Seeing Red

From the website Sensational Color ...

Increases enthusiasm

Stimulates energy and can increase the blood pressure, respiration, heartbeat, and pulse rate

Encourages action and confidence

Provides a sense of protection from fears and anxiety

• Red is the highest arc of the rainbow.

• Red is the first color you lose sight of at twilight.

• The longest wavelength of light is red.

Red is the color fo the base or root chakra. This chakra is located at the base of the spine and allows us to be grounded and connect to the universal energies.
First chakra, base of the spine. Groundedness, trust, belonging, lessens feelings of mistrust.
Gemstones that will aid the Root chakra include lodestone, ruby, garnet, smokey quartz, obsidian, hematite and onyx.

All photos were taken on my little Canon point and shoot

Art piece by Malaika Zweig

NYC 2007

Twin 1

2011

Acrylic Ink on Polypropylene

by Malaika Zweig

(I love this piece! She's amazing!)

The whole world, as we experience it visually,

comes to us through the mystic realm of color.

Our entire being is nourished by it.

This mystic quality of color should likewise find expression in a work of art.

~Hans Hofmann

NYC 2007

Geranium Ojai 2010

NYC 2007

The Good Luck Bar

Los Angeles 2008

You can spend a lifetime studying the interaction of colours,

and painting how red can dance,

so when the viewer 'gets it'

and says 'Aha!"

their way of seeing is tranformed.

~Gayle Konantz

Do you have a favorite color? When I was little it was "rust" (I know, weird for a little girl) then it was maroon, then purple, then I went for color combinations like pink and green (what can I say, it was the 80s!) But honestly, it's hard to pick a favorite because when I see beautiful turquoise pottery I think, it's definitely turquoise. Deep purple velvet has me rethinking that, so does cobalt blue glass and the color combination of hot pink and orange, especially in flowers!

The one color I can never seem to resist though is red. If I see a sweater in any other color, it might be nice but I can resist. But in red? Pull out the credit card, it's time to shop! Red cars, red shoes, lipstick, fingernails, sofas, walls, dinnerware ... it doesn't seem to matter. (Of course, who doesn't love a red Valentino dress?) Christmastime, as you can imagine, I am beside myself! Red balls? Red beads on a tree? LOVE it! Maybe it's the fire sign thing. ;)

Here I am almost four years ago, in red, with my friend Dawn. I think it's the last time I was in a skirt that short, by the way!

Do you have certain colors that get you? That you just absolutely love? A color that makes your heart sing? And what does it mean?

Remember this song? I loved this song in high school!

O.K. I guess I just dated myself! ;)

I love love love this song from 1977!!

Good ol' Elvis. (Costello, that is.)

Who was was cooler than him? AND he wore glasses.

Here is his Sesame Street version of the song!

30 years later!!!

So funny! I love it!

What's in a name? I guess they must have named the band after his hair?

Anyway ... Here is another song released in 80s

by

Simply Red

I am as curious about color

as one would be visiting a new country,

because I have never concentrated so closely

on color expression.

Up to now I have waited at the gates of the temple.

~Henri Matisse

Hope you are having a beautiful, colorful week!

Thin Mints?

My car was towed.

I pulled my brand new umbrella out of it's box, knowing as I walked to the impound yard that it would rain. It did. I wasn't feeling so great about myself (completely spacing out, as I did. Road construction had started where my car was parked!) As it started to sprinkle I went to open my new umbrella which had just come from Amazon, and as I pushed up on the handle, it broke in my hand. I now held a tiny 4 inch handle next to my face as I walked in the rain to the impound yard 10 blocks away.

I was actually wearing gym clothes and this is shocking, frankly. Why? Because I was going to go to the gym for the first time in ... years. What was the universe trying to say? On top of it, I had two sopping wet parking tickets stuck to my windshield. Hmm.

Sometimes you have to just go with the flow, and keep things in perspective. (After a mini melt down, of course!) But alas, in the grand scheme of things these obviously are not the biggest problems and nothing that a night of great music and thin mints won't cure. I still have a car that drives, Amazon takes returns and Girl Scout Thin Mints haven't changed in 30 years.

Mmmm ... Thin Mints.

Were you a Girl Scout?

That night I listened to my friend Malaika's dad,

Barry Zweig,

play jazz guitar at Vitello's.

... and it was awesome.

Larry Koontz and Barry Zweig

John Pisano and Barry Zweig

"Weather the storms.

Let them pass

Keep your balance, as best you're able.

Remember to be flexible and sway with the winds

like the tall trees in the forest.

Trust the flukes, too,

those moments when it snows on the desert.

Let destiny have it's way with you."

~Melody Beattie

Journey to the Heart

Artist Malaika Zweig

This is Malaika Zweig. We became fast friends after I'd met her when she was teaching a painting class at U.C.L.A. a couple of years ago and I tell you, she is amazing!  When I say that she is amazing, I mean both as a human being and as an artist. Here she is working on her new pieces in her studio in L.A.  She also is the one who teaches that amazing figure drawing class in Los Feliz I am always going on about.  She is truly a light, and her art reflects that.  

Everybody needs a little cobalt violet!  ;)

I am so in love with this!  I so wanted to rip it off the wall and run out the door with it!

Today a new sun rises for me;

everything lives, everything is animated,

everything seems to speak to me of my passion.

~Anne De Lenclos