by Diane Widler Wenzel: My daughter's artistic hanging maximizes the effect of my paintings

The light gray walls complement my color saturated paintings.
Accessories like flowers and pillows repeat the blues and yellows in my paintings.

Thank you my daughter, Nancy. I hope these paintings enrich your life.

a work in progress

by Rain Trueax

Do you think about how the world is doing? When you read the papers do you lose hope or feel more optimistic? I do a little of both with articles that make me feel positive and those that cause me to lose faith and see instead a future for humans that might be dystopian. 

Except, in our daily living, for most of us, our world goes along smoothly. Not to say, we don't know pain or dissension. But we don't suffer what the people did in Paradise or the ones who went to a restaurant/bar for a nice evening and found a nutcase with a gun because his life hadn't gone as he had hoped (I know it could be a her but normally it's not).

Diane Widler Wenzel :Thankful for memories

Looking through my stack of paintings, I recall many memories tucked into each piece.



This  airbrush on newsprint is from a photo taken of my mother in 1934 when she married my father.

This is my first airbrush work done at a Linn Benton airbrush class. Done in 1986 a week after I  broke my left wrist!  I am proud of  how I was able to open the Higgin’s ink bottle just with my right hand and drop ink into the pen I was holding in a hand mostly enclosed in the cast.

For this post I pulled out paintings and drawings I have stored in a stack on shelves. The watercolor of the woman on top is a painting of my mother  in her last years.

Each one of my pictures has memories of the people who taught me like my parents, treasured teachers, and people who support me like my husband, family and friends. I am thankful I have been in a position where I can be so creative. My stacks of art work is a happy visual diary of my life.

definitions change with the times.

by Rain Trueax
 
There is a quote that floats around claiming a Chinese curse says—may you live in interesting times. It turns out it’s not Chinese, and there are different opinions on from where it originated. [Quote Investigator]

Certainly, we do live in interesting times. Despite the many advantages, for those of us who live in what are considered developed countries, sometimes the fast movement of events does feel like a curse. Things change, or what we thought was true, suddenly is proven false. Conspiracy theories abound (if you are not up on these, head to YouTube, it's rife with them). 

This is not just happening in the United States; but as a country with global influence, some believe it’s our fault wherever bad stuff happens.  I think we do have a lot of influence, but with a changing world, that might not last. Nothing ever does.

The post below is about cultural shifts. It's not partisan but might appear political to some. Of course, it is-- all human interaction eventually gets down to political maneuvering.

Painting after cataract surgery

The removal of cataracts is rejuvenating my vision and I enjoy more beautiful, bright vibrant colors. 

The future holds some welcomed challenges. One challenge is painting color expressive in new ways to me.

At the Oregon Fall Creek Fish Hatchery and Research Center's Art Festival, Saturday, November 3rd several days after the surgery I demonstrated painting process. During the lunch break I went outside to watch a pair of spawning Chinook. I did a quick sketch on my watercolor paper. 

 

 

 

Then inside I began the watercolor. Even in the early stages, I started painting dark that soon covered too much of the painting. One reason may be that color now looks lighter with my cataract free eye.

 

Working from memory at home the painting lost the flow for me. So I washed most of the paint off  by dunking it in our bath tub then sprayed away the color with warm water. Working over the washed painting, I started wishing the Chinook covered more of the painting surface.  The finished piece needed cropping.

I find many happy surprises looking at my paintings done before the surgery. But some tempt me to change them. It would be a good idea to wait on changing work until I get used to the way the world looks now. But on an acrylic painting, "The Painter at  the Beach", the color just does not match the emotions I want to portray, so I decide to touch up a few places.

The purple on the sky popped and looked too saccharine.  As usual I deceived myself thinking only a few brush strokes would make this painting better express how it felt outdoors that Autumn day on the Oregon Coast.
 

I never learn that going back into small areas usually means the surface becomes a mess of strokes showing awkward indecision   Somehow the grays of some clouds had nice line but were dark and foreboding. So I needed to wipe it all off.  I summonsed my courage to be more direct. I made most of the sky a thin wet tint and brushed strokes of grays close to how dark they appear.

I started a new painting as a test because I feel uncertain of using a new surface until I learn how my eyes work. So a $7.00 Habitat for Humanity 54" x 42" lightly used canvas is a bargain giving me freedom to paint freely.  On top of this discarded painting I am responding to what is on the canvas. The all over random criss-cross heavy broad stroke texture and pastel palette allowed my addition of  an imaginary powder blue sky.  Then I had the freedom to further assign vertical whites to reach high. The title in marking pen was on the back - "Another Spring". It is still "Another Spring".

