December Moments

Musings and paintings from walking around NYC

I’ve been endlessly strolling around NYC, people and window watching, finding small enchantments around me. I’m happy being alone in the midst of all the energy. My quiet bubble is important to me, and even though it’s cold and sometimes very grey there is so much to be inspired by. It always seems that this time of year just creeps up with no warning, the shortest day and the darkness. The winter solstice is just about here and happily that means the light starts coming back. Things just keep on moving forward. The cycle is hopeful. I wish in this loop of the months going by we can find some peace in the world and love for each other.

I was wandering around the Union Square farmers market on Friday, bored of the selection of root vegetables and dried flowers, I pushed myself to follow my mission of noticing and looking more closely. I want to find miniscule moments of wonder to spark my day. The gorgeous watermelon radish, which was a bright shade of pink with a lime green edge was a good start. I saw many people dressed in great outfits, as colorful as a handful of my favorite paint colors. I followed a woman with an embroidered coat that really had me swooning. On the way home I passed by a Christmas tree seller on the corner and was caught up in the beautiful pine smells of the greenery. The top painting in this letter is my version of a gorgeous basket of winter flowers and berries that I found. These bits of observations are helping me feel settled. That’s not my normal December mood, so I’m grateful I can work on shifting. It’s hard work. I’m going about the process slowly and when it’s time I’ll be ready for a burst of creativity and painting. The small experiences make way for magic to happen but it’s easy to forget to look.

What I’m loving now in my practice is taking those simple magical memories that I come across everyday and layering them together, abstractly, adding, taking away, painting over, and creating a painting that reflects the impressions of my day. It’s a bit of being lost and just wandering, going where my paintbrush takes me. Sometimes all it takes is picking up the paintbrush and starting. As with everything, that’s the hard part.

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We are painting from the classics

January 13th 1-3 EST. We will be working on our own versions of the Mona Lisa. In a similar vein my friend

Samantha Dion Baker

wrote a great post about how beneficial it is to go to museums, look carefully, copy and learn from drawing what you see.

Our class will be a 2 hour, donation only event. A portion of the proceeds will go to our local food banks.

Gayle Kabaker

and I will each paint for 40 minutes and talk about our process. Join us!! If you can’t make it, the video will be sent to everyone.

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I received a beautiful knife from Nakano Knives recently. They are having a sale 20% off. Use code AUGUSTWREN at checkout.

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Have a wonderful holiday and I’m sending light and love to all of you!

xxx Jennifer