By Your Side

Last night in my studio, I stayed up working until 2 am.  It felt like grad school, minus the stress, plus the glitter (I am in the midst of an obsession with chunky gold glitter).   In grad school, my friend Meghan and I were always working in the studio together, spending late nights talking, printing and rocking out to whatever mix cd we hadn't scratched too badly yet.  When I'm making art, I like to have a good playlist blaring (Spotify has been great for this) or a sappy favorite movie playing in the background.  There is something comforting in hearing the voices and love stories play over and over again.  Yesterday, I painted to Sleepless in Seattle, one of my all time favorites.

'By Your Side.' Acrylic on canvas, 5" x 7" x 1 1/2".  The wings on this little lovebird are really thick.  I painted, painted, and repainted them in layers of yellow, teal, green and white.  The colors are very peaceful, a sea of muted turquoise, gray and fading white dots.  My bird seemed a little lonely on his perch, so I added a little cloud of glitter to keep him company, a memory floating in the empty space where the second bird should be.

I've been reading about lovebirds from the many books I've collected for inspiration; they are social and affectionate, and spend a lot of time just sitting together and preening one another.  I think it's very romantic, and I wonder how they feel when their partner is gone?  This reminds me of a book I am reading now about a parrot named Alex.  This past December in my travels to Clemson, I paid a visit to my favorite used bookstore, McClure's.  I used to scour the shelves for art history & printmaking books, travel guides to Italy and vegetarian cookbooks, trading in my old books for new ones.  On this particular trip, I came across a book called Alex & Me.  It is about a really exceptional parrot who lived and learned for 30 years with an animal psychologist named Irene Pepperberg.  His last words to her were "You be good, see you tomorrow. I love you." Heartwarming and heartbreaking.