Alita

Please say hi to my newest Whimsical Wonky Woman, Alita! There is a woman locally named Alita who is leading and organizing a group of us who are working to get folks registered to vote and to do anything we can to encourage people to vote in November.

So, from a techniques perspective, this painting is a new experience for me. I participated in an interactive discussion last week that allowed folks to ask questions of the artist Deb Weiers. She is one of my favorites and is the one who has inspired my new style of painting. In response to a question about how paintings come together, Deb said that it can work a couple different ways for her and one way is that she will sometimes paint a background and will “see” something in the background that inspires her to paint a certain subject or theme, etc. Well, I didn’t really know how that felt but thought I’d try some new backgrounds and see what happened. Well, I painted several and didn’t see a darn thing in any of them. Then, I painted this background and I thought I could see a face. So, I went with it and this is what happened. I love the background and will do more of those in future. And, if you look closely at the poster, you’ll see that I painted a purple color over a piece of metallic ribbon. I had no plan when I painted that other than to see if the paint would show through the pattern. It did and it was a rectangle and that made me think of a sign.

When I showed the painting to my husband, I told him I was trying to figure out a quote to put on the banner. Knowing my passion for getting out the vote and my current work with a local group to get folks registered to vote, he suggested “VOTE” might be appropriate. I loved it and that’s how the painting all came together.

I hope you enjoy the painting and, if you are not registered to vote, please do get yourself registered. Voting is a privilege and the very cornerstone of our great American experiment. We are the people and we are very lucky to live in this great country and to be able to exercise our right to vote. Your vote counts and can make a difference! Please VOTE!