Nan’s Notebook
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Escape artist | “Summer Waltz” by NG Swett | acrylic painting (& video)
I herein reveal…
what made me want to paint this scene
what I was trying to express
how I think it came out
how I made the video (below)
and more
Heat wave! It’s been so hot.
As much as one wants to go outside and enjoy the summer, IF it’s cooler inside, then one would like to stay inside.
By looking out the window at the beautiful summer day, one can feel FOMO — the fear of missing out. Summer is here, but it won’t be forever. Summer is the season to recreate, enjoy life, and take it easy. If not now, when??
What made me want to paint this scene
I spotted this lovely scene out the window and I thought I would set up my paints as if I were outside painting, only I would do it inside where it was cooler.
I saw a chance to play around with the indoor and outdoor scenes and have some fun with paints — and my smartphone!
The scene outside the window was so summery, breezy and lovely.
And the scene inside the window was also lovely. A bouquet of flowers that our daughter brought sat on the dining room table near the window. The striped curtains fall around the scene like theater curtains.
But there was also something not so lovely: the feeling of not really wanting to go out into the extreme summer heat, feeling a captive inside the house because of that. Of separation from nature. Of watching and waiting. The emptiness of the lounge chairs on the lawn and the chair at the table…
What I was trying to express
The process of painting the two scenes together in one painting — one a kind of outdoor plein air scene and another as a kind of indoor still life — showed me a few things:
initially I felt fear and trepidation, which is visible in the video — doubt that I could make a good painting or a good video
the sense of aliveness in the natural world I try to capture using a dabbed impressionist treatment
gratitude and appreciation for a longtime home, a place near and dear to my heart and where my family lives, albeit a more staged and less changing indoor setting
longing, yearning and meaning of empty chairs but also of possibilities
challenged — demarking the window screen as the focal point, the exact place where indoor and outdoor meet; it picks up sunshine along its thin silvery grid lines
defiance! The curtains lent themselves to a modernist, expressionist treatment — very satisfying! Like, I could make these curtains more exact or prettier, but I just did ‘em how I felt like doing them
the lovely flowers, though challenging in their detail, came through best for me using some abstraction
How I think it came out
I mean, I like how the painting and the video came out. Works for me! I always think it’s a miracle when my painting ends up looking like anything at all, let alone forming a complete picture.
I really had fun with the digital and video tools, too.
Here is the video:
How I made the video
Here are some notes about how I made the video:
I videotaped with my smartphone and a tripod
I edited the video in Canva
the waltz soundtracks are all from YouTube’s free audio library (for YouTube use only)
the scenes of me inside the painting are done with the image of the painting overlaid with a video of me with the background removed
Exile: its meaning, purpose & tips
I know, it’s an odd topic but hear me out…
Why though?
It’s so simple.
I went to the beach, I found a nice spot to set down camp, and once I had a swim and settled in, I got a feeling of being alone and far, far away.
To capture the feeling and to practice taking wide video and being “on camera” I recorded the scene on my phone. I thought, maybe I could even use the video clips at one point.
With the beach footage in mind, and the feeling it gave, I researched the idea of exile. It’s a subject that’s come up in my own fiction and poetry writing. It’s an interesting subject. The more I found out, the more a video came together.
So this is how I used the beach footage:
Notes on the video
I used:
smartphone for beach footage, no tripod or mic
my “Blue Wave” 10x10” mini acrylic painting in lieu of the beach’s water view
ChatGPT, Answer the Public, YouTube and Google search to shape and research the ideas of the video
Canva to make the longer, wide version of the video itself as well as shorter vertical versions for social media, the thumbnail, and graphics
Audio from YouTube’s free audio library, including surf sounds and thought-provoking background music
What I like and what I don’t like
I like that the video felt fresh to me in the sense of experiencing something and within a week putting it into a video and dispatching it out to the world. If people knew more about exile, maybe it would be easier to survive and thrive through it.
I don’t like that the video reveals the kind of subjects that I’m liable to go off on a riff about. I mean, who thinks about exile??
~ Your pal, Nan.