lisateasley

PEN & MARKER FLOWER DRAWING

It occurred to me to share pen & marker (or pen & pastel) drawings I tend to do after dinner in front of the television. I do euro style dates out of habit from when I was in diarylike communication with a fellow painter who is French, and so I've dated with day before month for decades now. Hope it doesn't seem pretentious but I can't break the habit, ha. Drawings after dinner in front of the tv is also a decades long habit since usually the show is not gripping enough for full atten...

DIARY OF A YOGI, Raw Read #2

Here is raw read number #2 from my working title book, Diary of a Yogi. The entry is from April 8th, I have been writing every day since February 13th.

Thank you, Manuel, for your comment on the first raw read video, as it immediately prompted me to do another, just now. I have never read unfinished material before that first one, and now this is my second read of unfinished material-- in fact it's the first time I have even read the material, myself, as I keep writing without looking b...

AWAKENING PROCESS SKETCHES, PETALS & CELLS

I just pitched a gallery, moments ago, inquiring if they would like to see the plans for my awakening series, which begins with the Petals sketch here (shedding petals of emotional body gunk) and the second would be the green and pink painting you have been seeing in process, Sun in My Heart, and the awakening Cells sketch here, which as I type all of these I see the order is quite debatable.  Once all 3 paintings are finished, it may not matter what the order is, anyway, as it will not ...

GABRIEL AND THE TRAIN, acrylic on canvas

I hope this isn't true but this may be the only photograph I can find of this painting, Gabriel and the Train, which was sold at my first major solo show at Watts Towers Center. The reason I thought of it is-- not only because it's the exact 2 year mark of my last solo show-- but because I photographed a friend for a portrait on Saturday who didn't get the lottery to remain in the U.S. and so must return to India within the next two months or so. When I photographed the friend who is the subj...

BANGKOK MORNING

A friend sent a poem this morning dedicated to the painter R.B. Kitaj, and his work reminded me of this painting I did last year inspired by a morning in Bangkok, and the colors in the painting felt akin to David Hockney's and R.B. Kitaj's, though I was painting what I saw. The colors in the room were all that and more.

THE NUMEROLOGIST story reading at The Last Bookstore, DTLA

This story popped into mind when a friend said yesterday that the world will never be the same again, and of course this is true, as change is the only thing we can count on. But this story, which is very short, was written in 2012 when the spiritual community were full of talk about the end of the Mayan Calendar and the recepton of light to come on 12/12/12. I played with this idea for Halloween but listening to it now I realize it's more about what is and what isn't real to you, that what y...

SUN IN MY HEART, more progress

Here is the painting a week and a day later from the last post of it's beginning. Two years ago today was the opening of my retrospective show, Paintrospective, and there is the bittersweetness of memory for times past and great wonder for the future. I am so grateful to you here for encouraging me to keep on keeping on. I send you love and gratitude.

SUN IN MY HEART in progress

Instead of my usual Cathedral-of-the-Trees hike in the glorious mountains where I hear Julie Andrews singing,The Hills are aive with the sound of music!, I painted. I wanted to work on the beginning of this trio series where I try to show what is happening with me spiritually. This one in progress is the Sun in my Heart. I don't know how she (or I) turned out green-- I know techinically by using yellow and blue, but not yet emotionally why I'm choosing what I'm choosing-- and I don't know how...

AGNES MARTIN ARTIST DATE

Another from my Vivaldi Music Book of Artist Dates I took myself on: Agnes Martin retrospective at LACMA. I not only love her work but love the philosophy in which she lived. She built her house in New Mexico with her own hands, made art as spiritual contemplation, and lived peacefully. She is often referred to as a mystic.

HOCKNEY ARTIST DATE

A few years ago, I remembered Julia Cameron's words in The Artists Way about taking yourself out on an Artist Date. I have a Vivaldi Music Book of Magnicat, containing records of my artist dates. This page is when I went to see a documentary on David Hockney. The theater ticket stub is the faded square on the side of my oil pastel drawing, inspired by the evening and his colors.

HORSES KISSING

On this rainy morning, when my wall heater isn't working, the house is cold, and so I am working, writing in bed, I thought I would share one of the paintings I wake up to, and is in view when I do these very occasional work-in-bed mornings. It had a daytime background when I first painted it, then I changed it to black. I am not sure if it is actually finished. 

Thank you for looking!

FILM TEASER FOR "OUR STORIES: BLACK LA WRITERS"

This film teaser I appear in was made by The Ralph J. Bunch Center for African American Studies at UCLA. It features as well, the late great Wanda Coleman, who has been coming up in posts and literary conversations these days-- such as the one I had on Saturday for an AWP Writers Conference Panel-- which gives me great pleasure because I not only idolized her as a writer and poet but she mentored me, she really took me under her wing for gigs at colleges, literary venues, and bookstores. She ...

DIARY OF A YOGI, Raw Read, 1st Page

Thanks to you all, I have been twice as productive as a writer and a painter, and I just wanted to read to you, at the same time that I read to myself, the first page of Diary of A Yogi.  Of course it will go through multiple edits, but I thought it makes more sense to share with you the raw first page, since I have been so inspired by you, in the first place. Your support means everything in the world to me. Thank you from the depth of my heart.

