The Feeling of Flight
Hi Friends!
I'm a bit behind in my blog post, due to moving into my new house, which was quite a task. I'm really excited, as it's been a 2-year project of acquiring land, and finding a builder who would work with my health issues to create a no-basement, mold-free, non-toxic and net zero home-- built of sustainable materials! Amazing! Here's a photo of my kitchen/living room area... I don't have much furniture yet :)
Reuben is getting adjusted!
And I also have some other very exciting news to share with you...
The pilots among my readers will know of the organization called AOPA (Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association) which is a Maryland-based American non-profit political organization that advocates for general aviation. AOPA's membership consists mainly of general aviation pilots in the United States, and it publishes two very well-read magazines, one of which is called Pilot.
In this month's issue of Pilot (September 2024), they published an 8-page article on my work! It's called The Feeling of Flight, and you can click the button below to read it.
Additionally, I've been working hard to get My Shop online and running, and I finally finished! So please check it out: https://liselemeland.myshopify.com/
You can purchase giclée prints here, and some works on paper. I will be adding more items in the future, so bookmark it and check back in a few weeks!
The article is called The Feeling of Flight because that's what so many of my paintings attempt to depict. It's been really interesting for me, over the years, to try and turn a physiological sensation into a visual depiction using images. Often I'm trying to show the dizzying feeling of spinning, rolling, and looping by flipping the horizon line in the painting, turning it on it's side or upside down. Consider this when you look at the videos below, which I took with my cellphone 2 years ago:
Or this one which I took 10 years ago, which I called "Gravity As Illustrated by My Hair":
It's been a while since I've been able to do aerobatics, but I'll never forget the exhilarating feeling of it! In a strange way, it's a very mindful experience, because you really have to be paying attention, watching the horizon and your instruments AND feeling all of the G-forces, and dizzying sensations at the same time. It's so much fun, and at times a little scary, but very challenging and rewarding to master.
I hope you enjoy the AOPA article!