Pears and Pansy

Pears and Pansy

Pears and pansies often show up in my artwork.  This is a mixed media painting on watercolor paper.  I received my first check from an article I wrote which was published in a magazine, and I wanted to document my excitement in a painting.  Pears and pansy pieces were cut from a photocopy of my check and I glued them to the painted paper.  Then I added more layers of paint over the collaged pieces.  The black lines were drawn with a black marker.

 THE INSPIRATION
Pear or Avocado?

I had a happy childhood.  My mom worried that I was a tomboy.  I loved climbing trees and picking and eating the nearest guava, mango or mountain apple fruit that wasn't already visited by the birds. I'd sit on the highest sturdiest branch people watching.  I heard funny stories from way up high.  No one had a clue that another pair of ears was listening to their whispered secrets.  At times, it was fun to play tricks on the unsuspecting kids below me.

We had a large "pear" tree in our back yard, next to our vegetable garden, which was next to the cane field.  I was an only child for the first eight years of my life until my sister joined our family.  Up until then, I imagined quite a bit.  Oftentimes I took my tea set and spread my mat under the towering "pear" tree and pretended to have tea with my stuffed animals.  It was during one of those imaginary outings when I was laying on the mat looking at the cloud animals that I noticed a sturdy branch in the tree.  What if I tied a rope onto that branch and made a swing, I thought.

Happy childhood memories sometimes become favorite memories when a child becomes an adult.  I later learned that my "pear" tree was not a pear tree but an "avocado" tree.  Today, I still refer to avocados as pears, maybe because habits are hard to break, or maybe because I want to hold on to those wonderful memories of long ago.

So there you have it, Pears and Pansy.  I guess I should tell you all about pansies sometime . . .

Singing Pears

 Singing Pears

Singing Pears was produced from a quilt block I submitted for publication in Art Quilting Studio, Winter 2010 issue. 

THE INSPIRATION

My Pears are singing their happy song:

Feed your soul,
Sing your song,
Sing joyfully.

Here they are on Page 61.

My Pears are letting you know that anything you can imagine is within your reach.

Reach out; pick a star, or two, or three or more.

They are within your reach.

They're yours.
You can have the moon if you sing like a star.