Among most couples I believe one is a dance lover and the other, well, not so much a dance lover. I would bet the former is female. My husband, Luke, could have, with no intention to do bodily harm, broken every toe on my feet in an effort to make me happy on the dance floor. So I finally had him begrudgingly sign up with me for private ballroom dance lessons.
For three years we learned everything from the jitterbug to the tango. We attended exhibitions and dance socials. We danced and danced. We got to be pretty good before we moved on to learning tai chi and then yoga.
The movement of the dancers was of great interest to Gloria, the painter. Here my dance series started. Once I learned the correct posture, forms, and positions of the typical dancers, it was not much of a stretch to render them on paper and canvas. Gown colors were interchangeable as were the fore and backgrounds. Who knew that the waltz could be performed on the edges of cliffs that dropped off into raging Maine rocky coastlines. Or fluttered on hilltops in the spring. Or shimmied in the shallow shorelines of the mid Atlantic. All in elegant flowing colors – especially a touch of red.
The painting style for my dance pieces ranged from fairly static in my early work to a much more abstract looseness as I got more comfortable. The evolution in style mirrored our growing comfort on the dance floor itself. Funny how my paintings can be so similar to our real life.
When I began my dance series, I thought I would enjoy the movement and the color and maybe some folks would find them agreeable. I had no clue there were so many romantic art collectors out there! Trouble is they still want them, but I am no longer inspired!
