I took a break from 30x30 over the weekend to begin my Yoga Teacher Training program at Kaya Yoga in Davis. Not making a collage Saturday and Sunday felt like trying to keep my hand out of the proverbial cookie jar. And then, flying to Kauai on Monday, well how can you argue with that? Now, settled in our home away from home, the colors of #12 surround me.
It's all about the weather here as Beatles lyrics run through my mind in a crazy counterpoint."Here comes the sun...and I say, it's alright" is swiftly followed by "Rain, I don't mind. Shine, the weather is fine." * The weather in our Central Valley is equally capricious. Moments of sparkling azure skies cloud over quickly with a gray mist promising rain. It all comes out in the art.
*Partial lyrics from the songs "Here Comes the Sun," and "Rain" by the Beatles.
The first few days of a challenge are exhilarating. Pictures emerge, I try out different techniques and there is a splendid newness. The real work begins when the shine wears off. Fortunately, there are also dreams. All last night as I alternately slept and woke, the outlines of leaves and flowers arose before my eyes. I recognized this as the blessing it was, grabbed a pencil and paper and began drawing.
Last night, as I lay in bed, wind lashed at the trees, and sheets of rain streamed down the windows. "California dreaming indeed!," I thought. And as I thought about "Day 6," and what kind of background I might use, I imagined using my gelli plate to print paper with gray droplets and layer the plant forms on top of that. Gray droplets however, soon shifted to aqua skies and a strange amalgam of a lauhala tree* emerged. Keep the rain coming--I'll create the blue skies in my studio!
*The lauhala tree is native to Hawaii.