Back On Guam

My studio is currently on hold. Although I do still have everything ready for inspiration to hit...

My blog has been a bit quiet lately. After a very busy year in Denmark, I am now back in the tropics, back on Guam. In the past few weeks I've had a few loose ends on the Danish side to finish before returning. And since arriving here, we have done very little other than unpack. But now we are finally settled back in, in new surroundings. Very little (if anything) seems to have changed here on the rock this past year.

And it IS in fact very nice to be back!

We do live in another house (hence the new surroundings). So, my huge, light and stunning studio is no longer in existence. This house is a lot smaller, and with no real room for an actual work room. But that is okay in every way. As I have something else on my mind at the moment: I am pregnant, and that takes up a lot of my thoughts and mental energy. I am very excited about this new aspect of life...

I have kept my art supplies handy, and I am sure I will be working on various project, throughout the year. (- I do have a pet portrait to finish in time for Christmas) I will just work a little differently this time around. And this blog may change a little, take on a new form. And then again - maybe not. I'll have to see that happens in my work and in life...

Back In My Old Room

My new/ old room. A very different feel from the room I knew, in the 80's and 90's

Goodness - it has been for ever! Seems like a lot has happened since my last words, but that could mainly be in my mind! I have moved all the way from tropical Guam to a very wintery Denmark! It has taken me a while to get settled, to get out of suddenly-chance-location mode, and finding myself again, back here on the Danish West coast. In the very same house I grew up in...

This is now my living-, bed- and work room. Quite literally, half a world away from my tropical studio. It is my old room, the same one I had since I was a child. There is something magical about being back after so many years, and after having lived in so many places. The room looks, smells and feels very different. It is only because I know it is the very same place that, I can truly tell. The view is different too, and yet the same. The trees have grown a lot, and some are gone. During my first weeks, I have enjoyed the backdrop of orange and brown leaves, and a field full of cows, peacefully eating grass, with their mooing and chains as a nice, subtle soundtrack. Such a change from the jungle, palms, boonie dogs and papayas of Guam. I love the change of the seasons, and the view has already changes much more in a month, than my Guam view did within an entire year.

On a more boring/technical note - I’ve had all kinds of practical issues with my website and blog, the reason it has now changed address to http://collagepainter.blogspot.com/

I have spent a couple of intense afternoons in front of the fireplace, moving all my old blog texts to this new site. What will happen about my website is still up in the air. I am checking out options, thinking, considering the best way... Not quite sure yet. In the middle of the move from Guam my computer crashed, and so did the entrance to my old site. I can’t get back in. Like you wake up from a dream and you can’t get back in there. A little annoying, as I liked the way my site looked and worked, but on the other han

d, perhaps this is my big chance to reconsider new and fresh ways. So maybe it is for the better. We’ll soon find out...

Goodness - it has been for ever! Seems like a lot has happened since my last words, but that could mainly be in my mind! I have moved all the way from tropical Guam to a very wintery Denmark! It has taken me a while to get settled, to get out of suddenly-chance-location mode, and finding myself again, back here on the Danish West coast. In the very same house I grew up in...

The view of fall...

Leaving Guam

A view of my Guam Studio. It has been the perfect work room, a lot of space huge, open windows and an amazing view.

After only a little over a year, we are now getting ready to leave our small tropical island. The plan was for us to stay here for three years, but suddenly we got word that my husband would be stationed elsewhere for 12 months. I decided to leave as well, moving back to Denmark to be around my family and friends. It has been a busy few months, getting ready for this suddenly move, mentally and practically. My work has been on hold, which is also why my blog has been so very quiet lately. But, hopefully, as I get settled into my Danish life, my work and blog will take off again...

The paintings I did while living on Guam - against the Jungle of our back yard.

Cleaning out the Studio

Cleaning my studio was long overdue. It wasn’t dirty, nor messy really, just disorganized!

Ever since arriving in Guam, I have worked between my things, without having a true space for each item. We were so busy arranging the rest of the house that when I got to my studio, I just wanted to PAINT. But last week, I finally decided it was time to do just that: arrange my studio to make it work better on every level.

