In a cold December night
In a crowded place
Many hands upclose
But no one holds
A child that no one holds.
…
Author – simplyoj
Wandering Mist - Inspiration is everything
Art, Design and Inspiration Unlimited
Filed Under: My Paintings By Ishrath Humairah 6 Comments
In a cold December night
In a crowded place
Many hands upclose
But no one holds
A child that no one holds.
…
Author – simplyoj
Filed Under: My Paintings By Ishrath Humairah 5 Comments
Soul Freedom Chained
Acrylic on Paper
12″ x 18″
And an orator said, “Speak to us of Freedom.”
And he answered:
At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your own freedom,
Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him though he slays them.
Ay, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff.
And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you, and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment.
You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief,
But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound.
And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights unless you break the chains which you at the dawn of your understanding have fastened around your noon hour?
In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these chains, though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle the eyes.
And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard that you may become free?
If it is an unjust law you would abolish, that law was written with your own hand upon your own forehead.
You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing the foreheads of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them.
And if it is a despot you would dethrone, see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed.
For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud, but for a tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their won pride?
And if it is a care you would cast off, that care has been chosen by you rather than imposed upon you.
And if it is a fear you would dispel, the seat of that fear is in your heart and not in the hand of the feared.
Verily all things move within your being in constant half embrace, the desired and the dreaded, the repugnant and the cherished, the pursued and that which you would escape.
These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that cling.
And when the shadow fades and is no more, the light that lingers becomes a shadow to another light.
And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters becomes itself the fetter of a greater freedom.
The Prophet
by Khalil Gibran
Filed Under: Inspiration, My Paintings By Ishrath Humairah 39 Comments
This is the question that often comes to my mind… why do we paint?
What makes you paint? Is it because you took to the brush when you were a kid? Did you see a masterpiece so magnificent that you took to the brush like no tomorrow? Why did you not do something else? Why did we choose to paint over many other options available to express? How do people end up painting, in life? Or is it just the one side dominance of brain?
I am not talking science here. The science of art is neither my area of interest nor my cup of tea, at the moment. There are artists who stress upon how methodical and scientific art is. I may climb to that realm, later in life.
I experience a period of frightening clarity in those moments when nature is so beautiful. I am no longer sure of myself, and the paintings appear as in a dream
Vincent van Gogh
What I am more interested now is how art makes you the person that you are – when you paint or when you admire art. I want to know how art starts to speak from within… how art expresses the deep core…. how art translates the messages…. how art works when words fail… and a lot more – for art was when languages were naught. And even today, a picture is worth a thousand words.
Then, is art an urge to express? Is it our failure to master other forms of expression that art gives us the refuge and medium we seek?
Do we artists reject the nuances of language, grammar and words, to express? Do artists want unbridled freedom in expressing and questioning? Do artists want to do something that was never made before? Is this the way we like to be spent? Does making artwork undo the artist? Is art a part of unlearning to enlighten? Does art make us understand the elements better? Does art makes everything simple?
The only time I feel alive is when I’m painting
Vincent van Gogh
There are a multitude of emotions that an artist goes through when creating a painting or a sculpture. The joy of seeing ones vision translate with hands, the despair of a wrong brush stroke, the anxiety of using a new color, the confidence of a repeated brushstroke, the tension of a measured stroke, the strain of fine brush work, the stressful judgment of seeing the big picture, the want to create a balance, the stray hair of the brush on canvas, the pace of emotions within, and a lot more….
Art is artist painted.
To paint is to show a bit of your soul. Where words fail, colors and strokes convey. Deep seated sub conscious comes to life. It is a way of connecting with your inner self. And more often than not, we remain surprised with what we see.
Like Jerry Fresia said, “we make a mark on the canvas and when we look back, we see something that seemingly was not there a moment ago. And there is that miracle: by virtue of making marks, we have created ourselves a tiny bit more – and we actually can see more, feel more, because we have become more, by that tiny bit”.
Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.
