December 19

I haven't painted in years. 9, to be exact. And when i was painting, I avoided watercolor like housecoats or needlepoint with no irony. But Things Change. These days a housecoat would be a step up from my moth eaten sweaters and too tight jeans - and if there is one thing i can't stand it's that i couldn't feel the love in useless craft.
So when i started scribbling again a few months back, i found that the B/W chicken scratch that once upon a time had passed for 'a study' didn't keep my attention. Every nose begged to be red and i wanted to paint the purples in really, really fat people. At a loss for money and space, I purchased a set of water colors that could fit in my bag and notecards that could hold water and tucked neatly into my sketchbook...
I'll post some of the results here.
Some are of people I know, some are of people I don't but wish i did, some are not people at all and are better suited for the Cost Plus greeting card aisle, others would be refused by Wallmart.
And some are the results of on-going collaborations with friends - painters, writers, poets, photographers, social workers...
those will be described in more detail in the future.

For now, here's a couple for starters...

This is a fellow i met in Addis, Ethiopia. He shared a lot about Islamic culture with me, invited me to join him on his pilgramige to Mecca, and advised i not travel alone - especially not in lion country. He asked me to take a photo of him smiling so I could show my fellow Americans that not all Muslims are terrorists. Later that night, I heard him and his new wife have crazy sex through the hotel wall.

This is a painting of two friends of mine - one part K and one part C - a tip of my hat to intelligent blondes.

This is a series of paintings profiling Nazi scientists that the C.I.A. brought to the U.S. to work on NASA projects during and after WWII. The name of the operation was "Project Paperclip".