Changing light. . .

Raku Bowl, watercolor

Labor Day is behind us and the light in the house is changing. . .signaling the welcome of a new season.  The windows were open over the holiday. . .the cool was refreshingly wonderful for those few days, and yet now the temperature is once again inching up reminding us that summer is not so easily given up. 

The scene above was created, (hence painted, "Raku Bowl") in my prior Orlando home. . .in a room that featured not one, but two large round-top windows. . .there was never any mistaking the "changing of seasons" with those windows allowing streaming light in from both the east and south.  It was totally perfect for setting up still life tableaus and served as a stimulus for my creative energy.  I was always on a quest to paint the light, or lack thereof!  The particular table in "Raku Bowl" is featured in several of my paintings from that period and originally came from my parent's home.  The heart-felt sentimental value (read memories) of things in my environment just had to be painted as an expression of my gratitude.     

I will admit to a sense of wistfulness at the changing of season.  I embrace it as a friend though, not to be wrestled with, but accepted, loved and welcomed.  I have to wonder if this is just my particular quirk, or do all around me have these same feelings?  The longing isn't one of regret. . .it's just simply a sweet voice of remembered days.    

Every creative act draws on the past whether it pretends to or not.  It draws on what it knows.  There is no such thing, really, as a creative act in a vacuum.

- Ada Louise Huxtable