Well, that is the only line of poetry that I remember that mentions April, tho' I'm pretty sure Wordsworth wrote one, too. (The line is from TS Eliot's "Wasteland", which my favorite bit of poetry at one point in my adolescence.)
Actually, I'm posting about poetry because OzWeaver has several good posts on April being poetry month, which I didn't remember. I should have remembered, because one of my favorite bookmarked links is to The Writer's Almanac which Garrison Keillor does for NPR. In fact, today's poem is about April, and is a very good one!
Also on her ArgoKnot blog, Brenda has posted some great paintings of poets, so I decided to post this at-best-adequate little oil sketch of Lord Byron that I did when I was experimenting with the oils I use. I used only burnt sienna and a bit of white and black, at the end. I painted the whole thing with burnt sienna, then wiped out the light areas, then added touches of white and black in a few little places. Painting from a photo of someone I never knew personally helps me 'distance' myself from needing perfection, and, oddly enough, those paintings usually turn out more satisfactorily than those I am worried about 'getting the mouth right' on. It really is delightful to do a small portrait this way - with no drawing involved at all!
2 comments:
Kathy,
Thank you for reading my recent blog posts! Thank you for sharing your portrait of Byron! I enjoy seeing art portray art, which is why I chose paintings and drawings of the poets rather than photos that seemed rather documentary, as I could have done with Frost and St.Vincent Milly. I love your portrait of Byron and your description of how freeing it is to paint from a photo someone you never actually knew personally.
Your description made me realize that I've been meaning to tell you something for a couple of months now. Your 'illustration Friday' exercises have helped me try my hand at drawing. I do it on Monday mornings, as a little motion of hope that the week ahead will be productive for me. I'm calling them "inspiration Mondays" and you are the seed of this new activity for me.
Thank you! I did mean it when I wrote that the candlelight of others helps me see my way!
Yes, I think that's one of the best things about the Internet - the list and blogs, etc. - it lets us be inspired by others. That's especially helpful for someone as isolated as I am!
Post a Comment