press pause

painting by Soutine

I am guilty. I have abandoned my virtual atelier for faster updates and snappy shots. It is difficult to stay motivated when you write in a void.At least on FB I get quick "likes" or funny "comments" from dear friends.But then again, I cannot tell details about my life , stories to whisper in your ear, sights for you to discover. It is also due to the fact that for the past 6 months, I have rented a real atelier, a private space where I can go paint, stare into the colors, feel the knots of stress disappear as I find my creative center. So, as you know there are so many hours in a day, and when I am not working, well, I go paint, and breathe.But today, I will tell you a few facts:
Growing up in France, a big part of my diet was meat and potatoes. Now I still LOVE potatoes, but as a child, as my mother reminded me some years back, I did not like red meat. I always felt that I was chewing the flesh of my tongue, eating flesh felt wrong. And I still feel that.I was just in Paris recently, and I was walking in front of the local butcher, when this caught my eye:

It brought back floods of memories: horse carcasses dripping black blood from the horse butcher,some amazing Soutine paintings of butchered meat that shocked my young sensibility, guillotined heads of veals,boars etc on counters....
Was it the week delivery, or half week ?... The driver was also the person who carried the half beasts or whole pigs on his back, bend in half, with his white cloak stained red.


As I snapped these, a mother with her three young children watched , the kids ,curious and puzzled, the mother turning to me" it is really interesting, no ?"
So at Thanksgiving, I also go meatless.I actually like my plate of corn bread, sweet potato puree,mushromm gravy and cranberry sauce.It just feels right.