Flying Girl and The Lesson, or Bee

Flying Girl and The Lesson, or Bee. 9/23/08 Golden Fluid Acrylics and Faber Castell Pitt Artists Pen.

This has to be quick, before nap time runs out. Actually, that is fitting, because this painting was quick, done, as it was, after I had updated my goals list over on 43things. You can find me there, too, if you want. It was late at night, and I knew what I was going to try, thanks to Karen at Beelieve, and whose post I used as my visual source. I knew I didn't want to mess around with the multiple layers and fits and starts of my usual process. I just didn't have time.

I knew I would be doing just one layer of color, and that's what I did. You can actually see the paper through the paint. And the bee was drawn with the help of my beloved Pitt artist pens, using what I learned yesterday in the smudging and drawing experience. It was a quick and satisfying painting all together, but the last part to be decided on, was the skyline. I just did not know what the land should look like. City? Flat horizon? Hills? No idea. So after sketching the girl and the bee, I thought I would listen, as Flying Girl was, to whatever the bee had to teach me.

And what I heard was, "bridge."

Hmm. I don't know if I actually heard the word, or maybe I saw the image, but I asked for what lesson needed to be painted and suddenly I knew. A bridge. It put me in mind of the the George Washington Bridge, that stretched right outside the front door of my cousins' apartment building growing up, spanning the silvery Hudson River. It was always magical. And it also put me in mind of the famous and storied Brooklyn Bridge. There are few structures that more represent MY New York City than that bridge. And then again, the more personal Williamsburg Bridge, the bridge that led from my old apartment in Manhattan to my later home in Williamsburg. I still have never managed to achieve my goal of walking across the Williamsburg Bridge... although Ivy was very close to almost being born on that bridge (I think I would have named her Willamina Bridget if she had, never mind what S says.)

Then again, it's probably not an actual bridge at all.

What exactly is this lesson the bee wants Flying Girl (and me) to know? Is it something about transitions? Is it something about the woozying effect that crossing over from one world to another can have? Is it something about collecting nectar and making honey while the sun shines? I am not sure. Maybe all. Maybe none. Maybe that bee has something else to say to Flying Girl (to me, to you.)

Maybe listening is in order.


bzzzzzzzzzzzzzz