Resilience and appreciation

Palette of the Month 006: Frozen Foraging

Hello from the soft corners and dimly lit colors of deep winter.

The thing I love most about the practice of being in relationship with natural color is asking each material-being: What is special about you? I am learning that each plant or stone or piece of anything has a story with its own unique history, its own science, its own magic.

Making paint as the natural light slowly falls away.

A grey day or so ago, I caught myself with a feeling that there would never be a single unit of joy in my bones again, and just as I had the thought, the clouds parted for a moment, and a stream of unobstructed sun was cast onto the trunk of a random nearby tree, glowing and beaming at me, and it all flooded back full force.

My mind actually loves winter, but my body’s entire physiology changes (not for the best) when the temperatures are below freezing, and I find myself wishing there was a season that has both the quiet depth and inward facing cushioning as winter, but with the sun vitamins vibing on my skin and humidity vapors soaking through my body like the summer. Last year at this exact time, I had just landed in India, and that whole experience - the before, the during, and the afterglow, completely inverted the seasonal depression effect for winter 2024.

Now, I am cold and the animals are cold too, finding their sneaky ways inside. In my studio yesterday morning, I noticed little mouse handprints in the left-open pigment dust (omg so cute), and some of the leftover pollen was stirred and sprinkled around. I’m a little worried now about the secret artist mouse babies getting particles in their tiny noses and lungs and so I've made sure that all of my little dusts are covered now. Sorry, buddy. But also, you’re welcome!

Evidence of tiny tiny mouse hands. I just want to make this mouse a miniature bowl of approximately eight warm grains of quinoa with a side of a couple of sugar granules and leave it out instead but that’s not what you’re supposed to do!!!

Palette of the Month 006: frozen foraging

The above color dusts are not the Palette of the Month, just some leftover memories.

When I set out color-seeking for the palette I’m sharing today, I did some frozen foraging, which resulted in the below collection of colors, a palette that feels so reflective of the current landscape.

When faced with strong conditions, there are two things you can do.

1. Balance out the conditions with the opposite.

2. Lean into the conditions and merge with them.

I could have found a way to play with warming colors as a therapy to bring balance to the winter’s color-deprived scenery. Maybe that will be later, when I’m more desperate (see you in March!), but this time instead, I took the latter approach: If you can’t beat it, join it. And also see the secret beauty in it…

Palette of the Month is my series of exclusive posts for paid subscribers, thanks so much for supporting my work! Spoiler: when you are a subscriber you are automatically entered to win one of my original color study paintings each month!

One lucky subscriber will win one of these original 5x7 paintings from this month’s palette, including any new subscribers that come in this week. I feel like I could arrange these in different orders to tell different stories, sort of like a choose-your-own-adventure comic strip...