Work-in-progress: one side of the story

Not having any photos of my great-grandfather Taylor, my imagination fills in the gap to build these collage portraits. I've taken this (copyright-free) image...

and turned it into these:

At the end of the Civil War, my great-grandfather Taylor returned from Texas to Kentucky, to his wife and two daughters. At some point, he worked for a man who refused to pay him after Taylor had completed the labor. When Taylor called him on it, the man fired shots at him -- hitting him in the neck, the shoulder and groin.

So as a Civil War veteran, Taylor looked for medical help from his local veterans' hospital. They told him since he didn't receive the wounds in battle, there was nothing they could do for him.

The pain drove him to two more veterans' hospitals in Ohio and Virginia, where they told him the same thing: sorry, buddy. I imagine him guided by the North Star, in search of relief.

On Monday, I'll wrap up the story with more about the other half of this collage pair. Hang in there!

Work-in-progress: Looking forward, looking back

If you follow me on Facebook, you might have noticed an evolution going on...

.. two collage portraits in progress.

The Janus faces I've been working on are inspired by one of my great-grandfathers. The family story is that Taylor escaped the person who owned him (either in Virginia or Kentucky). Near the end of the Civil War, pension records show he became a private, then a sergeant in the United States Colored Troops (later known as the Buffalo Soldiers). But the records indicate it wasn't until after the war that Taylor was seriously injured.

His doctor filled out the above diagram, with pointer fingers to show where Taylor was shot three times: once in the neck, once in the shoulder, and once in the hip near the groin. (P.S. That's a fig leaf in the diagram.) He lived with those half-treated wounds for years, searching for relief while trying to support nine children as a farmer or farm hand.

I'll tell you more of the story behind the gunshot wounds tomorrow... I promise...

Making more art: get on with it already

I thought a lot about this quote recently:

If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint and that voice will be silenced.
-- Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh, Self-Portrait (1889), via Wikimedia Commons

I've had a really hard time silencing that voice for the past three months, even while the rest of me kept thinking of new art to make. Instead of working, however, I've been wasting time -- yeah, I said it -- worrying. Fretting about the right venue in which to sell my art, and how to find collectors who will connect with what I do.

 Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.

-- Andy Warhol

Here's how I got over myself and started making again:

• I chose to start working toward an exhibit deadline I know I can meet.
• I painted while I let The Boy and TwoBoo watch TV. 
• When the kids got bored, I told them, "find something to do that doesn't involve a screen." I then ignored the whining that followed. 

They found something to do.

Sometimes I do look for something creative for them to do alongside me, but not always. They can make their own magic. I can make my own, too. And yet I'm still forgetting and relearning this lesson, so clearly I have some work to do.

Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get to work.
-- Chuck Close

Do you have a prompt/trick/method to help you get to work? Tell me in the comments or on Facebook.