a self-portrait. I take a night painting class at the Art Student's League and we are having a class show next week. I am supposed to have my self-portrait done by Thursday. With only a little window of daylight per day this time of year and me choosing to use it by standing by the window in my "studio" (a little alcove in the front room of my Brooklyn apartment), I find the days ticking by and myself painting, rubbing out, and repainting the same thing, my eyes. The sun has set and I need some inspiration if i am going to get up earlier tomorrow and drink more coffee and get this done and learn something from doing so by Thursday, so I turn to some other artists' self-portraits to see what they saw in themselves. Their self-portraits are as different as they are or were. What do you see in yourself and have you looked deep enough lately?

John Singer Sargent, Self-portrait, 1892, oil on canvas.

Kathe Kollwitz, Self Portrait, 1898, color lithograph.

Mary Beth McKenzie, self-portrait (front window), collection New York Historical Society, 46 x 30, oil.

Silvermine painting weekend.

Mary Beth McKenzie painting for us.

A new year means... time for a road trip! Drove to New Canaan, CT last Wednesday in my "Spy car" (Zip car) listening to Iron and Wine and sipping caffeine. Watched painting demos and painted for three days. Walked around the frozen, back in time, landscape of white houses and icy rivers. Talked about art and life with women wiser than I, over warming tea, sitting in the old parlor into the wee hours and slept with old portrait eyes watching over me at a lovely, quaint and creepy old Inn. Drove on from there to New Haven. Walked around the ghost town that Yale becomes when students are not yet back from holiday. Marked my journey with footprints in the snow covered quad and then warmed up in the Yale Center for British Art looking at some finely dressed British ladies, rolling hill landscapes and seaside views cracking in their old details. Stared at John Constable's cloud studies that covered a wall and thought about the big world. "I have done a good deal of skying- I am determined to conquer all difficulties and that most arduous one among the rest...The sky is the source of light in nature- and governs everything" John Constable to John Fisher. I Feel inspired from the journey and ready to use the new knowledge I have gained. p.s. please excuse the photo quality I forgot my camera and bought a disposable for the first time in years.

Calder like sculptures and the yummy place we ate lunch across the street everyday.

Outside the Silvermine Guild Arts Center...

Mary Beth's monotype plate and our view from the studio.

Two hundred year old inn and its surroundings...

New year. Old holiday cards.

(front)

"Let it snow."

(front)

(back)

"Happy holidays."

(front)

"Peace on Earth"

(front)

"Cheers."

I procrastinate. I never posted the rest of my holiday cards in 2009 so I will now. My fancy printer broke and so I outsourced my cards this year and in doing so realized how expensive it is and learned a great deal about what to ask for. Do not assume paper the printer picks will be fit to fold for cards. Ask to see the paper and test fold it to see if it cracks! My dear old friend was my first official costumer and bought a bunch of my holiday cards which I bundled up and took home to Colorado with me. And because of the printer mishap she will be using them next year. Happy times in Colorado with family and snow. We even attempted to ski after many years of absence from the slopes. we made it down the run all bones in tact and we patted ourselves on the back and wiggled our toes out of our ski boots to see if they still worked. And on the eve of 2010 I found myself toasting to the new year, glad to have made it through the last year in one piece (it was a hard one for me) and looking forward to the endless possibilities of the next decade.

(back) (front)

"Deck the halls."

sheep need wool scarves?

but of course they do. starting in on my holiday cards. very into plaid this season. here are some wooly friends to start the season's greetings out with.

(front of card)

(inside of card)

gobble gobble.

(front of card)

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving. This is a silly card I made about being grateful for what you have in the world. It is of a cute squirrel, yes. But it shows how the simplest things in life are what matter. The simplest things in life that I have and may take for granted most of the time, such as food and warmth and home, other people don't have. Sometimes when you are walking down the street and in a moment are reminded of this you realize you actually in fact have life pretty damn great. I am thankful for these basic necessities. I am also thankful for my family who I will miss tomorrow and love. I am thankful for my dear old friends who are out of town and who I wish a happy day of thanks to. And I am thankful for my friends who I will get to share the day with. What are you thankful for? It's good to think about.

(inside of card)

I dos.

(back of card) (front of card)

Last wedding card this year? Perhaps. So it had to be unconventional. I got the lovely couple a stylish bike bag for picnicking because marriage is not a picnic...unless you are of course on a picnic, and then it is! Or if you are newlyweds, in love, always doing romantic things such as going on picnics. The weather has been crazy warm in New York this November and I think we all need to take advantage of that before winter finally decides to make an appearance and we shut our windows and become partial hermits until April.

(inside of card)

images above © 2009 by Ivy Hickam