Reflections: What’s on my easel as the year ends

Ghost Town, Oil on Canvas as of 12/24/2013  (24″ x 36″ Work In Progress)

I started these two paintings a couple of years ago. And for the past two years, they laid there on my walls, unfinished, as a reminder that my muse had either left me or that I needed to be more disciplined about my art.  Last month, inspired by Art Basel – Miami, I started working on them again. On the cathedral first because I knew what the final product was supposed to look like. I have always been struck by the gracefulness of its silhouette, especially viewed from the side. I call this painting “Ghost Town” because this area of Port-au-Prince, Haiti was completely destroyed during the 2010 earthquake and I want to believe that somewhere, in a parallel universe, it still exist, intact but slightly better.

It was the complete opposite for the abstract painting I am also working on.  It had lacked a strong composition since the beginning and was constantly mutating, a sign that I was never too happy with the final product.  “Meeting of Two Worlds”, (abstract and real) as I call it, was my little Cinderella, my Saint Anise as they would say in Haiti.  At every painting session, I would start working on the cathedral first, and on it towards the end, as a way of cleaning up my brushes. But surprisingly enough, of the two, it is probably this one that shows my true state of mind. The one neglected, lacking a real composition since the start is really the one I pay more attention to now, because I feel completely free when I am working on it.  Working on the cathedral is tedious work while working on “Meeting of Two Worlds” let me experiment. There is no reference point and I can let my imagination go wild. Maybe this painting will eventually sum up what this past few months have been all about for me: a search for something new, something different, something original.

Meeting of Two Worlds, Oil on Canvas as of 12/24/2013 (30″ x 42″ Work in Progress)

These two paintings are works in progress that would eventually be completed towards the end of the year. They represent two facets of my life, two sides of my personality that want to merge together: the designer/architect and the artist, the disciplined woman and the bohemian. Hopefully in 2014 these two sources of inspiration will seamlessly merge together and my black and white compositions will meet with my colorful paintings to create a beautiful body of work.  This could also be the year I become licensed as an architect, meaning that my abstract line composition will turn into sculptures that will eventually become structures, creating spaces that people will embrace, and inhabit. As 2013 comes to an end, I raise my glass to a New Year full of promises.

Cheers to you 2014!  And to you my dear followers, visitors and hopefully future clients, I wish you all a Happy Holiday Season! May God bless you!