Janice Mason Steeves

Lightworks 1 30x30" Oil on panel ©2015 Janice Mason Steeves I've written before about courage. Many times actually : at times when I have changed directions in my work, when I have felt vulnerable , and when I moved into abstraction in my painting.   Before the two advanced painting workshops I taught this past month, I invited the students t o send me some suggestions for topics they wished me to address in the workshop. Many wrote to say that they wished for some discussion of authenticity and truth. They wondered how to achieve that.   Authenticity takes courage. It takes cour age to show your art, to open yourself to criticism and rejection, to pick yourself up when things aren't going well. Painting t eaches that. Not everyone will like your work. Some will hate it. Others will totally understand it. But opening that way, showing that vulnerability is how you find the truth of who you are. It's saying, "This is who I am."  Brene B...

 Singing the Essence 46    29.5 x 39.5" ©2015 Janice Mason Steeves Sometimes there is another presence at work when we make art. Elizabeth Gilbert in her book, Big Magic , calls it "eudaimonia", a word coined by the  Greeks meaning an external daemon of creativity. All artists feel this at one time or another. Call it the muse, or an angel or a spirit guide or flow. It doesn't happen for me all the time. But that creative presence has definitely visited me. I remember early on in my painting career when I made a painting that was far above my ability at the time. Of course, I painted it, but there was a sense that I couldn't have. I remember the first time it happened. The painting painted itself very quickly and confidently and when I stood back, I was shocked. Something magical had happened! At first my ego puffed up and took full credit. Only trouble was, I couldn't repeat that feat. It took another year or so for me to bring my paintings up to tha...

Delicate Balance 16x16" Oil on paper ©2015 Janice Mason Steeves I've always considered play to be the driving force that leads my work. It takes me into new territory, helps me break boundaries and express myself in different ways. Mindful play is the sort of play that It involves preparing ourselves in an inner way, calming our minds and bringing ourselves into the present moment. It also involves coming to the work with an understanding of structure. It's not thinking about design, it's more that we have incorporated that knowledge and then we let it go. In the same way, we can't pick up a saxophone and become jazz musicians by blowing random notes. Jazz has structure and skill behind it and the musician moves beyond it in order to fly. My current work as in the photo above, began this past winter after an intense year of work in preparation for a major exhibition. After the work was completed, I needed to have a respite and simply play with paint on pap...

Releasing Light 1:  oil on paper  16x16"  ©2015 Janice Mason Steeves Each class I teach has it's own personality and demands different things from me. In the workshop I taught last week  my students were gradually moving forward in their work but seemed to be struggling. I spent the first few days teaching them techniques of working with cold wax and oil as well as the elements of design, encouraging them to make small quick paintings alongside the others that they were developing. The idea was to combine play and structure. Often students figure it all out on Day 3, but on the fourth day into this workshop, many were still stuck in the structure part. It was my job to find a new way to help them break through. Several people asked me if I'd demonstrate how to play. I have always had respect for teachers who are able to paint in front of their classes but I am reluctant to do it, partly because I find it hard to be a performance artist, but also because I wan...

Singing the Essence 38   Oil on panel  36x36"©2015 Janice Mason Steeves There is a timing for things. It isn’t a mistake or a sign of weakness when a person comes to art later in life. The time hasn’t been right for them to arrive any earlier. Like late-blooming plants, they’ve weathered the heat, the winds and the fierce summer storms and now, the autumn is their time. In nature most plants and trees bloom in the spring and summer. But some are only ready to flower in the late fall or winter. In Southern Ontario, some fall and winter-blooming plants include Chrysanthemums, Burning Bush, Amaryllis, Christmas Cactus and species of Witch Hazel. The magnificent Saguaro Cactus, which grows in the Sonoran Desert between Arizona and Mexico, can live for 150-200 years but only blooms after 35 years. And the Madagascar Palm Tree blooms with hundreds of tiny flowers only once in 100 years.  Like the Saguaro Cactus, I bloomed late too, attending art school in my late 40s....

Writing at the kitchen window at my residency in Sweden. Photo: Rebecca Crowell I've been back from my artist residency in Southern Lapland for nearly three weeks now. Almost all of my creative time there, and since I've come back home, has been spent working on a book. The idea for this book came to me in a dream about three years ago, when I was on another artist residency, and it's been sitting there at the back of my mind for all this time. It's a book dedicated to all those artists, who have come to art later in life, as I did. While I was in Sweden, I sent out a questionnaire to a number of artists. The scope of the project grew as those artists suggested others. I've received incredibly touching stories from people, telling me how important it is that they finally have the time to focus on their art. It's as though they are getting in touch now with part of their soul that they'd longed to connect with. They've come to art later in ...

 Rebecca Crowell and I have just finished our month-long residency in Southern Lapland. We leave tomorrow. As a sort of wrap-up, we wrote a co-blog post about our experiences here.  I'll include a few other photos here, but click on the link below if you'd like to read our stories. http://www.crowellandmasonsteeves.blogspot.ca/2015/06/notes-from-lappland.html At Stekenjokk.  The light was gorgeous. At Stekenjokk, the highest place on the Wilderness Road that leads into Norway. The road is only open in early June because of all the snow. Look at how high the snow still is in this section of the road.