I took everything out and started over. I got rid of things I know I would never need again, and it felt good to see the get-rid-of pile growing, and all the extra space I didn’t even know I had.

Over time I have collected boxes and folders full of pictures, photos, cards etc. The hardest part was to sort through those. And actually, I must admit I gave up and kept most of them. I remember where and when I got most of them, and the story behind each card and image. And (my best excuse:) they don’t take up THAT much room!

Another nice addition to the studio is that I now finally have all my art books around me. That had been my plan all along, but until now they had lived on a shelf in the living room. I like them them upstairs, with everything else ART related!

By the end of the day I felt so good - the studio was clean and organized. And seemed much roomier. And best of all: I now actually know where everything is.

Guam at First Glance

A look at my new Guam studio. Still a lot of organizing to do before I am ready to start working. But I like it. A great room with lots of light and windows. The view is beautiful; looking over our backyard jungle, and the silhouette of palm trees against the pink and orange Guam evening sky. What’s not to love?!

It has been a crazy summer. I notice that my last blog was written back in April. Time has gone so fast - and so much has happened. Moving from NJ was exactly as stressful as those things are (and perhaps should be?) We sold the condo, moved into an Extended Stay - I went to Denmark for a few weeks, then back to NJ. Kevin and I then spent two weeks in South Dakota with his family, before we - finally - took the big anticipated step and moved to Guam. We had been excited for so long, but had no real frame of reference. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into - none of us had ever been on a tropical island before. After our share of diver’s ear and food poison, heavy jet lag and two weeks in a fancy hotel - we found our house. And a lovely one that is: big and cosy, in a quiet neighborhood, and with a tropical jungle of a garden.

The heat on Guam is extreme. It is a moist, uncomfortable heat, that it will take some time getting used to. So will all the geckos, poisonous frogs and big colorful spiders. Not to mention the thought that a brown tree snake can show up on your door step any day...

We are basically moved in at this point, and have begun to explore the island. I still haven’t had a chance to check out the art life on Guam, but I look forward to it, and I am excited to see what I find.

I am more than ready to start working again. And talking about work - above is a picture of my new studio, “a work in progress”. It is a perfect art room. And although I still have a lot of organizing to do before I am ready to actually start the painting part, I love it, and can’t wait to spend my days in there. It has been a long spring and summer since I did some work, and many ideas has developed in my mind during that time. I am curious what it will be like to work in there. My rooms, their views and atmospheres have always means a lot to me, as I spend hours in there. They become significant and (I feel) somehow influential to the work I produce. That’s why I do like to change the rooms once in a while. And believe me: this new Guam studio is a huge change from my little room in new Jersey, looking over an urban parking lot...

Studio On Hold

It has been a very long time since I wrote an entry. So much has happened that wasn’t really art related, and I was just too busy and too restless to accomplish anything artwise.

We knew we would be leaving NJ this summer, but not until mid-March did we know the actual destination. We were dreaming of moving to Europe, Germany perhaps - and I was so deep into my thoughts of being there, living somewhere in the heart of Europe that it hit me like a fist, when I was told we are in fact going to GUAM. It could not be further away, nor more different.

It took me some time (a good couple of weeks actually) to digest the news, I googled info about this truly tiny Island between Australia and Japan, and slowly I got used to the idea and began to look forward to our next assignment. But it took some time, some huge twists and turns of the imagination. In my mind’s eye, I now see palm trees, turquoise water, colorful drinks, (necessary) sun block and straw hats...

On top of this, we are selling our condo, and in order to present the place in the nicest way possible, I have severely cleaned up my studio - taken all unnecessary items out for it to appear larger and tidier. I like it clean and simplified, just waiting for activity and new stories to begin.

I know how much the environments has affected my work in the past - and I am curious to see what Guam will add, change or move. I feel my work is done in New Jersey - my mind and body feels far too uneasy to take up more projects - It will have to wait. So really, my studio is on hold...