Ave Maria, Bit by Bit, by Santa Claus!

I am no longer a religious person, although I do believe, like most of us, in some kind of “metaforce”, which I called Santa Claus yesterday, in a conversation about the higher power which guides the writers and painters hands…Why did I call it Santa Claus? Ask me please if you want to know…In my youth I spent a lot of time and energy in religious discussions, but one day I stopped, and even officially left the Catholic church in Germany (does that mean, by the way, that I am out of the French Catholic church, too? ….. no idea!). But this week I came by chance into a discussion with some Christians in WordPress and well, I am older now, and wiser and surely more relaxed about religion, so in the end I enjoyed the discussion, and still do.Anyway, the entry which caught my attention was called “Ave Maria”. To honour these kind people there on Reformation Universalis, and because it is Sunday, and because my parents still go to the church where I was baptised, and because this church is 5 km away from Lourdes, where Marie appeared to Bernadette, I painted my Ave Maria today, with my hands and my computer guided by Santa Claus!… sorry if you don’t see the connection, but Santa was in quite a crazy mood today..

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Ghost Games

This is what happens when I feel lazy, too lazy to do the computer work I have to do: ghosts invade the screen and play their poetic games with me…

YOU and ME on the Edge of Space and Time

Perhaps I shouldn´t shout to the world how I feel when YOU are away
how lonely
how lost
how insignificant
how nothing
just one tiny nothing
on the Edge on Space and Time….

But I can´t help it, even when I know that nobody hears me from so far away,
not even YOU
because when we are apart
YOU are
just another tiny nothing
on the Edge on Space and Time….

Merry Christmas from Miki to Everybody!

I made this Christmas picture for my best friend, Susan Cornelis, but today I think she will agree me sharing it with all of you…

Kevin has made a Special Christmas Song for all his friends from Cafe Crem, but I am sure, he would be happy to share it with YOU too!

Allow me to serve you all a cup of hot Christmas chocolate and to wish you a merry Christmas, and to all your family and friends!

Moroccan Dreams

Still no snow on the beach, and no more hope to see some soon, it is warmer again in Spain! So I better stop dreaming of snow and go over to my Moroccan dreams!Why Morocco?Well, I have been dreaming of going to Morocco for more than 20 years (yes, you won’t believe it, but I am older than 20!). My brother lived there, in Casablanca, with his Arabian horse. I swear, he really had an Arabian horse which he rode regularly, practicing for the parades of the French Army where he was a colonel and a teacher for Information and Logistics. Anyway, I never went to Morocco, the reason being, without entering into the sad details, a total travel incompatibility with my first German husband!But I regularly keep dreaming of Morocco. I dream of the landscapes, the colours, the markets, the medinas, the atmosphere, etc.. I want to go there with Kevin in our motor home, but I am so scared. One hears so many scary things from travelers. I heard that motor homers tend now to form big colonies and travel together through Morocco like a camel caravan in the desert, the only way they found to be safe.. Unfortunately this is not my conception of traveling and freedom…So I keep dreaming and painting Morocco from my fantasy… I have no idea if Morocco looks like my paintings of it, but at least I sell them well!Another reason to come back to Morocco these days is Cafe Crem. We have a new concept there, and Madame Monet, who lives in Morocco, is inaugurating since yesterday the new Cafe Crem with a series of entries about The Festival of The Sacrifice. Great entries by the way, and if you want to participate to the discussion, just go there and speak!

It is still snowing all over Spain… but where?

Everywhere I go, in every newspaper I read, in each Spanish TV channel, they all tell me the same:

“It is snowing all over Spain!”

They have been threatening it for 2 days, they told me that the mountains and even the beach would be white the day after, and when I awoke the next morning I climbed up to my solarium, from which I can see the mountains and the beach, but everything was so normal, the sky was blue, the beach was yellow and the mountains were grey. What a disappointment! You, who live in the Northern countries, you won’t understand it. But when you spend the whole year under the sun, you really fancy some rain sometimes, and even more some snow, which looks extremely romantic upon the Mediterranean landscapes.

But where is this bloody snow? They keep announcing it for tomorrow… I guess it is again a perfect example of the well-known Spanish life philosophy which can be resumed in one word:

“Mañana!”

Surely the simplest and most practiced philosophy in the whole world!

But it is a long long time till mañana, so today I keep dreaming of snow… with my brushes in hand, the most secure way to see snow in Spain!

It is snowing all over Spain!

I was working inside all the day, didn’t notice much of the weather except that I felt some kind of (for Spain) unusual cold creeping through my skin… then, late afternoon, I had an appointment with a client, I had to drive with him to Altea -a wonderful artists village in the neighborhood- to order a frame for a painting of his house I made about 3 weeks ago. I was quite shocked by the temperatures outside, considering that some days ago we had about 25 degrees outside! At the frame shop the man said, that it was snowing all over Spain already, that there were even snow on the low mountains around here, and that tonight, snow was expected on the beach! I so much hope to see that tomorrow morning, snow is so rare around here!

In the meanwhile, and because I am so impatient, I have made a painting of snow in Spain… only how I imagine it of course!

Fire orange: a new light on a woman and her painter!

When you are a painter yourself, to appreciate other painters’ work is a rather delicate matter. At least if you want to be honest. There are many reasons to it, more or less the result of our human imperfect condition (I suppose you all know what I mean…).

But one reason is from different nature: I suppose each painter prefers paintings which resemble his own. Not always, of course… but somehow it is logical, because I think each painter (at least the ones who paint only for the sake of it) is trying to paint what he/she likes in the way he/she likes it. For example me. I generally love paintings in the colours red, orange, yellow, pink, purple with some contrast in grey, black, brown, and a little bit of green or blue. And paintings which show movement, or harmony, or passion, etc… and when I look back at my own work, well, this is exactly what it is all about!

Some time ago I saw a painting from Susan Cornelis, which totally blew my mind. I just felt deep admiration and the result was that I HAD TO present it here, to share it with everybody visiting my blog.

This morning I had an experience of the same kind with a painting from Ion Vincent Danu. I saw it and instantaneously thought:

“Wow, THIS is beautiful!”

And as I did with Susan I want to share this painting with you here, and invite you to visit Danu’s blog and to read the entry corresponding to this painting. His entries, each of them in that blog, next to the paintings, are anyway always very interesting and well written.

And as I said in a comment I left in his blog:

“I guess every woman would like to be painted in this orange fire light! And this painting is also giving a new, firey light on YOU, Danu!”

Merry Christmas, Madame Monet!

I have just mounted the Christmas Tree in my gallery´s niche bar… I know, in many countries, one shouldn´t put it up before Christmas Eve, but well, I am in Spain, and here in Spain we do what we want with Christmas trees, the traditions having been above all imported by the many foreigners living here. And anyway, I am an artist, and I am claiming here my artistic freedom to have my Christmas tree blinking and flashing whenever I like!

I received a beautiful comment from none other than Madame Monet, this morning:

“… I really LOVED this look into your gallery! This looks like a place I’d love to visit (and have a glass of wine while looking at the paintings)…”

So I decided to inaugurate my Christmas Tree by toasting her with a glass of wine:

Tchin Tchin, Madame Monet, and Merry Christmas!

And of course: Merry Christmas to everybody here!

Star to Star…

As you can see for yourselves, the brightest  star in my exhibition yesterday was not me, but… Kev Moore,  an English Rock musician on the big stage of his previous life in Norway!