out on my final run of last year
i spot a newly pruned shrub
eyes and legs, upright and steady
muscles coordinate
nature inspires me to draw a cerebellum
power of fine-movement, precision, timing
balancing eye and hand
muscles coordinate
to create first study of the new year
#LittleBrain #ArborVitae
cerebellum: sagittal cross section
©2020 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED BY MONICA AISSA MARTINEZ
Today in Yoga we talk about the organ of the heart. I happen to have completed (yet another) small drawing of one. We tend to think of it in connection to love. Meg, the instructor, says in this case it’s connected to happiness. She explained the energy is more about accepting what is – as opposed to wanting to control. I also drew (yet another) brain.
They work together. Or do they?
For some reason I make a connection to Ahimsa. I’ve decided non-violence is a discipline. I’m not sure why I piece this together. But I do.
I start with a general outline, lay in the underlying structure and out of that surfaces everything else.
I created a 4 minute video that shows various layers in the process.
The exhibition – Sex, A Woman’s Perspective @ Frontal Lobe, on Grand Ave – runs for the month of September. Also includes an opening reception, Sept 6th from 6-10 (First Friday) ; a closing reception on Sept 20th (Third Friday); and a Collector’s Tour sponsored by Artlink on September 21st.
Note: I continue to use the sound that artist/musician Joe Willie Smith and I created a few years ago. I think it’s a bit loud at the end. I’m amused, so I leave it as it is.
lower volume if need be.
The human body is the primary subject of Monica Aissa Martinez’ small painting. She portrays our bodies as fantastic little factories, maybe tiny sex breweries, in a series of works about brides and grooms.
… Martinez says the experience of her recent marriage prompted her to explore the topic of who and what we are in a male/female union. Fascinated by the look of scientific detail in botanical and biological drawings, Martinez treats the figure to a revamping that includes ribbons and champagne glasses. The bodies take on the form of laboratory glasswork. The details in her work hold our attention long enough for us to realize the sly humor of lifting the lid off the marital sacrament to reveal the delightfully intricate plumbing that makes the whole process pump.Linda A. McAllister
Senior Curator, Here and Now: Arizona Contemporary Artists, Part 1
ASU, Nelson Fine Arts Center, 1996
Linda McAllister wrote these words over 15 years ago about a series of small works based on brides and grooms. When people tell me my work has changed, I don’t agree completely. My work still focuses on relationship, if not male/female then masculine/feminine. I still use the body as container and I highlight the organs, I work with the idea of transparency, and all these years later still use the same batch of pigment and enjoy making and using egg tempera.
The Bride and Groom
Egg Tempera on Paper
16″ x 11″
1996
Below are a two more examples of the way I’ve represented relationship and the play of masculine and feminine, or male and female.
Conductivity
Egg Tempera on Canvas
12″ x12″
2207-08
Kinectic
Egg Tempera on Canvas
12″ x12″
2207-08
Right now I’ve put aside what I was working on to work a new painting for an invitational. The theme – Sex, a woman’s point of view. The show runs in September. I began working on this painting right after agreeing to take part – just so I wouldn’t over think things. I got a visual while reading the invite and went with it.
Detail
Casein on canvas
This painting is casein on canvas and today I paint until I tire and can’t control line work anymore. I have a few decisions to make. I’ll just leave it alone until I resolve some composition and then continue.
New work as yet untitled but still part of the Nothing In Stasis series.
Casein on canvas
I photograph at various stages so I can produce a short video.
– I’ll tell you more about the exhibit in time. The group of artists is exciting.
This week I focus on detailing the lower extremities, from hip to foot. The legs work to support the physical body. But what about the legs in a handstand? What then?
I think of Gordon – we practiced yoga together for a few years. Gordon was in his early 60’s at the time. He could hang out in handstand and make it seem effortless. Professionally he was a psychologist. He observed people go up into handstand and was always good to offer support – for the body and mind. He often broke it down step by step for me: separate your arms more, press down, use your fingers, take the hips over the shoulder … he’d pause … now kick up with a strong leg and bring your other leg to meet it, don’t take it to the wall (don’t take it to the wall – is key), take the rib cage in, and finally … press up, activate your feet. There were times he’d discuss how fear plays with the mind and affects the body. See yourself in handstand, he’d say. If you succeeded he gave you all the credit. 
Now, all these years later, I can – focus and can go up slow and mindful. I feel how the body and joints align. I hold a handstand for a few seconds, long enough to feel hips above shoulders, knees above hips and feet above knees – energy pressing down to rise up. I sill think of Gordon.
