#polygons

Mojave with Shadow (detail), 2016. This was the first gouache work I did consciously revisiting the desert landscape of my childhood. Ironically, as realistic shadows became more important in the work, the figurative shadow became a less powerful thing. I’m off to the desert this week, to hike among the ruddy rocks and enjoy the unfriendly desert flora.

#polygons #contemporaryart #heatherleebirdsong #mojave #gouache
https://www.instagram.com/p/B8W4h81Bwhn/?igshid=4tr58mx69tzy

It Has Always Been This Way, 2020, gouache on hot-pressed paper, 24 x 18 inches (slightly cropped in this image).

My first completed painting of the year/decade: a sparse Mojave-inspired landscape, populated with silhouettes of invasive plants and a string of sharp-edged polygons. I was thinking most prominently, though not exclusively, about the fragility of life in the face of obdurate systems that perpetuate inequality and ecological destruction.

#ithasalwaysbeenthisway #heatherleebirdsong #contemporaryart #painting #gouache #polygons
https://www.instagram.com/p/B8FVi3ihjlp/?igshid=s2zy3mn0f5xu

The final details added to a painting just finished. The problem with scaling up, in addition to taking exponentially more time to complete, is that it is too large for my scanner.

#ithasalwaysbeenthisway #heatherleebirdsong #painting #polygons #gouache
https://www.instagram.com/p/B77pV53h9Kh/?igshid=8hfiuxxgmh63

It took a lot of experimental mixing and testing before I found the right color for this. It includes all of the colors from the rest of the painting. And while that was largely the result of multiple failures, it also feels conceptually appropriate.

#ithasalwaysbeenthisway #polygons #wip #hlbirdsong #gouache
https://www.instagram.com/p/B7rA-qlhytb/?igshid=q02kgjq9nznc

Last few days to see TIME BOMBS: Art About Anxiety & Impending Disaster at Manifest Gallery in Cincinnati. If you’re in that part of the world, there’s a closing reception tomorrow, Jan. 10 from 7-9pm. Thanks for including my work @manifestgallery

#artaboutanxiety #heatherleebirdsong #contemporaryart #polygons #mediatedcommunication (at Manifest Gallery)
https://www.instagram.com/p/B7Hgp-Ghq8b/?igshid=1wn3i7t2552r6

Plants invasive to the Mojave that appear as silhouettes in my current work in progress: California fan palm, leafy spurge, Canada thistle, oleander and tree tobacco. A couple of these were surprising to me - they‘re so ubiquitous in my memories of the desert. But then, that’s what makes an invasive a concern for the native flora and fauna.

#invasivespecies #mojavedesert #wip #hlbirdsong #polygons #painting
https://www.instagram.com/p/B7Cxw0fB4F7/?igshid=o1twlotinshj

Leafy spurge exudes a sticky, toxic sap when cut. It is also invasive in the Mojave - like most of the plants I’m silhouetting in this painting. This is the kind of detail that is meaningful to me, but not necessarily important for viewers to know. I find that tension between what the artist invests and what the audience can read/know endlessly interesting - and often challenging to navigate.

#wip #invasivespecies #leafyspurge #polygons #hlbirdsong #heatherleebirdsong #ithasalwaysbeenthisway
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6CB-XmBGqv/?igshid=49saz8j1h8js

The shadows were satisfying to lay in. After a couple of weeks slowly working at this piece, large for me at 24x18 inches, perusing my folio of finished works (which top out at 11x14) feel smaller than I remember. A good reminder that most things are relative.

#wip #polygons #painting #ithasalwaysbeenthisway #pdxartist
https://www.instagram.com/p/B4-2h8Whq2d/?igshid=1ew1u6z8aixcu

So far. It’s been difficult to find time + energy to work on this the last few days. The big, blank patch on the left has been mocking me.

