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Polly Castor

Fostering a new renaissance through creativity, authenticity, spirituality, and art

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Hope

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Nice Article about our Older Daughter’s Work
By Polly Castor on March 20, 2017
Last week, St. John's College in Annapolis, MD, where our older daughter got her undergraduate degree, put out a...
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Grace Notes #4
By Polly Castor on March 19, 2017
My hope is that this practice will make us more aware of the constant flow of amazing good we...
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Our Daughter Builds a Wood-Fire Kiln
By Polly Castor on March 15, 2017
Last week was our daughter's spring break from college, but she stayed on campus with some other ceramics students...
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3
1
Projects and Divine Mind’s Direction
By Polly Castor on March 12, 2017
Glide instead of trudge. Work out from perfection instead of up to it. Enjoy the refreshing breeze of...
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The New Woman Shall Subdue the Whole Earth
By Polly Castor on March 8, 2017
Mary Baker Eddy quote with paintings of women by Richard Burlet...
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pollycastor

I was thinking about how I’m a devotee of “big

I was thinking about how I’m a devotee of “big shapes and small shapes” as a compositional guideline that I preach to my painting workshops. I continue to stand by that. However, my life right now is many small moving parts, and I wanted to paint a feeling that was based on the happy juggle of disparate parts. Could I make a pleasing composition of all small (with some tiny) parts? I compensated by contrasting other things, like making sure I had value contrast, warm vs. cool color contrast, straight lines contrasted with circles, sharp edges contrasting with soft ones. I needed to do this complete with a focal point and finding ways to move your eye throughout the piece. This painting is the result.

I’ve Got a lot Going On is 19.7″x26.5″ and is painted in pastel on Sennelier mixed media sanded paper, which I spritzed with India ink before commencing, so the small parts could contrast with a base of minuscule ones.

#gotalotgoingon #alotgoingon #conceptualart #contemporaryabstraction #abstractart #artistoninstagram #pollycastor #softpastels #sennelierpastels #contrast #composition

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©2025 Polly Castor. I encourage you to freely share and forward my blogs in context, with proper attribution, and with links back to this website attached. Feel free to use the "Print" button provided to utilize Polly's recipes for personal use. Prior explicit permission is required, however, for any portion of Polly Castor’s photographs, art works or writings to be otherwise copied, reproduced in any way, re-blogged or downloaded (Contact Me Here). Please don’t steal my work. Copies of photos and artwork are available for purchase in my Gallery.

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