Back to the painting …
Today I detail the legs and think about the joints, muscles and feet. In the original photograph my legs are not symmetrical. That’s my husband offering the support of one hand and that leg – because it is pressing up into it – is muscular. The other is still organic and finding its way. I could have corrected things in the painting, but I want to be true to the moment. I learn from it. In general, we are not symmetrical creatures. But with a little help we can find center. 
I am going to take a pause now. I’ve worked steady on this painting for a good while. I
want to look at the composition for a few days to decide how I’ll continue.
Back to Gordon …
Years ago, when I was learning Photoshop, I designed a Yoga magazine cover for Gordon because he was so helpful to all of us.
Hey Gordon wherever you are …. thanks! Not only can I handstand but I can also draw myself in one. One of those activities is harder than the other and I won’t say which.
Every square inch of the human form is a world unto itself, much of which cannot be seen with the naked eye. All of it can be felt though, especially when you simply pay some attention to it. By touring a body in detail, it is possible to build up your own, and embrace all of those nooks and crannies, some abandoned, some unnoticed for so many years. Home sweet home ~ Gil Hedley
I drew out the complete contour of the body, and then I set structure into that – the bones and muscles. Now I organize major organs. I feel like I am filling up a container, especially because the figure is hand-standing and coming together from the ground up. I have to pay close attention because I continue to get disoriented. I have access to a full skeleton which helps when I lose grounding.
I occasionally hand stand, to feel out whatever confuses me. Thinking is not working now. It’s too much.
This morning while practicing asana, I wondered about the various structures of the body and how separately they don’t hold up. Bones have weight but they don’t move without muscle. muscle by itself won’t hold form. And the organs without containment, I imagine … could spill everywhere. Together they interact, support, and strengthen – but how does it all actually work? What moves them / me? Where does vitality emanate ? What animates … me?
I’ll be moving into the legs on the first figure. Then I’ll begin the other figure. The cat is almost complete, though I’m sure to play with her a bit more.
Spent the day painting in the studio.
This is a shot of a current work, in progress. A layer of white egg tempera was brushed over the entire surface for translucency. And now I’m going into small areas with casein, to create more opaque detail for the eye to follow.
I do want the whole thing to work together. But I also want each section to be able to stand on its own.
New work. Completed on BFK Rag. The 28″ x 20″ mixed media on paper is sitting on my easel, waiting to get signed and titled. No name for it yet. Part of new series “Creative Structure.”
Composition evolved from a larger work, a 6′ x 7′ canvas, that was much more monochromatic. Went from very large to moderately small. Unusual evolution for my pieces. Usually start very small on paper, to eventual moderately large on canvas.
Wanted to work with color and paint with various mediums: casein, gouache and egg tempera. Also wanted to mark make. Latter wish comes from watching my students draw right now. The whole process of teaching charcoal always comes into my studio work somehow, including working on paper and some dry, monochromatic element, in this case graphite.
Finished work appeared slowly, September 18th to November 21st. Took many turns. Probably could have stopped several times and called it done. Though, really was looking for a certain quality, a sort of alive composition, and depth. Steady thought, steady mark. Brush stroked color and fine line silver graphite.
Here is how it came to be. Complete. Living with it a for a while before I name it.
preparing a value scale
This post results from a note a drawing 2 student, who worked in Pastel, sent me. He asks if I can tell him what the technical term for working with pastel is called, precisely. I’d referred to it as drawing [with pastel], during the course of the semester. A drawing teacher, could say this. After his experience with it, he wonders if it might be more technically correct to say painting [with pastel], or in fact, could he be sculpting. I loved the question. He knows, he says, he is not pasteling. I understand he’s put his whole self into the process and experience teaches him much.
He picked up freedom with this medium, that he hadn’t been able to find with marker or charcoal. When he draws with pastel, his arm seems to glide or dance across his paper. I say to him his instincts / his feelings, in fact, are all correct. Any of the technical terms he uses, could be accurate. He could be drawing, he could be painting, and yes, he very well could be sculpting, on a 2 dimensional surface, with the medium of pastel.
learning local value with pastel
He notes that whatever it’s called…he absolutely and joyously loves it. With that statement, I decide since my semester with him is technically over, I can write what I really believe he’s doing.
I tell him he is engaging in joy, thru the medium of pastel, on a 2 dimensional surface (paper/canvas).
I humorously add, I think the Dalai Lama would approve. I believe he just might.
I choose to continue, and discuss practical things, because I feel one can never know enough about safety, especially when it appears, on all counts, he’ll continue using pastels. He’s bought himself several Rembrandt sets. (He does use both regular and Oil Pastels throughout the semester. Most everything I write here is referring to regular soft Pastel.)