#wip #painting #polygons #hlbirdsong #pdxartist #ithasalwaysbeenthisway (at Portland, Oregon)
https://www.instagram.com/p/B4nekYSB5P3/?igshid=1xosunu1d3j5h

Working with color can be tricky: balancing hue, value, temperature - and then making sure I’ve mixed enough (a challenge as I scale up). Gouache adds another layer of difficulty to all this, looking different when wet versus dry. I love it, but feel I never quite get used to it. Maybe that’s why my heart belongs to intaglio.

#painting #colormixing #printmaker4eva #artistatwork #polygons #ithasalwaysbeenthisway
https://www.instagram.com/p/B4RhQ79hNCU/?igshid=1ficgq9r1pj1w

Purple mountains - one of the few things I miss about southern Nevada.

#wip #painting #hlbirdsong #ithasalwaysbeenthisway #pdxartist #polygons
https://www.instagram.com/p/B4A4LUJhrFT/?igshid=jjc39kp2t06q

Work in progress: starting with a thin, blue sky. I mixed purple (don’t remember which - it’s been sitting on my palette for months) and cobalt turquoise to get this blue.

#ithasalwaysbeenthisway #wip #polygons #hlbirdsong #painting #pdxartist
https://www.instagram.com/p/B38v-BuBM-P/?igshid=65efce7238b4

Detail of work in progress. Thinking about inheritance, learned behavior, recent research regarding trauma and epigenetics, and the fuzzy logic of dreams.

#wip #painting #polygons #ineffableemotions #epigenetictrauma
https://www.instagram.com/p/B2QvBrXhJ7x/?igshid=1if8r9bof3g4w

“You must be mistaken.” 2019, gouache on paper, 11x14 inches.

I let my mistakes and brush strokes show in this one, which goes against my instincts. The gouache’s matte finish makes them less visible in reproduction, which feels both a little sad and a little funny after all my internal struggles.

#heatherleebirdsong #contemporarypainting #gaslighting #polygons #hlbirdsong #ineffableemotions (at Portland, Oregon)
https://www.instagram.com/p/B1uvhh_hM7T/?igshid=belr7nj408xk

This change finished the piece. I’ll take a proper scan and post the whole soon.

#polygons #painting #ineffableemotions #hlbirdsong #gaslighting #abstractart
https://www.instagram.com/p/B1pGHf4BNAm/?igshid=1388i0kb479n

Nothing about this one feels quite right, and I’m fighting with it, even though that’s kind of the point. Don’t get attached though - I’ve worked on it more since snapping this photo.

#polygons #wip #painting #hlbirdsong #studioday #ineffableemotion
https://www.instagram.com/p/B1YJc7NB5KJ/?igshid=1d890ye2cwsdj

I’m very slowly scaling up my work, and yet and finding new ways to obsess over very small areas, like this one. I feel perpetually perched on the edge of success/failure with this piece, more so than usual.

#polygons #hlbirdsong #wip #ineffableemotions #gaslighting #painting
https://www.instagram.com/p/B1J8qhaB8iC/?igshid=mfk77fjcvv1t

The overlapping shadows are about to get a lot more complicated.

#polygons #wip #hlbirdsong #ineffableemotions #painting
https://www.instagram.com/p/B1DiueshWIt/?igshid=1vlul0rhqh7wl

Work in progress. Thinking about the difficulty and necessity of learning to hold many contradictory feelings simultaneously, and sometimes intensely. Using sound as a metaphor, learning to hear a choir and not just noise.

#polygons #ineffableemotion #gaslighting #workinprogress #mediatedcommunication #hlbirdsong
https://www.instagram.com/p/B0gy3TthQD1/?igshid=thntg97r8698

I’m creating a relief matrix to add flats of color to a little intaglio print. An early proof, hand colored, is propped up for reference, though I’m definitely changing the palette for the final.

It’s been a while since I’ve used these tools, so I’m going to hone them, and then hope I remember how to handle them.

#printmaking #artinprocess #polygons #smidgeonpress #pdxart
https://www.instagram.com/p/BxrA6sNBAJb/?igshid=xo7p7xao4wl8