March 30, 2022

Archive

Portrait in Purple: Innocence

Sometimes I complete portraits that are gifts, or otherwise personally inspired and non-commissioned works. This piece is one of them. Begun around 2018 or 2019 while still in Alabama, I was inspired by some old photos I saw either online, or possibly by email…old photos of my cousin, Laura, that I had never seen before. I recently learned that her oldest brother, Dennis Slifer, had taken these old black-and-white treasures…I do have them in my computer files labeled “Laura…and 1963…”...

Guest Writing: Losing the Land, by Dennis Slifer

Preface by Eileen: A few weeks ago I contacted my first cousin, Dennis, oldest son of my Uncle Bill, because a line he had written for a family project assembled in 1998 was coming into my mind. Of all that he wrote, that line has sometimes come back easily into my memory. The sentences (woven into a more recent, more extensive piece Dennis did for a wonderful collection of family history, genealogy and old photos) appear later in his writing...

Hand-Painted Wedding Invitation for Virginia and Guy

I recently finished this watercolor/guache hand-painted portrait of Bride and Groom on a matted and framed invitation from their wedding. This piece also featured some metallic gold highlighting which worked well with the decorative gold frame. My client, Christen, has ordered a number of these personal wedding keepsakes – seem to be her go-to gift in recent years and I so appreciate the repeat business! After some views here of my most recent piece, I will also include those she...

Can I Do This?

Like most every morning for quite awhile now, upon waking I think of what is ahead not only this day, but in future days… This morning, before putting my feet on the floor, I formed this sentence:I CAN’T do this. I WILL put my feet to the floor. THESE are the terms. For the rest of my life. At 9:20 am on this Sunday morning, I am still loosely organizing in my mind what I will tackle today and in...

Ethnos and War Drums

Typically today we think in terms of nations, rather than the biblically-used Greek word ethnos. The link given is not intended to provide an exhaustive understanding of this term, nor deep interpretive understandings of how it is used in various passages or other contexts. I am simply thinking about our need to recognize that many, if not most wars, can somehow be traced back to underlying clashes between various ethnos that continually move, intermingle, ideologically evolve, revert and more… and...