Mom and Art
In the sixth grade our class was given an art project, the medium was watercolor and ink. I drew a palm tree, sand, and grass at the base of the tree. I loved how mine turned out and it was the beginning of my love of art.
In junior high, I took my first official art class. The medium was tempera paint producing soft colors. My teacher didn’t believe in copying a picture or a photograph. I found a picture in The Ford’s Time magazine and fell in love. Defying the teacher’s rules, I painted it anyway. She liked it so well that she submitted it to a competition. I won a gold key as an award. Mom and I had to drive to Portland which was a long way for us and it used a lot of gas. We found the famous Powell’s Bookstore and went in to get my award. I felt so guilty because I copied the photo, but it was a false guilt really, because technique was what counted. Yes, I still have the key, a trophy really.
My high school art teacher was like the one in junior high, who also didn’t believe in painting from a picture. Once, Mom and I went to Sutherlin about 20 miles north to sketch and start painting plein- air-oil painting on site just like my teacher wanted.
That year my boyfriend, Barry broke up with me. I was really, sad for a very long time. This my first taste of depression, but certainly not the last. Decades later I‘d be manic and take my family with me on an awful journey. After the breakup, I had no interest and no inspiration for the next assignment which was to paint something abstract. I was dull and flat emotionally and so I copied another student’s picture.
Years later during a time when I was of level mind, a client at our salon named Florence, encouraged me to take her class. She taught watercolor classes at Umpqua Community College. It was the first time my adult mind thought about painting. She was encouraging and praised me for my beginner paintings. We painted every Thursday from one o’clock until four. The other students were far from beginners. I watched them paint, I knew they were above my level, but I kept going. The creativity fed my soul in what was both the middle of my busy life and sometimes in tough times too. This was also how I met my first artist friend, Lisa. She is so amazing and she’s my friend even when I’m not painting.
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