Struggling is good in the painting process for several reasons. One, the positive outcome of a struggle means I appreciate all the more the success at learning. Two, I always anticipate that there is more to learn.
 

Beauty, Truth and Love

by Rain Trueax

Denton Lund giclee, Echoes of the Old Ones, now hanging in the bedroom

While I don't generally discuss politics here, the US has just been through one of the most brutal election seasons I can remember-- and that goes back a long way. For many, the attacks weren't based on issues so much as evil vs. good; Nazi vs. Communist; stupid vs. smart; and on it went. The attacks were not just against a candidate but against anyone who voted for him.

Those of us in the middle tried to keep our heads down to avoid being hit by the shrapnel as it flew from both directions...

by Diane Widler Wenzel, My colors seen through different lenses

 

           I anticipated lavender areas would help pop autumn colors to express how I felt about Ritner Creek.  I began the painting on a prepared ground of lavender with a band of blue tint grayed with burnt sienna at the top. Before my surgery I was unaware that the lavender I was painting was so saturated. It looked almost gray to me like the photo shopped one below.

 

 

 

 



 

October 30th I had cataract surgery on my right eye.

The second  is close to what I now see with my new artificial lens.

 

 I like both ways of seeing my painting. But I feel it was more cohesive through my quinacridone gold colored cataract often referred to as being amber colored cataracts. The yellow ting grays violet and darkens navy blue and browns the greens for me.

Just goes to show how we perceive the world depends on the lens with which we view it. We do not sense the actual object through our eyes. We see the color not absorbed by the object. We see energy reflected by the object and how the energy flows through the lens in our eye and is channeled to the brain.

Thus an analogy is drawn between perception of colors and our perception of other aspects of life. I am aware of my lens on politics tending to bend information towards what I want to believe and the structural beliefs of my lens will not focus on information that does not affirm what I want to see.

Our preferences depend on familiarity: Over past decades the desire for saturated colors has increased a demand for more colorful greeting cards due to the public getting used to TV screen colors. Our figurative lens through familiarity not only finds saturated color more acceptable, we buy more saturated color items.

In 2018 more family and friends are looking at my abstracts than they use to.  Thirty years ago I used to watch gallery visitors walk right by my work. Now people look until the colors and textures affect them - calming them, or energizing them, or striking other emotional connections. In the last ten years or so more people are used to seeing abstract work and the vibrantly colors on their electronic devises. Face book plays a part in getting the general public seeing things in intensified color hues, resulting in a preference for brighter colors. In addition to accepting modified colors more people are able to connect with the abstract.

Equally abstract paintings in 1959 went unnoticed or loudly condemned by many, even by artists. Human nature rejects the different and strange.  The viewer were more easily gratified by instantly recognizable objects.

In 1959  the Portland, Oregonians' were angered by Louis Bunces' abstract mural for the Portland Airport. It was hotly debated. The opposition wanted a pastoral scene. His mural still graces a wall on the way to the concourses. He pioneered the public display of the abstract and his work continues to familiarize us with a broader appreciation.

I am tempted to go back and change some of my paintings with lavendar and greens and yellows. The red ones have not changed as much. But maybe in time I will get familiar with the new way I see colors and I will accept the old paintings as they are.

the end of a season

by Rain Trueax
 

Equinoxes and Solstices aren't the only way the year can be divided. Most people are familiar with religious holidays but maybe less so of those from our more agrarian past when humans lived closer to the seasonal changes.

by Diane Widler Wenzel : Halloween Collaboration

Trick or treat? What a fun time to decorate for the  trick-or-treaters. Two black cats and a witch will greet them.
 Husband Don is trying to use up the odds and ends of lumber he has collected over the years. He produced them for me to mark cutting lines on three pieces of mahogany skin over plywood.

Then husband Don cut the plywood and sprayed it with flat black. I added the painted lines and color on the witch. I painted a witch trying to be beautiful.

After I painted, Don installed some flirty, flickering LI D lights.



Yesterday I had cataract surgery and today I am thinking of dressing as a one eyed pirate.

Planning, also, for next week's blog, a dead serious one. On some things I have noticed how differently people perceive my paintings. It is easy to demonstrate different perceptions are to be expected and not reason to attack the taste of other people who see differently. We all expect that in art and we do not blame others or insult their intelligence. So people I know are more open than they used to be about art as compared to 1959..

writing what comes

by Rain Trueax

Some of you, if you have been with this blog long enough, know about my newest exploration of the 'other' side, the Hemstreet Witches based in Arizona. Those books have been exploring what might be for powers, as well as what is unseen by most of us. They are as much metaphysical as they are paranormal. Is it possible that some are born with insights and power to see beyond the physical reality? I write these stories because I think life is not that firm for "What Is". 

by Diane Widler Wenzel: My meal prep like my painting process, My table like my hanging of my paintings

The presentation of a simple meals is as important to me as the arrangement of  my paintings hanging in my home.

