This idea caught me by surprise. I had never really thought about how the contemplation of eternity or the afterlife is a form of leisure. I think it is a pretty broad definition of the word leisure though since there are people who are employed and working hard to think on these things. Nonetheless, it isn’t the primary creative purview of people laboring to survive at an existential level. It’s for those who have the time to contemplate it, right?
Interesting secondary thoughts
is this true of all aspects of religion, not just the afterlife?
I sometimes think ahead and scan my line drawings before painting them. I thought I would show some of them to you side by side. The drawings were all done live at the scene. Painting was done afterwards in my studio. Five of these were done in coffee houses, one was done on an airplane.
There is a slider you can control, going from just line to fully painted. What do you think?
The Conversation, Before and After, ink & acrylic paint, Starbucks, Tulsa, 2014
Anna and Meera, Before and After, ink & acrylic paint, Shades of Brown, Tulsa, 2015
The Knitters, Before and After, ink & acrylic paint, Shades of Brown, Tulsa, 2018
Megan, Before and After, ink & acrylic paint, Starbucks, Tulsa, 2015
Catherine, Before and After, ink and acrylic paint, 2013
Britni the Filmmaker, Before and After, ink & acrylic paint, Fair Fellow Coffee, undated
Men at Starbucks, Before and After, Ink and Acrylic Paint, Starbucks, Tulsa, undated
The woman had rarely been out of the house for the last 12 months. The last time was picking up her daughter from the day care center the day it closed down. Since then she’d had groceries and meals delivered or her partner had gone shopping. She had worked remotely and had done all her exercising either on her own or via zoom.
She had gotten into the habit of staying in her sweats all day, not wearing a bra, makeup or doing anything with her hair. She told herself she liked it like that because it was so much easier.
But when it was time for their vaccine appointment she put on a bra and makeup and even colored her hair her favorite color. She put on her best tank top (it was hot that day) and her old skinny jeans and tried out a new pair of hoop earrings she had got for her birthday but had no reason to wear over the year. It made her unexpectedly happy to do all this.
They waited in the car line for about 20 minutes then it was their turn. She was so excited she forgot to put her mask on but no one said anything about it. She made sure to be on the passenger side with her partner driving so the shot would be in her right arm since she was left handed. She thought the nurse was the prettiest woman she had ever seen in her life and told her so. Her partner smiled because she had missed seeing that part of her over the year. Then they waited 15 minutes until the nice firefighter signaled they could go.
When they got home the first thing she did was take off her bra. But she kept the rest of her clothes on because they made her feel good. Then they had bologna sandwiches and potato chips to celebrate as they finally planned their long-delayed wedding.
A Woman Making Her Way – An Illustrated Short Story
Deborah was at a spring party in someone’s backyard. She told the man who was too interested in her this analogy. She saw herself as being on a paddleboard, making her way through the perils of life. She had to row, she had to balance, she had to keep strong, and she had to focus to avoid all the dangers around her and get to where she wanted to go.
The man who was too interested lost interest and went on to another young woman at the party. Deborah smiled and went over to the canape table and ate 6 crackers with crab dip on them.
Back before the Pandemic, when we could actually go and hang out in coffee houses, I did so on a regular basis. Way back in October of 2016 I tried a new cafe, Chimera, in the Tulsa Arts District. After I settled in I drew the scene in front of me in my sketchbook while I sipped my coffee. I used a Japanese brush pen called Copic Gasenfude.
Copic Gasenfude brush pen
Fast forward 5 years. I was looking through that sketchbook and realized I never finished the drawing. Of course, 5 years later I had no memory of the actual colors of anything. All I knew was the bricks were red so I started there. After that it was simply using colors and tones I thought looked good in the scene and together. I added brick under the counter as a way to tie the image together even though I don’t think there actually was brick there.
This is an important thing to remember about art – unless you are being paid to replicate something or someone then what matters is how your image looks, not how accurate you are in copying reality. The image IS the reality people are looking at, not the original thing. That is why so many drawings and paintings made from photographs are so bad, because they look like bad drawings and paintings of photos, not good pieces of art.
Worry less about unoriginal and uncreative copying and trust more your own eye and hand to create something of interest.
What is discrimination, bigotry, racism, ageism, and sexism (and more) but variations on this theme of not respecting who people are? It’s all basically saying you don’t approve of that person as they are. You want them to change to be more like those you approve of. In other words, you want them to be more like you.
Expect my Resistance
I am going to assume for a moment you are reading this from a comfortable, non-threatened existence. Think through what what would happen if the tables were turned and you were the one being shown disrespect for your very existence. What would you do? If there is enough power arrayed against you, you might just get along as best you can, not cause trouble, not raise a ruckus, choosing to preserve your life and family over the conflict that would surely come if you stood up.
But what if this went on for decades and centuries, always finding a way to rear its ugly head no matter what supposed progress was being made. What if the disrespect was so violent as to actually threaten your existence and not just yours but your family, your tribe, your culture. Then what would you do? It’s the impetus behind every struggle for freedom and equality in the history of the world.
Whose Side Are You On?
If you do this thought exercise of putting yourself in another’s shoes it’s not hard to finally understand why people who have been threatened in this way are standing up and fighting back. The question is, are you on their side? Do you respect their existence, not as you want them to be but as they are?
The painting looked at her longingly, hoping she would feel the same. She did, paying $765,000 for her and putting her over her couch so they could watch TV together.
Two Portraits
The portrait sat there for years but the serpent was a good singer so she didn’t mind.
Sculpture and Volcano
The metal sculpture was always hoping for visitors but was usually alone because of the volcano.
Sculpture and Patron
The dream recognized his recent lover but took no responsibility, blaming the image and deed for her condition.
Sculpture and Paintings
The ancient sculpture spontaneously started crying oil paint of various colors from every minute crack and became a pilgrimage spot for all true artists from everywhere.
Sculpture and Nude
The sculpture enjoyed blocking the view of the nude since she was jealous of her having a body.
Update 3/6/21 – I posted this painting on Social Media and since it was so public I thought it might be kind to find the woman I drew. I had her company email address so I went on Facebook and found someone with her name who worked at that company. I friended and messaged her, letting her know about the painting having finally been finished.
She wrote back saying she loved the painting and lo and behold, even though I had no idea when I wrote it, the thought bubble and text bubble were perfect representations of what she had been going through at the time, which was a time of great indecisiveness (I don’t know) leading up to a final bout of clarity (I know) that allowed her to break up with her BF of four years and start a new life!
‘Know Don’t Know’, Watercolor on Paper, 2021
I drew this woman at a Starbucks in Tulsa, OK in 2019 before the Covid 19 pandemic hit. I drew it on Watercolor paper instead of in my sketchbook, hoping one day to find the time to actually paint it. I finally found time in 2020-2021.
I had drawn in the two thought bubbles early on and ignored them until I was done painting. I liked the idea of her thinking one large bubble worth of thoughts and then editing it down into a smaller bubble. My original idea was she would be writing a story and I even wrote a segment of a murder mystery and it’s edited version but didn’t like the vibe of it so never wrote it in.
Finally I went with what I was thinking at the time, which was, ‘I don’t know’. Once I finished the large thought bubble it made sense to have her typing out the exact opposite of her ‘I don’t know’ doubts, just like so many of us do on a daily basis.
