So I enrolled in this class to break loose of the limiting decisions and unnecessary beliefs I’d been holding on to about art and painting. I wanted to talk out some of the things I’d been tripping over, and I wanted to have a conversation with artists (in this case, graduate students working on their MFA degrees, and an instructor who has been painting and thinking about all this for 30+ years.
And to a great extent, it has worked. If not for my art — at least for my head. And, I think also for my art — at least a little.
Here are my last 2 paintings for the class.
Fallen Imprisoned, copyright 2010 by Lynn Whitlark. Carbon, vivianite, indanthrone blue, prussian blue on Arches Natural White cotton rag paper; 22" x 30", and natural 100% cotton muslin.
The first, called Fallen Imprisoned is the final painting in the “Imprisoned” series. There is a painting on the surface — though it is very faint. It is a shadow of the previous crouched figure. Everything else on the painting is made of painted cloth. The cloth doll figure, and the shreds of “his” (the doll’s) skin, swirling around him.
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Agreement is Shared Tattoo, copyright 2010 by Lynn Whitlark. 140lb Arches Natural White hot press cotton rag paper. 16" x 20" Carbon, vivianite, and Derwent Inktense pencils.
The second painting is not part of the Imprisoned series. It is something else. The words between the face and the thigh say:
Agreement is shared tattoo
and the repeated single word ‘agreement’ appears 3 more times in other places on the paper.
Which is probably only going to make sense in the context of the Graves model of human development. Tattoos have very specific purposes for L2 and L3 in the Graves Model. These purposes — and the medium of the tattoo change at L4+L5, and then again at L6+L7. This painting is an attempt to talk about the form, medium, and purpose of L8 tattoo. Clear as mud, right? Not a problem. It’s just a painting. The important thing is that our agreements are as indelible and unmistakable as a tattoo mark. They identify us. They make us recognizable to each other and to everyone else.
7 BY THE SEA 