a winter tale

hi all- just at the end of a week long break that came upon me after i had a tooth extracted and wound up with a nasty infection and a fever of 102 that would not go away for most of the week- until today as a matter of fact.i stayed at home from work alternating between lying on the couch and determined to get some painting, journaling in, but as luck would have it no good work came out of the week,too sick for creative genius, as if the work that i do qualifies as genius!but at least i tried. tonight i had a little fun taking prints off my painting in progress and the results were quite interesting and looked like more than they were. i have to report   that i have some work published in somerset gallery magazine- i haven't gotten my hands on a copy yet but i saw the table of contents for the magazine and my article is listed in the contents. so I'm waiting patiently(not) for either  them to send me a copy, or for Barnes and noble to get it in stock or for the copy i finally ordered arrives. don't they know this is a big deal for me ! I've never been published before! somebody please have pity on me and find me a copy and mail it to me before i die!my address is 228 grimsby street s.i.n.y. 10306. i will reward anyone who sends me a copy with something or other, including the cost of the magazine. this is an a.p.b. to anyone who is listening.onto other news 6 months until i retire forever from nursing as a side job! lots of ! in this post. until we meet again, and in case i don't post until then merry Christmas and happy Hanukkah to all my Christian and Jewish fans. cheers brigid.

aaah december!

hi y'all- just when you think things can't get any worse december comes. i know all you christmas lovers are hanging your lights and listening to 106.7 with their nonstop christmas music, and are singing along trala tra lalala- but i hate december and am terrified of christmas and the shopping and the wrapping and the nervous wait for amazon packages to arrive! i'd rather it be february(which is closer to june) or may or something less sinister than whipping out your credit card for just one more gift, i don't think i got enough(when i'm wrapping it's like why the hell did i get so many gifts). anyway the good news is that our house wasn't really touched by the hurricane-we're the only ones living on our block, ian got hired back at his old job temporarily-we're not sure for how long but at least till march. i'm going to have some artwork, and a short article that i wrote published in amagazine called Somerset Studio Gallery, or just Sommerset Gallery in the December  issue, one week from now and I'm deathly afraid they're going to change their minds at the last minute and not publish it, so i'm trying to be very low key about it, but they just sent me a check so that's promising.i'll let you know as soon as i have the mag in my hand. keep your fingers crossed or pray for me if you pray -it will be a really good thing for me. i am also working on putting together a web site- it's still totally disorganized, but you can look for it brigid gallagher davies on art /slant.some of my paintings are on it by no means all so it's good for a laugh.past my bedtime got to run karen my faithful reader please send me your address again(sorry)send to my email bgallagherdavies@gmail.com.goodnight,love ,love brigid.

For Jack

hi all- this post is a commemoration, a poem, a love song for my newly departed much loved friend jack foley, who slipped from this life into the great unknown on September 1st 2012, with the wind at his back, and a bagpiper leading us all, his friends and his loved ones from his commemoration ceremony to the reception, up the hill from the field where we all sat in our various stages of grief and relief,that his suffering was past, that he could finally go home to that next stage of life of which i know nothing, except that his time here is past, and the next stage begun. i told my son alex who adored jack and was devastated by his death, that if there is a heaven then jack was on the express train there, for surely there was no better friend, no better lover of life, no better lover of his wife(or his bride as he used to call her) and their three beautiful children . jack,  whose friend i was so proud to be, i will miss you with all of my heart. i remember things both silly and profound-introducing him to coleen, who told me with ferocious intensity that it was he that she wanted to marry, and the night i threw my glasses(which i was blind without) off the ferryboat back to staten island after a night of drunken debauchery in order to liberate myself in my drunken mind ,to both jack's amusement and terror, as he had to lead me off the boat and take me blindly home. i remember that he laughed like a little girl, and that he laughed often and well, and i have a particularly poignant memory of him sitting on the bench in their foyer with alex, talking to him as his equal, something not enough people do to alex, and for which i was profoundly grateful.there are many more stories to tell, many more tributes to be paid, many more glasses raised- but for me i just want to thank him for being my friend, and try to pay back some of the love he sent my way, and to tell him he will be sorely missed and that most of all, he went away much too soon for all of us who loved him, and that without him nothing will ever be the same .good night,good-bye.,brigid

hooray for computer savvy daughters

hi all -the picture on this post is brought to you courtesy of my brilliant daughter's troubleshooting the reason why i couldn't upload pictures to my blog- i am severely computer challenged, having been brought up in a world where only scientists in space labs had computers, and you had to go to the library to answer questions like why do cats lick themselves or what color are drew barrymore's eyes ? anyway it's back to september and i am back to work, so blogging should resume at it's regular pace-i.e. whenever i get a chance to do it. i know you all are dependent on my every word to get on with your lives but get over it,seriously. i am currently in a creative rut brought on by not too few but too many ideas of things to do, which has me literally panic stricken and unable to do anything at all. i'm also at a point where i have to decide what i want to concentrate on and what i should let go, but the problem is i want to do everything and i don't have time to do it all. i want to paint, illustrate, write books and articles, design fabrics, knit, crochet, etc- oh by the way i have started working on a website but it's not organized or completed i'll let you know when it's up and running,with the help of my more computer literate friend(thank you laura). well that's it for now, i have to go and look after my son , and do some housework, and maybe paint a little, but i will return with more exciting news about myself and my near and dear friends, and especially with a tribute to jack foley, who so heartbreakingly passed away on september first, and with news about my upcoming retirement from my day job in june or september.love to all ,brigid.