I don’t think how my work will effect interior decorating when I paint so I am always happily surprised when our living space and my paintings enhance one another. These surprises are thrust into my awareness when someone requests a viewing of my work and I start arranging work on my walls that I think will suit them.

I was surprised to see the lighting change during the day picking up the light in the painting, "Swimming Free". What surprised me was the painting created an enhanced lightness as if there was an additional skylight in our home.

My open storage is like my refrigerator storage. I pull out ingredients with water themes to hang for my friends who are coming this Thursday to acquire a couple of paintings. Although I am not actively promoting my art, if friends or family want my work, I am happy to see my favorite paintings go to a good home. Then I can visit and in some cases I can borrow it for shows.

Hanging art in my home is like meal preparation. I  can go to the refrigerator or studio to pull out the ingredients for showcasing  my meal whether my art is painting or food.

I should not be surprised that my meal presentation and painting choices are so similar. My meal prep is like my "laissez faire" painting.  I don't know what the menu will be until I see what ingredients are ready for me to prepare or hang.

My palette : My table
accepted and award winning in a 2003 Art About Agriculture Exhibit

The paintings on my walls can not be seen seperately from the totality of  living.  I should not be surprised.

 I see them as nurturing and as satisfying as a good meal.

When your body can talk to you

by Rain Trueax

Our life depends on our body continuing to function. Kind of a basic truth. Years back, I was interested in meditation as a way to keep track of how my body was doing. Deep breaths, blocking out my thinking, meditative scripts, music, lots of ways to quiet the brain, and listen to the body. 

Mostly, being aware of our body involves noticing what in the beginning might be subtle changes. Losing/gaining weight? Yellowed skin? Long-lasting, unexplained pain? Digestive disorders? Skin changes? Breathing difficulties? 

For most of us, we'd just as soon not have to think about something going wrong. Reality is-- the earlier we recognize a symptom is significant, the more likely it can be fixed. 

Many people depend on yearly checkups, mammograms, colonoscopies, and other tests in the doctor's office that might find a problem before symptoms.

There happen to be home tools that can help our body talk back to us. For young folks, this may not be an issue as there are years when we don't worry about things going wrong. The older we get, the more that changes.

by Diane Widler Wenzel: I garden the same way I paint

Lighting, atmosphere, color and linear gesture are important considerations in both my paintings and flower garden. My "laissez faire" approach, likewise, is the same. In my garden I love volunteer poppies, forget-me-not, snapdragons, glads, dahlias, and cosmos to come up where they may. In painting I often plunge in with colors without  little conscious thought to bring about what may. "Laissez faire" painting brings about new relationships that look natural because the paint flows naturally. Then  I weed out all but the happiest of accidents. In my garden and painting I am perpetually weeding to center attention on what is most interesting to me as my goals evolve. In paintings that tell a story the weeding is particularly important to communicate.

Pictures with busy activity can be more expressive of intention by subduing the activity. For example I just did some weeding within my 1989  on location painting of Tom Allen's watercolor demonstration at a boat repair yard on the Yaquina River.

My painting before subduing the clutter.

The distracting boy to the far right obstructed the dry docked boat that Tom Allen was painting, The boat is a necessary part of the story. So I cut him out entirely by scrubbing out as much paint as possible before covering the boy with Daler Rowney white acrylic ink. When the ink is just barely dry it can be covered with brilliant watercolor. Later it hardens and if thick will resist the paint like the white lines in the man's hat in the lower right.  Since the boy I removed was an important memory of our summer stay exchange student from Barcelona, I  redrew him lower down in the composition.
 

Adding a blue wash over mostly the bodies holds the group together as a unit by eliminating all that distracts from the faces there by popping out their expressive gestures. The same principle applies to my flower garden. When a green clover starts to dominate I allow my husband to rototill  and spread the mint mulch. The mulched garden is seen as a visual unit like the onlookers at Tom's demonstration.  The gestural blossoms are made more prominent by the less busy mulch.

a monster or more

by Rain Trueax

In 1992, I wrote my first paranormal, Sky Daughter, where the heroine returned to her grandfather's Idaho mountain after a series of losses. Once there, she learns things about her family that she hadn't expected when she finds her grandmother's Book of shadows-- a witch's compilation of her spells, potions, and experiences. Going against the rules as this book is only to be given to witches, Maggie's grandmother had left it for her with a note inside.

