A Fine line!

Title: A Fine line!

Medium: Acrylic paint, canvas, tempura paint, tortilla flour for texture, painted with casings from used shotgun shells and high caliber weaponry that were detritus from Artception series.  

Enriching music: I walk the line, Johnny Cash; Jump in the Line, Harry Belafonte

By Clara Guzman Herrera

Behind this piece: The undercoat of this painting was done with smooth acrylic, white. The original yellow line was also smooth yellow acrylic. It sat there for about three months. It didn't look right. I put it back on the easel one evening and just looked at it under light in the darkness of my backyard. I probably stared at it for an hour while listening to Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto #2. Then I decided it needed texture and growth. It just became after that: Tempura white came into play, but wasn't thick enough so I added tortilla flour. But just using a paint brush wasn't enough, so the entire whiteness of its texture was painted with the butt of a shotgun shell. The yellow line was painted with the butt of .38 rifle shell. Both of these casings were remnants of my oldest boy and my failed hunting adventures and successful art adventures in the Artception series.

I don't know what it means exactly - painting with used shells from guns and tortilla flour. But, if I had to self-analyze, I'd think it was a testament to my role as a parent, and woman: Taking on the masculine role of hunting and shooting guns with my son, as well as the feminine role, cooking in the kitchen making copious homemade tortillas for my children and their friends. It is the Yin and Yang of single parenting, y'all. 

If you've ever heard yin, yang, and y'all used in the same sentence, you just let me know! ~ Clara

 

 

Tanzania Sunflowers

 

Title: Tanzania Sunflowers

Photo by: Clara G. Herrera

Shooting Of Butterfly

 

 

Title: Shooting Of Butterfly, a concept of feminism and society

Medium: Acrylic, canvas, toy guns, plastic butterfly, glue

By: Clara G. Herrera

Enriching music: Perfect, Pink; Born This Way, Lady Gaga

Behind this piece: This turned out nothing like I thought it would. In the beginning, there was no butterfly, and the toy guns were to be ripped off after the paint dried to reveal their shadows in acrylic black and hot pink. The only concept that stayed were the pastel Easter colors of paint. Everything else is different than the vision I had created in my head. 

It just, became, down to the last detail. 

I left it to dry in my backyard, where I do most of my painting. The wind blew it off of the easel. The next morning it was flecked with dirt.

 Feminine, beautiful, dirty, all at the same time.

Funny how the mind works and how art happens.

In the end, it became this. It is my testament to the feminine spirit, represented by the butterfly, beautiful, flying freely, unable to be caught. The fake child-like guns are an overstatement of the bombardment women and girls face throughout a lifetime toward themselves and by society. Too much ammunition, big guns to shoot and try to kill or wound something so delicate.

 The toy guns form a cross of the female embodiment: Mind, Spirit, Body, Heart

We are always second guessing ourselves, us women, even as girls. The quest for perfection, and clearing the grime we imagine others see in ourselves, and what we see in us on the outside and inside never ends. It is an unachievable goal. Yet, we continue the quest.

Mind: Am I too stupid? Am I too smart? What if I say something stupid? What if I say something smart?

Spirit: Am I too joyful? Am I depressed? Am I me? Who am I? What do I believe? Why don't I believe in myself? What is wrong with me? What is right with me? 

Body: Am I the right shape? Do I need to lose weight? Should I buy a pushup bra? Does this make me look fat? Why did I eat that cake?

Heart: Do I love enough? Am I loved? Will someone love me? Why would they? What is love, really? Why don't I love myself?

This the end:

This is the middle: 

This is mid-middle:

This is the beginning: