Hip Cat

“Many things which cannot be overcome when they are together yield themselves up when taken little by little.”


– Plutarch

Hip Cat

4″ x 6″ Watercolor attached to a black canvas

Just look at that face. Awwwww. Well, he has been given the wonderful honor of being my very first sale on Etsy! YAY!!! He is going off to live in New York. It just goes to prove that people really do have room in their hearts for a purple cat on psychadelics. **big grin**



I have had a few paintings on Etsy & Artfire for quite a while. It’s time consuming to add them, so I never really got serious about it. Maybe now, I have a reason to maybe add a few more. I have monetized my website, but have not really been selling much of anything there. I have never tried Ebay. Some friends of mine do really well there.



I just love to paint! This whole business of selling my artwork is a little awkward. But, I would like to be able to justify all the money I have spent on art supplies over the last three years. My husband worries about my feelings. Since he doesn’t “get” my art most of the time, he worries about the rejection. I just put it out there, with my sense of humor fully in tact. If it sells, great. If it doesn’t, then it’s not for lack of effort on my part. Sometimes I get a wonderful surprise like I got yesterday… an email that tells me someone named Susan loves my Hip Cat.



And that is awesome! Thanks, Susan!



About Plutarch

Plutarch, the Greek historian who penned more than 46 anecdote-laced biographies of famous Greek and Roman figures in his Parallel Lives series of books, was more interested in exploring the influence of character on a man’s personal destiny than in writing dry histories. He was born in Greece during Roman rule, most likely in the year 46. He traveled extensively through the Roman Empire, finally returning home to become a priest of Apollo at the Oracle of Delphi. He died in the year 120.

Hip Cat Visits Lighthouse

“Life is like music; it must be composed by ear, feeling, and instinct, not by rule.”
– Samuel Butler

 

Hip Cat Visits Lighthouse
2.5″ x 3.5″ Watercolor ATC

Ha!  You were expecting a painting of a sailboat? 


I haven’t painted any cats for a while and this one just had the smug look that cried out for sunglasses.  The cat in the reference photo didn’t look smug, but my paintbrush interprets things it’s own way, sometimes.
I say … go with the flow when that happens.  No Rules.  It’s great brain food.  

About Samuel Butler

British author Samuel Butler is best known as the author of The Way of All Flesh, a semiautobiographical novel V. S. Pritchett called one of the time bombs of literature because of its incendiary critique of Victorian society and because Butler delayed publication until after his death. He was born in 1835 near Bingham. Rather than enter the clergy as many of his family members had, he became a sheep farmer in New Zealand for four years. He first gained fame with the satirical novel Erewhon. He died in 1902.

Hip Cat - September 15, 2009

"I do believe it is possible to create, even without ever writing a word or painting a picture, by simply molding one's inner life. And that too is a deed." – Etty Hillesum

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Hip Cat
4" x 6" Watercolor

This is the same kitty I painted yesterday. I love that.
Expression is way more fun that trying to achieve a certain perfection or in trying to make something exactly like the original. I admire artists who can do that, but it's not me.


Etty Hillesum, less famous than her contemporary, Anne Frank, lived a short life of great courage. She was born in 1914 in the Netherlands to a Dutch father and a Russian mother. She studied law, Slavic languages, and psychology. Hungry for knowledge, she cut down on food in order to buy books. She went voluntarily to the Westerbork camp to help fellow Jews interned by the Nazis. Her letters detail her experiences; her more meditative diary focuses on issues of faith. She died at Auschwitz in 1943.