April's Musings

Friday, June 17, 2005
“More musings with the muse: Calling my muse”

Sometimes I just can't get down to work. I can't kick up an idea or settle on a thought. I have a project in front of me, a to-do list of paintings, and an absence of inspiration. This is when I try luring my muse.

I set the welcome table for her.

First, I make the table look good. Wooden and pine is best, and there is one of those in most of my stomping grounds. I gather my assortment of water containers, all collected over time, many are small creamers, a cut glass crystal, which sparkles with clarity, a robust ironstone opaque creamer, two saki-sized handle-less cups, and a brown ware squirrel creamer (he makes me smile). There is a Portuguese blue creamer that Chris gave me long ago, with tonal blue flowers hiding in its rich French blue glaze, a delicate Victorian demitasse from my mother, white and flower shaped with a lip of pale green. One jug is mirror glazed and shapely, all are inspiring. As I take out these favorite vessels for my brushes, my inner vessel also starts to fill up! My mind and eye runs over their shapes and colors, their opacity or translucency, memories of their varied acquisition enriching my thinking, luring my muse.

I take out my brushes, wrapped in a beautiful bamboo roll. My paint bag, quilted, bright blue printed with golden yellow flowers, made especially for my paints, has tucked inside my favorite and familiar Winsor and Newton travel paints. They do travel well, but do very nicely at home too. I paint in some dark locations, so I might light some candles, I vary the shape, pillar, and graceful tapers, votives, and hand-made beeswax, carved and ornamented. Each shape holds my eye, each shape chosen to feed my muse.

I fill a picture of water, choose a beautiful white-backed plate for a palette, hmm, think about music. I might turn on some jazz, stimulates the mind, don't you think?

Oh, my eye lights on my beautiful Nataraj pencil. I can trust it to interpret my thoughts and lead me to myself. The blue pitcher has unleashed for me a memory: a Portuguese scene, a window sill, flowers in a cascade, the terracotta-colored pots, the white walls with violet shadows, a color palette is emerging, summer? The contrast of sun and shade, mid-afternoon quiet... "Welcome" does it say welcome? Geraniums, cadmium red, reliable. Yes, they are welcoming, perfect for my article on bringing nature indoors, my muse alights, we begin together; she has been lured in, attracted by the beauty of my setting.