I mention the importance of safety while working with the medium of pastel. By its very nature, it creates dust. Too much dust is a problem, to the lungs especially. Pastels are made of pigments and a binder, and pigments can be hazardous, the dust, specifically. Cobalt and Cadmium are beautiful, the blues and reds, and are highly toxic to the lungs, and kidneys. Inhaling or ingesting is not wise. Another pigment, Yellow Chrome, contains led, and can be absorbed thru the skin. Metals like gold, copper and silver can do the same thing. Mask (nose and mouth cover) and gloves are important with continued use of pastels.
The other thing about working in pastel, is that it is not a stable medium. Artists tend to fix it with an aerosol fixative. Caution should always be taken with any fixative. If you don’t have a ventilation system in your work space, go outdoors to spray, and still cover your mouth and nose.
Probably if you’re going to be working large, and drawing for long extended periods of time with charcoal, you might consider covering mouth and nose.
setting a ground
careful observation
almost complete
My students assignment is to reproduce an old master. This is his rendition of Vincent Van Gogh’s, Skeleton Smoking A Cigarette.
Don’t get me started on cigarettes….
I suggest when working with pastel (or any other art medium), to research the material. A good book to have in ones studio, The Artist’s Handbook of Materials and Techniques, by Ralph Mayer. BTW, according to my copy, working with pastel, would technically be called painting…
I still think he’s engaging in joy. Approached with thoughtfulness and care, it could bring many long years of happiness.
Nothing about the creative process is black and white….just as in life, there are variables that affect outflow and outcome.
Yesterday I stretched two pieces of canvas. One I primed with white gesso, and the other with black gesso. I don’t know exactly what will go on each canvas, but I have a general idea. I don’t really work off of very developed sketches all the time. Most often, I have an idea and I progress with materials that are flexible and continue to move for a while. I correct, alter, and solidify, as I go along. Things are never really permanent until the very end, if even at that point. It’s not easy working this way, but its the way that is most successful for me.
Right now, I have a clear sense of the unknown, and I am in sync with that. I have a blank canvas…in this case…two blank canvases. I also have plenty of experience, materials, and skills that will come with me as I move thru these new compositions. Consequently, I feel a sense of regeneration. One of the canvases you see here will be the center (the guts… literally) of a larger composition. The other, will be a supporting element, that stands alone, to express progress. At this moment, I am at ease with what comes natural and easy, but also with the struggle.
Get on your mark, get set…stop! Get on your mark, get set…oops. Get on your mark, get set…oh shit! Get on your mark, get set….GO!
Steady now, creativity in motion… I trust the flow.
Working title: Formation
New work continues. I’ve worked the head and the upper extremities. This weekend’s focus, the lower extremities.
How will this fit together visually? Won’t really know until all the parts are sized and completed. Right now there are at least 5 (parts). I have a few more to paint, then I’ll start piecing it together.
The feet, all about being grounded. Foundation. Connection. Balance. Mobility. Direction.
26 bones. 33 muscles. 31 joints. Over 100 ligaments.
Rooting…into the earth. Feet are feeling strong, firm and planted these days.
Original sketch.
I do like this but I want a stronger design.
Processing feet.
Clear, white structure sits atop a black gessoed, solid background.
Some roots, some seeds…some play, some ground.
Satisfied. A clear and stable design with some flow and play.
They’re my feet.
Onto the legs.
To be continued….
I revisit this idea regularly. Maybe every few years. It always looks different.
I’ve got the parts. Forming the whole.
Never know what something is going to look like, until it all comes together.
Arms, hands…working. Foot and head working. One leg feels awkward.
Need a few more elements to pull this all together.
Working title: En Formación, In Formation
to be continued….
New Sketches….
(noun) 1. external appearance of a clearly defined area
2. the shape of a thing or person.
3. a body, esp. that of a human being.
( Fine Arts)
1. the organization, placement, or relationship of basic elements, as lines and colors in a painting or volumes and voids in a sculpture, so as to produce a coherent image; the formal structure of a work of art.
2. an object, person, or part of the human body or the appearance of any of these
(Philosophy)
a. the structure, pattern, organization, or essential nature of anything.
(verb)
1. to construct or frame.
2. to place in order; arrange; organize.
3. to frame (ideas, opinions, etc.) in the mind.
Reform-
(noun) the improvement or amendment of what is unsatisfactory
the amendment of conduct, belief, etc.
(verb) to change to a better state, form, etc.; improve by alteration, substitution, abolition, etc.
to subject to the process of reforming
to amend
To be continued…..
Monica Aissa Martinez 
