Back To the Paint

"Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more...Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood...Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide, Hold hard the breath and bend up every spirit
To his full height...-Henry V~ Shakespeare

That passage, in its entirety is pretty blood and guts. Seriously life and death, as Prince Hal urges the bloodied English through that wall at Agincort yet again. I'm pretty pensive this week, not at all mercurial, but I gotta splash some paint around fearlessly. The first line kind of popped into my head as I set about setting up the day. We need to feel passion for a performance. Which in the end is what art is. I don't need to be in the heat of a bloody battle, but just dial up somewhere between I am newly discovering this with the brain of a beginner and damn I love that blue, or vermillion, let me at that again, watch how it flows. I need, and we all do need, to summon up our juices when we are doing what we love.

And I am not unconvinced that it works when we are doing something that we may not exactly be thrilled to be doing at the moment. I've had a few of those days too. Getting through one more hour with a particularly chaotic group of young ladies in a project could try the best of my art loving patience. Just say the name Jessica to me and watch me wince. But even the Jessica's of the world have their lessons. ( She actually became a favorite. )

And so today, as I go back into the now dry ( and fully okay after the gremlin thing) Godiva painting, I am needing that passion. I let the painting sift and sit enough that it is fresh again. There's no hint of accident lingering. In fact, I now have the opportunity to do something I had not planned to do, but may in fact work better. And I have something in mind for a new piece that I had pushed way to the back and now comes up to the front after just looking at this piece for awhile. That's what happens when obstacles present themselves. Sometimes that wall is an opportunity. Things change, present themselves differently, sometimes in the form of an obstinate little miss and sometimes in unexpected events. Sometimes those very things turn out to be the victory you were after all along.

So Prince Hal, meet Brush. Ahh, this feels good...boots and saddles people, boots and saddles....