well first, thanks to Claudia for her invite and intro into blog hopping... I said "count me in" and THEN realized i had to come up with a way to intertwine my artist self blog with Mothers Day Me. Hmmmm but then i realized that the mother part of me is so deeply ingrained that it has only enhanced my love of art, color and all all things emotional and pleasurable..
But very rarely does the line between my paintings and my sons blur. Yes, Ive sketched and painted my kids when they were little, cute and cuddly. I painted murals in their nurseries, Denim jackets with Thomas The Train for little Jake, Sweatshirts and T-shirts and toy boxes and furniture for every little kid in NJ and beyond when it was my business, I even did a painting of Sam with his true love, a football, years ago. But that was about it. I dont do kids cutesy stuff. At this stage of the game, i am so over cutesy. Sorry, but true.
Then it occurred to me how my art and my older son recently connected. He's all big and grown and a manly-man now, but when i see him i still see the buzz cut and gap toothed smile and huge blue eyes of Jake at 6. I still have a landline phone only because the recording is his 6 year old voice saying "we are not home now, pweese leave a message"...he turns red when he hears it to this day.
These days he is a sous chef at a fancy shmancy restaurant in NYC, spending the hours before dawn at the market getting the days menu purchased, and the hours after midnight testing new recipes. He has the typical busy single guy NY life, with a text here and there to the mom, who thinks of him often (um, sorta 24/7) and misses his presence palpably. The last time he was home he said," I really love some of these little paintings you did of oranges, lemons," and whatever i had around when i was in a "IM BLOCKED but want to paint" mood.
"Can i have this one, I'd love to hang it in the restaurant?" what? really? i said........Yes, I love it, can i have the little one of the oranges to keep at my apartment over my desk?..."sure" i replied, shocked but thrilled.
This from the person who says "hows the doodling business going?" when he wants to get a reaction from me.
Anyway, this mothers day i will be spending part of my day at a course on
the business of the art world, learning some more "tricks" to help me handle the business aspect of art. But what I get from my sons, and their appreciation of me and my work, while not paying the bills, is truly priceless. I keep this picture of my boys over my desk, because now that the older one is 6'1 and his baby brother is 6'3 they dont do the "cuddly thing" with me much...Usually its try not to break a rib while squeezing mother.....And it makes me feel like ive done something wonderful by putting these two totally different young men into our world.
Happy mothers day to the ladies of the blog hop and everyone else who shares our love of Art :-)
Yeah for the Mother’s Day Blog Hop!