For the first time, Maggie understands why her mother had kept her away from her grandmother. This is only the first of what Maggie is about to discover in a world that isn't at all what she had believed. Something bigger, something unseen is out there. What is it? She has known many emotions, but fear is new to her. As I wrote, I contemplated an important point to the plot-- was what she felt real or her imagination coming from her losses? I reached the point where I had to decide. 

Diane on my paintings dedicated to two of the people I love

My entire body of work is a visual diary of my life including my hopes for the future of two of my most loved people - my husband and my mother.

This is my vision of myself and husband growing older together walking on slippery ice. The hand clasp is symbolic of being there for each other. This is one of the illustrations for a book dedicated to my grandchildren, "When I Get To Be Older"

Mama leaving for the beyond.


I painted mama and I couple a days before she passed away. She said she was tired and wanted a larger space then the nursing home room. I had visions of her desires for her existing in an exotic friendly atmosphere.
She liked posing for me.



The drawing on the easel is copied from a drawing on a prepared board
for an egg tempera she never completed from before or just after I was born.

My art process is a part of my whole way of living and dreaming. For more of my paintings about relationships see some of my old blogs.
http://widlerwenzeldreams.blogspot.com  is of illustrations for "When I Get to be Older"
http://parapluie-fromthentonow.blogspot.com is a short retrospective

reality versus how we might wish it was

by Rain Trueax

For this blog, I tend to write articles ahead of time, as ideas come to me. I had one planned for today and changed it after my friend, Diane, wrote her piece about her own experiences with sexual abuse. I felt her bravery, and yes, it takes bravery to share such things, meant I needed to change my own plans to address some thoughts on what has been traumatic for our whole country.

Here is not where I want to write about the recent hearings, guilt or innocence of anyone involved in them, but rather the subject of sexual abuse, ramifications on a life, my own experiences, and how thinking about the subject and its impact on adults led to one of my books.

Diane on cultural change: Recognizing sexual assault

Procion dye painted on cotton

Some names have been changed  in my true story.

Feeling like an outsider, felling  so different I might as well been an alien from outer space.  I needed to go along with the flow, to carry on and try to be happy when my feelings from sexual assault did not count in the eyes of others.

  I was 5 years old in 1948.  Walking alone to Jefferson Elementary School, I was crossing the extremely busy intersection of Delaware Street and the El Camino Real in Berkeley, California.

I told my mother what happened. She called the principal who had me and my mother come to his office. After we talked, the blond 6 year old boy who offended me came. All the principal did was ask the boy to say sorry and not knock me down again. No punishment.

They would have spanked me if it had been me.

 He never came close to me again after I pushed him into the bushes where he was stung by yellow jackets. My sense of power was short lived.

Today I see what happened in new light. I did not realize the extent that I was still without my power. Revenge doesn't work. One example, I always walked to school in a group. They didn't have guards at intersections back then.

 I did not realize my power was diminished by a man, the Principal. Seventy years later while watching the current event of Ford's allegations against Kavanaugh, I learned  new words and concepts - "sexual assault seared into my hypocanthus."  Now I know why I  remember the emotional details like they just happened.

How much of the incidents when I was 5  add to my self image as a pillow to men?  How much weight did this experience have along with many day to day interactions? The male Principal of Jefferson Elementary School whose casualness about the whole incident placed upon me the belief that this assault was not a big deal. My outrage was an over reaction. he did not even calling his parents! Instead of  getting justice, I learned that males were privileged and above punishment when it came to sexual acts.

In 1962 I was a naive 19 years old on a University of Hawaii study tour sharing a Waikiki condo with three other girls. I experienced  what would be called sexual assaults today but I didn't know but that my experiences were normal: there was no intercourse that could have spread venereal disease or end in pregnancy.  No problem? Wrong, I allowed  two to touch me with their penis with visible sores in exchange for being freed from their hold on me.  Since there were multiple assaults, it is hazy which of the men had sores. I don't want to think it was the one I liked until he assaulted me.

I did not report John to our guide who thought so highly of him as her student. He and his buddies barged into our condo when I was alone. When they couldn't find full bottles of alcohol, John turned on me.  Afterwards I asked the hotel management to fix the broken lock on our door saying I felt unsafe. They did not honor my repeated requests.

At the University in1962 I studied watercolor and dance. 
This 2006 watercolor, mixed media painting
 of Waikiki, Royal Hawaiian Beach Bar and Grill overlooking
the water where Ray, the sailor, and I met. We rented a surf board
and he tried to teach me how to stand and ride a wave.

