Evening Prayers, people are so cool around painters

                                                                                  WAG

      Evening Prayer Brunswick Heads, 27 June 2021, oil on canvas board, 25 X 20 cm

Two offering from last night that came quickly and without hesitation to my surprise. I hadn't worked in a while and it always makes me feel like a real beginner, not just the usual one. 

I am happy to be in Beginner Mind much of the time when painting at the beach. I don't wear a badge on my painting smock announcing to to the world that I am a professional, even though so many artists want the world to see them as such. I couldn't give a hoot as we used to say in Oklahoma back in the 30's. All the Wise Guys of the East talk about Beginner Mind incessantly, and this state of creative being has taken up a home inside me over the years so I am thankful.

Painting as a baseball player means to step up to the plate like a batter at the ball game, though usually without the crowds. This is when everything becomes really interesting. Will the batter hit a foul? Will he hit a home run or will he strike out? No matter, it's to step up to the plate without chatter in the mind is the right mind. (The Wise Guys of the East assure us of this!) 

It was a somewhat hazy, late afternoon which the first picture (top) shows. The second one was made in the afterglow, and I had to wing it a little because the sky had already lost so much of its power. 

There was crowd of teenagers who had arrived, they were quite sweet, but they wanted to take photos. I never say no. Yet, I would really never allow this at any other place in my life. I am far too discreet! But, I am at their mercy in a such a moment. With my left hand clutching paint brushes, I suppose I feel compromised in a curious way, I am open and vulnerable all at once. Moreover, my painting on the easel, in an unfinished state, might seem like an embarrassed young woman hardly wearing a thing. And, my attention is glued onto both the horizon line and the small canvas board on my easel so I acquiesce. What's a fellow to do??

Thankfully, people passing by need to make an effort to get up to to the dune where I am working. And with only a few exceptions, they have all asked permission. I really love that. People are so cool around painters, sometimes 

LGJ

Evening Prayer Brunswick Heads, 27 June 2021, oil on canvas board, 25 X 20 cm