Janice Mason Steeves

Potential art supplies to pack I'm wondering what to pack for my artist residency at the Baer Art Center in Iceland that's coming up in a week. It's the art supplies that are the problem really. What do I pack? What will I work on? How can I know? Do I limit myself in advance? It won't be easy to get more art supplies once I'm there.  It's not only the opportunity to travel that I'm looking forward to, but to be allowed an entire month to spend on my painting and my writing is a huge gift.  I like the freedom an artist residency allows me, to explore new ideas, new ways of working. "We travel, initially to lose ourselves and we travel next, to find ourselves. We travel to open our hearts and eyes and learn more about the world than our newspapers will accommodate", says Pico Iyer in his essay, "Why We Travel". "Yet for me", he goes on to say, "the first great joy of travelling is simply the luxury of ...

About six weeks ago I had eye surgery for a retinal detachment. A bad fall I had in my home just two days before the operation, further detached the retina. I was terrified of losing my vision. During the retinal laser surgery two days later, the surgeon inserted a gas bubble into my eye to help hold the retina in place, a standard procedure for retinal detachments. It totally obscured my vision and from the inside it felt like I was looking out through glasses where one lens was smeared with vaseline. The procedure for the first week was to keep my chin elevated during the day so the gas bubble would float against a particular part of my retina. For the second and third weeks, I was to keep my face down for 1/2 hour every hour. That meant lying on a massage table I’d borrowed, timing the half-hour transitions with a cooking timer. While I can now keep my head up, I'm not able to drive until the bubble dissipates and walking is a challenge with my distorted depth percepti...

Newgrange  48x42" oil/cold wax on panel ©2011 Janice Mason Steeves “ It is not enough if you are busy. The question is, ‘what are you busy about?’ ” ~Henry David Thoreau How can one person do it all?  I have taken classes on getting organized.  I set schedules and goals.  I have no TV.  But I feel that I'm constantly playing catch-up in my life: finding enough studio time, trying to catch-up on my art inventory, organizing my art classes, writing grant proposals, meeting art exhibition deadlines, donating to art auctions, writing blog posts, aiming to keep up on facebook, as well as walking my puppy, exercising, housecleaning and family life.  And occasionally meditating.  I was brought abruptly to my senses last night though when a dear old friend called to chat. We talk now and again but not regularly.  We've known each other since our now grown children were in Grade One. In the spring, she told me she was having very serious ...