Henry Ward Beecher
Sometimes we know what to paint and we begin with it. But as time and colors go by, the outcome is totally different as planned. Sometimes we don’t know what the painting is going to be but start painting anyway… and the outcome is something you had always imagined.
Each painting has its own way of evolving…When the painting is finished, the subject reveals itself.
William Baziotes
It is true that once the painting is complete, no matter how much you love it, it is outside of you. All that you held within for that artwork is right in front of your eyes. The entire emotional journey undertaken is right in front of you. A certain part of you has come onto the painting and remains there. Like a child who is born unto you, but is an individual by itself.
It’s not your painting anymore. It stopped being your painting the moment that you finished it.
Jeff Melvoin
Art. Love. Truth.
The colors to use, the shades to restrain, and the strokes to play with… are what defines the art and his artwork. These, over a period of time become unique to the artist and can never be replicated. If replicated, it remains without soul.
Every artwork created with labour and love, speaks to the person who is meant for it. There are many mass produced paintings, which no matter how beautiful and striking to look at, do not strike a chord anywhere. Try it yourself.
Art that gets produced on a fixed time scale, according to me, is never art. There has to be enough movement of soul for something to be produced. Art cannot be mass produced… until unless lunacy rules.
There are times when a blank canvas can stare at you for a long time and nothing seems to move. The blank canvas remains for a long time to come. And then there are those days when many canvases get consumed in few moments. There is no fixed schedule or timetable to create art.
Body suffers, soul celebrates.
To paint is to converse with oneself. I tried to study almond blossoms by Vincent Van Gogh to understand the whys and why not’s of art. As we match his paintings to his life history and the times at which each painting was created, one can sense an immense sense of escape and pleasure of life while at work. Even during his depressing days, the art works seemed to celebrate life. While painting, we live a life within which is much different from what we live outwardly.
Journey of the artists’ art
Painting is just another way of keeping a diary.
Pablo Picasso
As time goes by, painting chronicles our life. Like a journal – diary, we can see the ups and downs of life and the artists impressions. Of the images that lived within, the medium of expression, the sleight of hand, the madness of work, the evolution of subjects and objects of interest and the things that they always wanted to convey. Like a painter/ author once wrote: “painting is my predilection, my way or tool to evolve, to “know”.
If you want to know all about Andy Warhol, just look at the surface of my paintings and films and me, there I am. There’s nothing behind it.
Andy Warhol
When I look back at my drawings and paintings, I see a person so far and distant – that was once me. Now, the style, subject, composition, and fervour have evolved. Should this be called the growth or evolution of the person or the artist? I don’t know. But change is there, well chronicled on the chosen medium of communication – called art. And if someone wants to learn a bit more about the artist, study his art work from the beginning.
Art is not off-the-shelf product.
There are some paintings which grow on me after a long time. And this is not because I got used to seeing them.
Once finished and not satisfied with the outcome, I leave it to settle down so that I can come back to it with a better frame of mind and see it in different light or make corrections to it. But more often than not, I end up liking them the way they are – perfectly hung on a perfect wall to dry. They seem to be so much in place and peace that I don’t touch or re-touch them.
It makes me wonder if this is true of the buyers too. Shouldn’t the art lovers be spending enough time with the artwork to decide if it is meant for them?
And when someone does like the artwork so much to buy it, after spending some time with it…. does means a lot to the artist… that the art-lover has experienced something with the creation.
When art gives you hidden lessons or mixed messages, it works. Art that tugs your heart has always been the one that never portrayed the obvious. There is no fun in painting the things what you see around the way they are – within the confined dimensions of space-time. Art is about tasting with your eyes.
I am unable to make any distinction between the feeling I get from life and the way I translate that feeling into painting.
Henri Matisse
It is when the artist’s vision or imagination extends/ stretches these constraints that his art starts to talk to you. And then makes you feel comfortable or disturbed. Either way, it has spoken to you.
Thoughts on art… to be continued
From healing, struggling, binding to liberating… there are so many facets of art. I would love to hear what my dear artists and creative souls think about it or feel within. I keep thinking about it and would like to know your thoughts.