summer's end

hello- this is the 2nd time i've sat down to post all summer.the first one i never completed- i offer this up in lieu of that.i've been on vacation since the end of june, and am scheduled to go back to work on tuesday(today is friday). it's been a deliciously good summer with lots of time spent making art, reading, looking at art, sleeping, writing; spending time with friends and family and just generally doing whatever i felt like doing- the only really sad thing was learning that a dear friend of mine is seriously ill, and there is nothing that i can do to alter that...i also spent a fair amount of time doing nothing special-watching silly movies cooking alot of pasta with pesto sauce, drinking gallons of iced coffee laced with lethal amounts of cream and splenda-yes i am still a vegan, but a vegan who cannot live without cream in her coffee. i am going to make a serious effort to change this very soon as i think it may be one of the reasons that i cannot lose the weight i so desperately need to lose- but this is very hard folks- i've given up alcohol, i've given up cigarettes, must i give up half and half too? i see that my dashboard has changed in the months i've been away from posting-idon't see the little symbol for inserting pictures, so this may be a post without pictures until i figure it out, but i've made contact and blasted a little hole in my bloggers block-can pictures be too far behind? i'm working on creating a web page, which is far from finished, and i may have some artwork published in a few months,but those are stories for another day.for now i'm back, and am thrilled to be here-here's hoping my next post won't be too long in coming.oh i almost forgot- the best news of all- i am hoping that this will be my last year of working as a school nurse with a little luck, by this time next year i will be a full time artist!!!love for now, brigid.

corrections and connections

hi- just one correction- i meant to write pic as in short for picture, not pis as in short for we all know what. i've largely resolved my dilemma about the relative merits of arting and crafting by  just considering them all as creations or products of my creative mind. thanks to karen for her thoughtful advice, which i will bear in mind, but today i discovered something about journalling as  opposed to painting. journaling is semi-relaxing in a way that painting is not, and i can work with alot of different ideas at once and quickly , whereas while painting i sometimes seem to work for hours at a stretch and get nothing accomplished or do and redo the same part of the painting for days on end without resolving it. journalling is more immediate and limited- i can only do so much with a page and then it's time to go on to a new page. some fail some succeed, but it's not as big a deal as a failed painting somehow. i also find that i work alot with colors in my journals , trying out different palettes with strips of paper instead of paint which carries over into painting. and the colours i use in my painting palettes. i also work out placement and composition in my journal pages, and am able to be much more experimental in my journal than at my easel.needlees to say i've realized that journaling will remain a big part of my life for the time being.
just  showing off some of bill murphy's work to a friend. bill is an incredible artist-his work is absolutely flawless and if you haven't seen it google bill murphy artist. he is truly incredible and awe-inspiring and has been that way forever, for as long as i've known him which is a very long time.just thought i'd throw that plug in there- not that he needs it.

 moving right along i just read some really moving, incredibly honest and heart felt blogs by kelly rae roberts on the subject of motherhood and her traumatic birhting experience. she waited until she was ready to blow the lid off the story of what she went through, and most of us mothers can relate at least to some extent to her story. having children really does change everything, exposing you to an experience that is so primal and mind blowing that it's difficult to explain to someone who hasn't been there . it can bring out the best and the worst in people, and though i sometimes wish for a childless life, i'd do it all again in a heartbeat.i just didn't know i was capable of such a deep and ferocious love. so if you are a mom or even if you're not check out kelly rae's latest mothering  stories- they're well written and eerily familiar. that's all i've got for now, still haven't worked out the picture thing.This second pic ture was supposed to go with the first, the one i already posted

advice needed

hi i'm having a little problem with trying to figure out where to go artistically-ian considers all of the work i do in journals as just craft work, and defines craft as art for people who can't do real art like painting and drawing and sometimes i do too-but he thinks it's kind of beneath me as a "good" artist.i'm not sure how i feel-making the journals makes me feel good but does it help me to growas an artist? my life is very cluttered and complicated as a journaler, mixed media artist too cluttered- so maybe i h ave to remove  some of it but not all of it i mean this pis looks like art to me.cheers

blog #2 in 2 days

girl 2011

i do't know  what this is

hello i've been having trouble with blogspot so i may have to change my blog site which would be a drag since i have about 4000 business cards with this address on it. we'll see how bad it gets. right now i'm having trouble accessing my dash board and also retrieving pictures from my files- can any one tell me how i can type a little, insert a picture, type a little more and insert another picture-my pictures all seem to end up on the top or the bottom all together, not interspersed the way i'd like them to be.i suppose i'll have to do a tutorial or so well i took the day off from work and got nothing much accomplished still it's so wonderful to be at home and not at work. i'm trying to think of ways i can get my creative business started and i have a feeling the blog is key so i'm going to work really hard at getting my new work out there, and try to make some contacts along the way so if anyone's out there drop me a line and please be patient while i revamp my blog, and hopefully get a web page started - i really feel as if this is my time and that i can make it work with some help from my friends- life is passing by day by day and if i don't do this now, i never will, so wish me luck and keep the comments coming lol brigid.

