Perhaps, with a droll sense of humor, you will chuckle to learn what French artist Martin Drolling used to make Mummy Brown.
“Art historians believe he used the remains of French kings disinterred from the royal abbey of St. Denis in Paris” to create the burnt/raw umber hue in the below painting.
Kinda makes you think twice about what the women on the canvas are actually thinking.
daily word prompt: via Droll
The inside of your mind is torn
you ache for someone’s guidance
yet thrusted hand keeps them away
retained, a thunderous silence
Problems stem from holding back
and keeping troubles bound
The tigers growl, the gators snap
the lions, they surround
Isn’t is a comfort, though
to feel a warming hand
rest softly on your shoulder, stilled,
a yearn without demand?
To ask for help, there’s nothing wrong
seek others for direction
in grief or pain or lover’s quarrel
or self-imposed rejection
Why hold fast those troubled woes?
Let others help unleash
the honks of monsters, a demons fear,
a sorrow, then released
photo credit
A reminder about the challenges of growing into ourselves.
Once you get rid of the riffraff, the world is calm and beautiful.
I created this image by merging two of my paintings via photoshop.
daily word press prompt: via Riff
A better hand
to beat the man
I know which is the cheater
But he won’t stop
my smarter plan
and nothing tastes much sweeter.
Painting by CD-W – 1 of 5 of Box People series
Ah! What a delight
to open one’s eyes and discover
the world is more
than black and white.
painting by CD-W after Jean Siméon Chardin’s self portrait
daily photo prompt: Black
Whenever you are stressed or can’t sleep, they say to concentrate on your breath.
Laying under the covers, I closed my eyes and inhaled, exhaled, inhaled, exhaled. My mind wondered. “Concentrate,” I scolded myself.
In, out.
In, out.
In my mind’s eye, I saw my breath as I exhaled. It drifted to the mantle of my fireplace and peered down at me. I pretended to sleep.
It flitted around the mantle examining my wooden Pinocchio puppet, peered at pictures inside their frames and at my grandparent’s non-functional antique clock.
From there it floated to my bookshelves and I stirred when it became agitated. No doubt, it saw one of Stephen King’s books. That’s when it made its escape.
It seeped under my bedroom door and took a quick left to the piano but couldn’t muster up enough strength to press a key.
In the family room, it found my antique rocking chair where it settled into a back and forth, back and forth rhythm.
A back and forth, back and forth rhythm.
I’m not sure what other adventures it had. Nor do I know when it returned to me during the night.
I was asleep.
We all know that our eyes can be deceptive. Most of the time, we see what we want to see … until someone points us toward the truth.
“No, that’s not possible,” I told my friend on our visit to Florence, Italy.
“Oh, my dear, but it is. They mastered it well during the Renaissance.”
“But it’s a sculpture.”
“Nope. It’s flush with the wall. It’s all paint.”
That’s when I realized I was a neophyte to the art of Trompe l’oeil.
Wikipedia: Trompe-l’œil (French for “deceive the eye”, pronounced [tʁɔ̃p lœj]) is an art technique that uses realistic imagery to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects exist in three dimensions. Forced perspective is a comparable illusion in architecture.
I decided to give it a go, at least in small measures.
Thinking of Leonardo Da Vinci, I painted the image below (not the center man- he was truly glued on). The image is flat but I wanted to make the papers appear taped to a brick wall. The shadows around the papers add to the 3-D appearance.
Note: the words are written in Italian, backwards, like Da Vinci wrote. The envelope (from the man himself) says, “Dear Carolina, Maybe this helps!”
This one, The Helper, is one dimensional and has no real frame.
While I continue to be a neophyte in this department, today there are many great artists who can master this technique.
And, I still can’t decide which is better — a deceptive eye or the truth behind it. What I do know is this —
photo credit one
photo credit two
photo credit three
daily word prompt: Neophyte
It began as a stroll
both hand in hand
until she said no,
taking a stand
He turned to her face
and yelled some rude words
She knew right away
the man was absurd
Confident now
about the division
she strutted away
and praised her decision
Painting by CD-W
daily word prompt: Strut
While on vacation in Crested Butte, Colorado, I saw this old washing machine sitting in a front yard of a beautiful old house. Why did I take a photo?
Not only was I mesmerized by its beauty, I pictured the gone-by years when it actually worked. (From what I can tell from a wee bit of research, this machine was probably created in the 1920’s.) I conjured up the image of a person who used this machine. I pictured flapper attire, boys knee-length trousers, looser corsets and fancy stockings being pushed through the wringer.
Although its function was temporary, my curiosity — and perhaps those of others who had strolled passed — remains.
Weekly photo prompt – temporary
Carolyn Dennis-Willingham 