End of July

Robin earns his stripes

Acrylic on canvas

8 x 8 inches

Barbara Muir © 
On view at the Heliconian
in the Let's Play show,
opening August 6 -- 4 - 6 p.m.
(This is called Robin earns his stripes,
but currently it could be called

Robin earns her stripes because
a robin is raising a family of 4 on

a nest on top of one of the posts
supporting our front porch.
It's pretty cute.)

I'm sorry it's the end of July.  It feels like the summer is racing away.  And the
trouble is, it's been too hot most of the time to enjoy the things I like most
about the summer -- long walks on shady streets.  Even so
I was just making a list of 31 things I liked about July, and we had so much fun.

We are lucky to have air conditioning in our house, and our car.  So on days of really
deadly heat, (and there were quite a few) if we needed to go somewhere we were fine.

Generally speaking it is about 10 degrees cooler at the lake (Lake Ontario), so we had
some very beautiful walks beside the gorgeous blue.  We saw our family.  We talked to fun 
friends on the street.  And I worked on starting some paintings.

Have a loving your life day!

Forced to chill

 

First stop Paris

Acrylic on canvas

30 x 30 inches

Barbara Muir ©

It seems like the right night for this painting. As soon as I have some money saved,

this will be my first stop.Workers were in the house today and I am grateful for their
work, but I couldn't paint.

So what to do? Try deleting. First I went through my email got rid of one thousand
emails, then looked through the thousands of photos on my phone. The result? Lots
of subjects for new work, and inspiration. So all in all it was well worth it.

After his work was over I drew fast sketches of Paris for Steven on my iPad.
Nothing good enough to show you. But we had fun. It's exciting to know that we've
been there enough times, that I can draw something very fast and sketchy
and Steven knows where it is.

Have a loving your life day!

Painting, and other obligations

 

The Docent
marker on Bond paper
8 1/2 x 11 3/4 inches
Barbara Muir © 2022
(This was meant to be a
sketch, but I could see
myself doing more 
work on it.)

Today has been busy with painting, and going to a medical 
appointment.  All is well.  The painting is a landscape 
beautiful view, and I think I may be being too detailed with it. 

So we'll see.  What's exciting is that I'm having fun.  And I'm

taking it in small steps.  

Now it's TV time.  So I hope you had a great day.  Oprah, Beyoncé,
and Kamala Harris please be careful.  What a very crazy world 
it is right now. 

I miss New York and the MoMA and this docent was a very 
kind person.

Have a loving your life day!

The other part of the artist's life

Flowers for my father

pencil crayon on paper

21 1/2 x 26 inches

Barbara Muir ©
(the drawing was photographed
through glass because it's
framed.)

Today I worked with a wonderful person on updating my website. Don't get too excited.  There's a long way to go.  But it's so nice working on something that terrifies you, with someone funny and calm.  In fact it's nice working on anything with someone funny. 
The best.

So that is good news because my website needs an update.  I also painted for an upcoming show while the web designer courageously moved through my files trying to find answers for the vital questions of what is what?, and where do I find it? Done.

I'm showing you this drawing, in part because I have a friend who is a coloured pencil artist, and partly so you can see where I came from. I used to do coloured pencil drawings to sell for next to no money.  Then I took a course with Skip Lawrence based on acrylics, and watercolour, and never looked back.

Ease came into the process. So fun!

Have a loving your life day!

 

Hot Sunday

New friends from the

park at the lake

Photo

Barbara Muir © 2025

(This is from a week or so

ago.  This beautiful woman was

holding a new baby, and

I asked if I could take her

picture -- possibly for a painting

some day.  She said yes, and

here's the photo.  Get this --

she's the baby's grandmother.

So sweet.  She came to help

her daughter.)

Today has been incredibly hot. As I write this, we are down at the lake,
which is thankfully about 10 degrees cooler than Midtown Toronto.
People are partying and walking along the lake. And it is beautiful here.

We are so lucky that our friend at our favourite takeout place stayed
open in this high heat to make us supper. Oh dinner's ready! So that’s
it for tonight. 

Have a loving in your life day!

Busy Saturday -- some good thoughts from the past

 

It's movie night.  So here's a combination of thoughts from former years.

The news is, and has been hard for months.  I feel powerless reading
about wars, famine, politicians fighting for positions, instead of demanding 
ceasefires, and that food go to the people who are starving to death, that we take
care of the environment. Plus as artists, we still need to create.  It is our
purpose to use our abilities even when things are so grim.  

It was a beautiful day here, if way too hot, and I found a post from a few,
years ago with a very bad video by me about how Georgia Fullerton's GASP method
is somewhat magical, and worked for me. Forgive the terrible quality of the video.
To put it mildly I am not a techy.

"2020 was when this long, long pandemic began.  We
had no vaccines, and new variants kept coming at us.
One of my friends, the wonderful artist Georgia Fullerton,
held a GASP session for artists on Zoom, to try and inspire us
 to keep going.  I will quote that piece tonight, and show the poor
 quality video I made to go along with the blog post.

"COVID -19 (which by the way continues.  Now add measles

and RSV.  Close friends just had COVID) has shut a lot of
artists down.  We keep trying, but the impetus to paint has been
impacted by the facts -- so many galleries being closed, rare
meetings with other artists. 

On June 26 (a few years ago) Georgia Fullerton held a Zoom event to
introduce her GASP method of painting people's emotions and histories.
She had wonderful, inspiring guests.  And I don't know about the effect on
other artists, but it got me back into the studio in a pre-COVID-19
way.  I'm not saying the art I'm producing is great, but I feel super
painting.  The joy of doing it has come back to me.  I credit
Georgia.  Oh and of course my husband Steven who came into the
studio and said he liked the painting I was working on.  We need
that support."

Have a loving your life day.

How about this cool drawing of Jon Stewart

 

Jon Stewart  on The Daily Show

He asks the burning questions of the day -- with humour

Black marker on bond paper

81/2 x 11 inches

Barbara Muir © 

When I drew this Jon Stewart was on the Daily Show all week, not just
on Mondays.  He is still so funny, direct and takes on all of the 
ridiculous antics of the current government and its supporters --
who are trying so hard to turn a blind eye to everything their
leader does.  We need truth tellers. Especially funny ones.

Big fan of yours Jon.

Have a loving your life day!