Sunset, Thursday, 11 February 2010

William Theodore Van Doren. Sunset from Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on watercolor block, 16 x 20.

The other day I mentioned the California artist Lauren McMullen in connection with meditation and painting. Now that I’ve had a real chance to look through McMullen’s work, I feel I should add that whatever kind of meditation she does, it must work really well. I was drawn first to her collages, including one on “Dreams” and another, “Skully,” featuring a skull. They’re both beautifully layered, subtle and, like all the best work, endlessly absorbing.

I admit “Skully” made me laugh because my first thought was of Vin Scully, the (very) longtime voice of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

I’ll also admit that when I saw McMullen’s watercolors in thumbnail, they seemed sort of ‘light’, perhaps like something on the order of colored pencil sketches. When I viewed them large, I saw I’d been 100% wrong. They’re deep and dark and intensely brilliant at the same time. Her design sense and color instincts seem unerring. “Las Olas,” part painting, part graphic, should be adopted as an official poster for Costa Rica.

Sunset, Tuesday, 9 February 2010

William Theodore Van Doren. Sunset from Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on watercolor block, 16 x 20.

Snow started an hour before sunset. I heard today from an artist in northern California, Lauren McMullen, who uses a formal method of meditation to still her ‘critical mind’. I don’t do that, but I know getting to that open or free state of mind is important. Among many things that work for me is watching the snow as it falls.