Erik Gustafson's Blog

This is my latest painting I did. It’s done with oil paints.  I was exploring the sadness from losing memories as we age.  Started out sketching a brain and adding the sun.

Then I added dark clouds

And finally… the brain, with deep, expanding grooves shrinking the brain, which is being covered by the clouds.

I am vis8ting my daughter and saw this paining on her wall.  It’s titled A Mother’s Kiss.  I painted it in 1998.

That’s 26 years ago.

I am still happy with how it turned out and the warmth and joy it conveys for me. But man, life sure moves along a quick pace.

I am going to try something different this time. I have 12 tiny canvases and I am going to make one painting out of them.

This is the concept

I made this sketch for an idea. I plan to surround all this with many different types of flowers

I think the fun part will be arranging them for display! So many possibilities!

I’ve been working on these slowly. Here is the 6th one I have completed. The crown chakra with colored pencils. One more and I will have all seven completed.

I am going to write affirmations for each when I get done with them.

This is my latest piece. It’s mixed media. I have colored pencils, markers, and acyrlic paint surrounding the mandala. It uses an affirmation to remind me to create more!

I picked up this great drawing prompt deck called Doodle Deck by BestSelf.Co and selected a card to doodle. It prompted me to draw myself using symbols that are meaningful to me.

I think anyway! I hope you enjoy this one.

I think it would be fun to show how this one is progressing. I’ve always enjoyed painting trees, but rarely like to put leaves on them. I love the feelings that empty trees give off. Plus they remind me of spider webs. There is also a tiny cave there too, not sure what lives in there….

The Lonely Tree

Dark fingers curling up into the sky,

An empty hand,
Alone in an empty field
Longing for a friend, longing to be needed
Can’t reach the sky, straining so long
Can’t an owl just land on me or squirrels scramble over my limbs?
Instead, spiders settle in, spinning thousands of webs,
Between my fingers and stretching into the empty sky
Complex patterns of thin veins exploding all around me
I briefly imagine that the spiders are my friends. They, too, are longing for company as they weave their...