Three Blank Canvases

I did it!  Thanks to my friend Paula. … you were the little push that nudged me in the right direction at the right time… and a crazy chaotic right time it was!

Back to my journey back to Art, or my journey back to self… which this blog is all about (right now). Last year I was thinking about contributing a few pieces to The Anonymous Art Show 2012 here at the North Vancouver Arts Council.  The thought was there but life got busy and the deadline for submissions came and went.  The three canvases I bought became three iridescent yellow/green squares of growth still hanging on my wall today.  Growth needed to happen!  In the end, I never made time to do those pieces for the art show but did something for me… and then came the artist call for the Anonymous Art Show 2013!

I shared my intention of participating with my friend Paula and one day she generously offered to get me those three canvases, and sure enough she showed up, steps away from my doorstep as I was coming home one day,  with brand new canvases in hand!  I couldn’t back away now could I?  I didn’t want to back away and I needed to challenge myself in the direction of my art.  I couldn’t let another year go by without contributing.  The deadline was a couple of weeks away and as a single parent with 2 kids, a job, soccer games, a lawyer  meeting and a surgical procedure, I HAD to make time as if my life depended on it.  I could have submitted one piece but decided on the maximum three (we are three girls in my family after all; I needed to honour each and every one of us).

The creation of these three pieces, all on 8” x 8” x 1 ½” back stapled canvases flowed easily… in the middle of the night, at four in the morning, in the middle of making breakfast on the way to daycare or in the middle of existential ponderings.  I decided to make it a series of three meditations that would link back to my blog.  I can’t show them now because it’s anonymous but I will share those meditations after the show on or after December 15^th, 2013.

I am extremely excited because to me it means expanding further.  I worked in animation and the shows I worked on where very successful, but they were never mine.  This time, I get to share more of myself with the world and it feels pretty darn good; another step on the journey and another step on the art path.

Where the magic really happens when you expand is where it touches every area of your life.  Today, I found myself learning to put up soccer nets before my daughter’s game.  For those who know me really well, it’s like asking a polar bear to be part of a camel caravan in the middle of the Sahara desert!  By taking greater risks in art, I take greater risks in life and I am more willing to go where I’ve never gone before.  My daughters teach me this, and so does my art.

(A fun exhibition and fundraiser, the Anonumous Art Show 2013 shows artwork by established and emerging artists starting Thursday, November 21, 2013 from 7:00pm at CityScape Community Art Space in North Vancouver and continues until Saturday, December 21, 2013.  All paintings are priced at $100.  Come check out my art!)

Have you stretched your life canvas today?