Finished and Loose ends

I officially completed my 4' X 12' panel today. Trying up loose ends is the next task and that includes the child's rocking chair that has been bothering me for over a year. I was having trouble looking at the chair because of it's relationship to childhood and mine being particularly dark. I tried thinking of different themes i wanted to explore not related to my own experiences but rather the preciousness of water for example. But my heart wasn't into that and i continued to struggle with this object. I then reasoned that if i painted the rocking chair in the most beautiful color, then i would relate my childhood with this color. Thinking in those terms help me to overcome my reluctance to painting this and i am now happily painting this chair.

One of my other projects involve painting trees on kamaboko wood surfaces. Kamaboko or fish cakes used in Japanese cooking come on these wooden pieces. It always seemed like a waste to throw these little wooden rectangles away so i began saving them. I haven't quite sussed out why i am doing this only that i want to paint 1,000 of them and create a "forest". I like the idea of using what was once a tree to create a tree image so that these have a second life.