Looking Inward

I have been up long enough to give Dusty (our 13 year old lab) a bath and to make a few entries in my IW (Investigation Workbook) (Sketchbook). I want to blog before I settle in to painting.

This is the start of the painting that I refer to as "Looking Inward". It actually grew out of a few previously finished artworks. In 2009, I created a mixed media piece in a life drawing class I was taking. The woman was drawn with pencil, using cross contours. The background was fabric. The heart and ribs were oil pastels on vellum which was glued in place over the drawing. More recently I have been working on a 3-D piece which depicts myself when a was a newborn and myself now (It is not quite finished). I also recently completed an oil painting of myself with half my head and upper body portrayed as a skeleton. I will post these inspirational pieces later today so that you can see the similarities.
The concept of Looking Inward is that whether I am naked or clothed, I still feel exposed to the harshness of the world in which I live. I need to look inside, to my heart, to what is me. Then I need to accept what I see. This is me, Julie, I am sensitive, I am strong, I will believe in myself, I will become a better person!
Before I started the painting, I looked in books and on the internet to try and determine the placement of a woman's breasts in relation to the sternum. Interestingly, most images dealt with the male body. I solved that problem by simply looking in the mirror and figuring it out for myself! I hesitated to start the painting. FEAR FACTOR. I wasn't sure how I wanted the ribs and heart to look. Should they be transparent, on top of the skin? Should it look like there is a hole, the skin missing exposing the heart and ribs? Should it look like everything kind of melds together? Without making a firm decision, I just started painting. I like to begin with what is farthest away, in this case, the back of the rib cage. Once that was done, I added the heart. I need to wait for that section to dry before tackling the exposed ribs. I still felt like painting so I moved on to the belly and then the blanket. I am matching the color of the blanket to the background of the fabric I have selected to use. With the blanket done, I will be able to work all of the skin at once when I am ready to start on it! I was pleased with the progress I was able to make in only about 2 hours of painting.

Now I realize that I need to start another painting as the 3 in progress are drying. Watch for "International"!