Please do share… and let the journey continue.
Filed Under: My Paintings By Ishrath Humairah 11 Comments
Separation
Oil on Canvas
12″ x 16″
Separation was painted more than a decade back, when I chanced upon a photograph of war-torn people on the internet. Deeply disturbing and moving, this photo remained in my heart for a very long time.
And when I set out to paint, this embrace formed on the canvas. Was it the mother or the angel… who knows. The pain was building up while the brush moved effortlessly. It was painful, not cathartic.
It was difficult to imagine separation of loved ones, of losing loved ones, of the spoils of wars, of leaving children to fate, of becoming an orphan….
Millions of children around the world have been orphaned for no fault of theirs. If losing loved ones was not enough, they even lost their identity, home, warmth, security, love, and the arms that they could always run to.
Wars killed. Widows remained. Children were orphaned.
We then make peace with our conscience by quoting destiny, fate and higher reason.
Why call it their fate when it is the very ordain we write?
Why call it their destiny when we are the ones who make war?
Why call it higher reason wherein could not rise above ourselves?
To paint the life of someone else is to live their life for those moments. And to paint the living soul in pain is devastating. You cannot express. It is felt within. You become one. The painting wraps you around itself – even when you are done.
You cannot cry because it is not enough.
Here is an expression I waited for… from a beautiful soul poet – Ansul Nooreen Khan. There is not a soul who is not moved by her verses. Here is her Ode to the Orphan. It never fails to move me to tears. I cannot find anything better than this ever and probably never will. There is unbelievable amount of hope and faith midst despair. How can it not move you?
An Ode to the Orphan
Oh nameless enchanted flower!
Will my love suffice to give thy scent a name?
Or shall I bestow to thee my life?
Oh aimless ethereal breeze!
Shall I show my path to thee?
Or deliver you from strife?
Oh flightless angel lost!
Shall I kiss thy wings to heaven?
Or paint a newer sky?
Oh tearless eyes that plead!
Shall I fill thy orbs with bliss?
Or drink those tears that died?
Be not silent my little seed,
For in my earth will I sow your fate,
Where you will reap the fruit,
When in eternal sleep I rest.
© Ansul Nooreen Khan
Website: Ruh Aatish
I gifted this painting to my mother. And for every mother who had to be separated from her child, a prayer.
Filed Under: My Paintings By Ishrath Humairah 43 Comments
“Blue color is everlastingly appointed by the Deity to be a source of delight”
John Ruskin
Blended blues are a part of every artist’s repertoire. Almost all the artists I have met and seen their works have a blended blues in their collection. And why not? These gradients are so beautiful and easy on the eye that it is hard for most artists refuse to part with thier primary creations. Blue compositions are taught to budding artists to best understand perspective. I never quite understood that until I met a painter, many years back, who showed me his lessons in art. They were blue – in many shades possible and the gradient did give the composition some depth and perspective. Hmmm, I kind of learnt my lesson then.
It may look down right easy to blend in different shades of blues, but the painter alone knows how those shades and hues surfaced on the canvas, amongst the million options to chose from. The color of the skies, seas, sadness, twilight and more, there is no person on Earth who does not like a shade or two – of blue.
“Of all the colours, blue and green have the greatest emotional range. Sad reds and melancholy yellows are difficult to turn up.”
William H Gass
Blended blues was made recently as a respite from the fiery artworks that were coming out more often. A calming sight, as it dried, this painting stood at the same spot for many days. A soothing rectangle to look at when nothing seemed to work.
Again, the photo is not a true representation of the painting as it does not show the actual strokes and colors. The Blues include Prussian, Cerulean hue, Cobalt and a hint of Turquoise, on a white base. Blended from shallow to deep and from darkness to light, these blues but will always be close to my heart. They now hang on a blue-lover’s wall.
“Colour and I are one. I am a painter.”
Paul Klee
Blended Blues – Untitled
Oil on Canvas Panel – Unframed
12″x24″
SOLD
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is through a forest wilderness.”
John Muir
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