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Posts Tagged ‘Dolly Parton’

Don’t Let It Trouble Your Mind

Posted in Favorite Things, Music, Painting, tagged , on November 24, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Decompressing and keeping it simple this morning. Something soothing perhaps.

I’ve been looking at some work recently from back in 2006 and have been struck by the tranquility and simple cleanness of design in many of the pieces from that time. It makes me feel like I should be backtracking a bit to revisit this work to see how it would emerge in the present time.

Would it have the same sort of placid quality or was that a product of my state of mind at that time? Is that something that can just be conjured up at any time?

Hmm. Something to think about but I’m not going to let it trouble my mind which brings me to this week’s Sunday morning music. It’s from Rhiannon Giddens and is her version of the old (first released in 1969) Dolly Parton classic, the beautifully written Don’t Let It Trouble Your Mind. Rhiannon delivers a great version, as she always does.

Give a listen, have a good Sunday and don’t let it trouble your mind.

 

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Passing the Blues

Posted in Favorite Things, Painting, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , , , , on May 26, 2017| 4 Comments »

There are colors that really trigger reactions within me. Most people would no doubt think that the color red would be the main one and perhaps they are right. The Red Tree is certainly the thing that would come to mind for those who know my work. And Red Roofs and Red Chairs.

Or maybe one might think that it’s the Indian yellow, a warm color that was the basis for much of my early work. It creates a most satisfying peaceful feeling in me still, after all these years. It would n’t be a bad guess.

But for me, I always come back to the blues along with the purples that spin off of them. They excite, mesmerize, tranquilize, intoxicate and pacify me. They take the melancholy and anxiety of existence and mix it with the sheer joy of living and feeling to create an aura that surrounds our life. I don’t even know if that sentence makes any sense but it sure feels like the color blue to me.

An example of this might be found in this new painting that is part of my show at the Principle Gallery that opens a week from today, June 2. This 12″ by 12″ painting on canvas is titled Passing the Blues.

It’s a piece that I have been coming back to in the past few weeks, just hovering over it as I take it in.  There’s a feeling in it for me that I would describe as sweet sorrow. Kind of like the appreciation you might have for the melancholy that sometimes comes with this life. It’s not joy but it lets you know that you are are a living and feeling person.

And that, in itself, is a wonderful thing.

And that is how I see the blue colors.

Here’s a song that has that same feeling of sweet sorrow for me.  It’s a great song originally written and performed by Dolly Parton. It’s Don’t Let It Trouble Your Mind and is performed here by a favorite of mine, Rhiannon Giddens.

 

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