We had a great time walking hand in hand, surviving an attempted climb of crumbling lava on Diamond Head, hanging out with the preschool and kindergarten kids living in the condo next door. We played my favorite game - chess.  He taught me to cook chicken like he learned from being a fast food cook before joining the Navy.  All was fun until he became seriously talking marriage and expecting premarital sex.

My Japanese date said, “When in Rome do as the Romans.
When in Hawaii do as the Hawaiians.”

Three of us went out on a date with Japanese men probably in their late 20's. The one I paired with was verbally persuasive but I was able to persuade him against intercourse. He took me back to the condo but not before unwanted groping. Now-a-days that would be considered assault.

The one time I almost reported an incident was when several of the girls and I went to look at the Princess Cruise Ship  just as it was about to disembark. Three crewmen offered to take us on separate tours. Of the encounter, I will only say it was the most physically violent leaving me bruised. I felt very guilty because I did not report him. At the time it seemed so easy to think I could just forget about it because there was no intercourse. Maybe I would have been successful in getting authorities to get the help the crewman needed so no other girls would be hurt. That is my guilt.

In the Ford and Kavanaugh hearing the prosecution gave Kavanaugh a definition of sexual assault.
Expectations of proper behavior are changing? The definition was not shared on TV so I tried looking up the legal definition. It varies from state to state.

 I wonder what the boundaries will become.



The 19072 woodblock print that mother showed Assistant Curator Donald Jenkins

I am amazed that many other women like me experience horror when sexually assaulted short of intercourse.  Maybe I am not an alien after all.

 I realize the assaults were a factor in my choosing to close windows like the opportunity to study in Italy my Junior year at Portland State College.  I turned down an invitation to apply for a scholarship to do graduate study at the University of Iowa. In 1972 I turned down an interview arranged by my mother with assistant curator Donald Jenkins about exhibiting my woodblock prints at the Portland Art Museum.


2015 drawing of a window
of  my husband's and my desire of continuing
 to work for a marriage
in which we both support each other's passion
 

Where I chose to close some windows, new ones continue to open.

mystery

by Rain Trueax 

The reason why I write paranormals, despite not having a clear genre where my work fits, is my curiosity as to what might be, a belief that we don't know all we think we do, and my own experiences-- along with the challenge of exploring mystery with characters where it's imaginary ...or is it? 

Mythologies, the stories through which each culture determines the meaning of life and often rules for behavior, don't necessarily have to be imaginary. They could be a remembered history and are part of human life on this planet. In human cultures, some mythologies are more accepted than others; but if it isn't in history or happening now, it is mythology and fits into the world of the paranormal-- that which (despite arguments to the contrary) we cannot test and prove by something currently out there. It is a fascinating realm for those open to wonder and open to going where questions take them.

Painting Myth #2: I make mud continuing to paint after the surface is covered.

 I was happy, for a short while, with the directness and freshness. This would be a fine painting as is.  But early on I started to lean towards greater representation.
 Earlier I  posted about this imperfect painting with some parts more realistic than other parts. Then I stated making thumbnail sketches for ideas for other paintings.

As well as starting a new painting, I worked on an empty boat in the foreground. Then Elenore took her boat out to go fishing: I was enchanted as I have always been by Elenore.  So without staging the whole painting for her, I quickly added her.
 

At home I started out to minimize the boat into an unrecognizable shape. I didn’t have a palette knife so I used an eating utensil - a knife with a serrated edge. But for a happy accident, I was about to remove the boat and Elenore. Now she is a little more recognizable from a distance and in keeping with the way I abstracted the trees in the background.

I thought I would do a portrait of Elenor.  I will do a portrait of Elenore and her boat but not now. I continued to bring the eye to Elenor and at the same time created a movement away into the background.

When I continue painting even after the paint covers the canvas pleasingly, many things happen. Sure the colors can become more neutral but mud has more to do with indecision of the movement of your tool where the staccato is missing. When I continue to paint, I am apt to have a learning experience; Serendipity enriches me.

Dreams-- the night kind

by Rain Trueax

Generally my dreams are prosaic--rarely nightmares, just ordinary activities. When surprises come, they are from who is in the dream. These days, other than family, they are often people I only know online. I think the characters in the dreams are placeholders. 

Once in a while, my dreams are movie dreams, like watching one in Technicolor. Again, anybody can represent the main characters. I had one of those dreams this week, full of color, interesting events; and when I woke up, I rethought what I'd write for this blog. 

The reason I changed my mind is, I intended to write about mystery and how it works into my books. I had two blogs planned for the topic. Then came this dream and it seemed a good way to begin that series.