may day may day

hilary for etching










Easter Monday

self portrait 2012    graphite on paper

Hello hello- easter monday- also the title of one of my favorite dekooning paintings. if you don't know it, look it up- it's glorious, and today was a beautiful relaxing day, the weather was gorgeous and alex and i even went to church! pretty good for an atheist who believes that organized religion is responsible for alot of the misery in the world. i don't know why we went, it just seemed like a good thing to do on easter. i sat there, remembering the many childhood hours i spent in that very church, not feeling particularly spiritual, more like nostalgic, and kind of looking around me in wonder at the people who really believed all that stuff, and wondering if they even thought about it, or just did it out of habit- i probably think about it more than they do. i mean there's a part of me who really wants there to be a god, who wants to believe in jesus but there's another bigger part of me that believes that believing in god is like believing in santa claus- nice when you're six or so but absolutely out of the question once you become truly aware of being alive and all that it entails... i would love to believe in god, that there's a heaven just waiting for me up there  in the clouds, as long as i'm a decent loving human being i.e. "a good person", but somehow i can't reconcile it with the reality of life as i've known it, and sadly, the facts point otherwise -to life as a kind of brief interlude of consciousness to which we are privy, after which the lights go out, and we return to wherever and whatever we were before we were born. is that just as ridiculous as believing in god? i guess i'll never know. for now though i have a life to live, and a present to enjoy as much as i choose to, and just lately i choose to enjoy it a great deal. cheers,brigid.

aha!

, time for a quick blog before i head out for my printmaking class, where i'm working on a print of the painting i did of pat passlof,last year. it's coming along pretty well-i'll post it soon as i finish it. working on portraits of family members now- ihave three in the works, hard work but really rewarding when i just get someone's likeness. last time i posted a portrait of me and ian but i've changed it since then and i think it looks more like me now -you be the judge.i'm learning so much about portrait paintings and have begun to copy some of the masters styles-great fun, and a lot of inspiration. feeling better now but today i had a full blown panic attack about how we're going to make ends meet until i can retire. poor ian has had no luck getting another job since he was laid off a year ago- no prospects at the moment- and it's very worrying.it seems as if once you're over 40 in today's marketplace, you're thought of as an old codger, ready for the dole.it's so unfair-especially for someone like ian with a giant brain and a ton of experience- the man can do almost anything.but enough about that onward and upward! see if you can tell the difference between the two paintings.trala brigid

february and its almost gone

hi there- it's feb .23rd i think, and i've been on vacation all week and i wa going to blog everyday, get caught up, post lots of things. it didn't happen. i haven't even turned on my computerall week except to download some pictures. so this is me, i can't keep up with my own life, predict when i'll post or any of that. and that's okay because there are no rules that say how often i have to post or how good it has to be, and i'm not really trying to get a huge following or a thousand viewers,-i'm just doing this because i like to say hello to anyone who's listening, who's interested in what i have to say, or wants to see what's going on with me. i've pretty much given up on the idea that i can sell my work online,or have an etsy shop or a web page because life is happening every second of every day and i am living and i'm dead tired and i don't have the time or the energy for that. most of the time i'm working everyday and coming home and trying to make some art and that's about all i have time for. except this week i've gotten up and painted and made art all day everyday and gone for an hour's walk on the beach with my baby, and read books and enjoyed every bloody minute of it. i wish it could be like this forever!!! i can't wait to retire, i want it so much i can taste it, but it looks as if i'll have to work at least for one more year, maybe two, but if i just live one day at a time it will happen eventually, and i'll be ever so grateful.. and until then i'll make as much artas i can on the side, and enjoy that too. so tada for now and i'll be back when i can. thanks for listening!love brigid

i should be sleeping

i should be sleeping but it's been so long since i posted, i had to do it right now while i'm still awake and fired up from the energy of my printmaking class. started a new print-it's based on the portrait i did of pat passlof,last year. it's good to be backin the studio again. been painting and drawing like mad; taking misty mawn's online course and it's alot of work. haven't had time to post any of my stuff yet, maybe tomorrow. i'm trying to think of something really profound to say but i'm shooting blanks-how aboutthis "When you really look for me, you will see me instantly- you will find me in the tiniest house of time".Kabir.or this:"For men and women alike...this journey(is) a human life lived.Noone escapes the adventure. We only work with it differently." Jon Kabat-Zinn. so much to say and not enough time to say it. or maybe there is really nothing of any importance to say. goodnight, until tomorrow, when i will have alot more nonsense to say.love,brigid

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