A Soldier's Tale - A Painting for My Living Room

Over the Memorial Day weekend, my home air conditioner went kaput, so I bought a new one.  Thanks to recent improvements in technology, my new air conditioner has twice the BTUs and about half the size of the old one.  That means it now fits in the window, and I had a gaping hole in my wall.

Thankfully, I have a handyman contact who did a superb job of plugging up the hole both inside and out.  This took quite a bit of work, which shouldn't surprise anyone who's ever been involved in home repair.  My handyman took extra trouble for me, and for that I am grateful.  Now I was left with a grey 22" x 26" piece of drywall high on my living room wall.

If I were younger, I might have put gesso over the drywall and painted right on it.  Since I'm a senior citizen, I bought a canvas that will mask everything but the spackling.  Above is the finished picture.

I wanted something both beautiful and restful to look at.  Hence I chose four figures from four different periods of history and put them into a Dido-and-Aneas-like scent.  The soldier figure is from a famous early 19th century Aneas, and the queen figure is Maria Callas in the 1965 Norma.  The lady in red is from a Winterhalter painting of the Empress Eugenie and her ladies.  Madame de Pompadour is the figure in the flowered dress; both she and the Winterhalter lady have been dressed a la Mucha to preserve my theme.  The flowered carpet seems to have created the three dimensional effect I wanted.

This is the first large canvas I've done.  Mostly I paint on wooden boxes or small wood plaques.  This one was for my own pleasure.

Lucia di Lammermoor - The Love Scene

I painted this about a year or so ago, adding a Beardsley fountain to a Callas photo.  Apparently a good ruined fountain is rather a difficult piece of stagecraft; I know Callas once said the Metropolitan Opera set was about as romantic as an oil tanker.  Personally, I've never seen a photo of this scene with a decent fountain, so I went to my Beardsley book.

I have this picture on a stainless steel 'to go' mug and a couple of tee shirts.  Recently I began to think it would strike a chord with all women who have had to send a loved one overseas, so I've made it available on Zazzle.

Callas was the first to treat Lucia as a real person - a sheltered, bored, young girl whom nobody ever bothered to talk to.  Naturally, she would fall for the first man to pay any real attention to her, even if he's a family enemy.  This opera isn't just a coloratura showcase; it is a troubled and neglected young woman withdrawing into madness.

Nor is that just one woman's interpretation - it is evident in the dark, brooding score.  Gaetano Donizetti, the composer, was almost writing from contemporary life; women still were being forced into marriages for family advantage in his own time.  He certainly struck a chord, for the opera seldom goes unperformed when an appropriate singer is available.

Why Paint Dressed-Up Cats?

The short answer is that I discovered early on I can't paint people.  My father was a self-taught artist who painted wonderful portraits.  When I tried to develop my own painting style, I came up with these cats.  The family always had cats, and of course I was familiar with cat artists like Kleban.  I really started with cat angels on Christmas cards for my friends in high school home economics; they really enjoyed them.

 One of my early loves was opera.  Strange places, strange customs, wonderful costumes, and plenty of opportunity to let it all hang out.  I collected opera pictures, especially Callas pictures, because, when she did it, opera looked and sounded real.  The picture above is based on a photo of her and Ruggerio Raimondi in Act I of Lucia di Lammermoor.

Gradually, I became interested in painting all sorts of scenes, especially with historic costume.  From my father I learned to "look for copy", and I made scrapbooks from Metropolitan Museum of Art catalogs, tracings from fashion books from the library, and similar things.  One of my favorite sources is magazines from the 1920s, saved by a relative.  Dover Publications is a wonderful source of inspiration.  (They also have books of free pictures you can use for painting or embroidery.

Everybody needs a touch of fantasy in their lives.  My whimsical cats amuse even non-cat lovers.  Many of my best customers are middle school girls, which is why I paint paper mache and wooden boxes to provide a little bit of fantasy at a reasonable price.