Ted’s essays

almost art


I’ve been laid low by my over-used lower back for most of a week now (wrenching on cars is a younger-man’s game). The last couple of days I found myself in my studio puttering with a paintbrush on my second-hand garden stakes.

Years ago I used some rattle-can paint to dress up some cheap cut-steel garden stakes that were left behind at our Grangeville house, but this time I upped my game significantly.

When I recently bought the little Testors enamel paint kit I was not sure I would use it enough to justify Blick’s modest $20 price for 8 jars of paint, but I have had plenty of fun – and have just begun, making almost no dent in the paint reservoirs.

It is not fine art, or even remotely close to my own elementary work with pastels, but it is certainly steps up the creativity ladder from paint-by-number or adult coloring books.

Better still, I like it, and get to see them every day.

The pig cutout did not give me a lot to work with. I tried putting lipstick on the pig, but am not ecstatic over the results. I have it on good authority that you simply cannot do THAT.

In my pre-painting research I discovered that nature had no rules when colorizing salamanders, butterflies and hummingbirds. I took that as official license to follow her example.