PS I read this coming straight off ...

LAURA ON WILSHIRE BLVD in Progress

On this rainy day morning, with a fire going in the fireplace (it's cold inside!) I have this painting in progress. I want to start making short videos reading to you the pages-in-progress on the book I'm writing. 

Thank you for encouraging me, my productivity has doubled, if not more, since you have been with me.

MOM and DAD

I don't know if this painting is finished, it hangs over the television so I see it prominently every day, and mom hated it. This morning when Imogen sent me a photograph of James Baldwin in Durham, NC where we lived for some years when I was a kid, it brought me to this painting when my parents were my whole world. And my first meditation nirvana experience was about 10 or more years ago when I looked at this painting and thought about all of the qualities I appreciated in them, and felt thi...

PAINTING SOLD & SHIPPED TODAY

This painting "Kevin" was done many years ago but I got a text this morning from the buyer saying they wanted it and they wanted it "Now." So the morning was all about packing up and shipping to New York and then a dance of joy for its new home.

WORKING TITLES, WORKING GRAPHICS

As I have begun the regimen of writing about my spiritual life, to egg myself on in materializing this as a book, I created a dummy cover in all of 15 minutes, by photographing a corner of a Danish architecture magazine cover, changing the color hue and typing on the titles in bold font, then putting on my phone as a screensaver, so that when my alarm goes off at 6:45 and I shut it off, it then goes to this picture, and I am all the more motivated to get out of bed and continue on. I may chan...

THE ADVENTURES OF RON ATHEY AND LISA TEASLEY

I was grabbing Getty Images of me the other day to post on IG, which reminded me that the Getty has a little comic book of mine in their Ron Athey archive collection, entirled The Adventures of Ron Athey and Lisa Teasley, which are cartoon scenes from our friendship, done  in '99. We have known each other since 1985 or 6. Today is Chinese New Year, and  The Year of the Ox, which is Ron's sign, and he is currently in NY for the Valentine Day opening of his retrospective at Participan...

Be-attitudes

I just wanted to share with you the  "Be-attiudes" I wrote for myself some years ago, and try to follow:

BE THE POWER OF PEACE

BE THE POWER OF CREATIVITY

BE THE POWER OF WISE ACTS

BE THE POWER OF LOVE

JULIUS EASTMAN'S JOAN OF ARC, Studies/In Progress

Inspired by last Easter with a dear friend who played Julius Eastman's "The Holy Presence of Joan of Arc" during our sweet celebration, I decided back then that I would do a painting of Joan through Eastman's eyes. Imogen posed for it on the left, and on the right you see the in-progress of the painting, which is not much bigger than your foot. The painting in progress below is a study, and is six times the size of the "actual Joan" painting I intended. I have done this before, a very large s...

THE ELEPHANT TALKER short story reading

This story, The Elephant Talker, was recorded for Stay.Home.Stories and has a much nicer looking video thumbnail on their Facebook and Instagram sites, but I wanted to have it in my collection, as well, and Patreon requires that you upload from YouTube (or Vimeo) where I am still learning how to navigate the platform, and will keep my YouTube library set to private, so that only you here can see my video uploads just for you.  This story, as I explain in the recording, was written for th...

SPARTACUS and DEBRA: COMMISSIONS

The painting above, Spartacus and Debra, was a commission done in the early '90s,(also, the painting below) done for the same people who have commissioned me to paint them and their extended family, over the years. They probably have about 6 paintings in total. Lately, the husband has been messaging me about how many people, while Zooming, admire this one of his wife and their bird, and all of this has reminded me of the fact that I have been doing painting commissions since I was 10 years ol...

THANK YOU TO MY PATRONS

I am extremely grateful for your support. It means the world to me. I launched here on January 12th, so it hasn't yet been a month but already your support has seemed to double my creativity as well as to herald significant change in my life. So this is in deep deep thanks to you.

The image above is Self-Portrait with My Dragon, oil on canvas.

SONG OF SOLOMON Sketchbook Watercolors

The gallerist for my solo retrospective "Paintrospective" in 2019 wanted to include this series of sketchbook watercolors I did inspired by lines in the bible's Song of Solomon, but I thought they were too playful and odd next to all of the other paintings.. There are about 23 of them all together and they are 8" by 6." I am tempted to do another set based on new lines while listening to "Just (after Song of Songs)" on the 2015 "Youth" film soundtrack. I did a "serious" painting of one  ...

PAINTED FLOWER PANTS

It's a rainy day in California, a blessing for all life, and inspires me to anticipate the spring flowers, as well as to post here the flower pants I painted. If ever you are inspired to get painted pants (or shirts or Tshirts from me) just inquire : )

ART HOTEL BERLIN Painting

One of my favorite painters is Gerard Richter, particularly when he painted a series of realism portraits of actual photographs of family members, friends, etc. The moments he chose were never typical, always off in tone and angle and subject, so in 2016 when I saw this candid photo taken by a partner,-- with whom I was entertaining marriage and my move to Berlin-- I knew I would paint it at some point. He took pictures of me brushing my teeth, walking down the street, waiting for the subway,...

READING of MAGIC IS THE NATURAL ORDER

This story was commissioned by the Broad Museum for their Summer Happenings  in August 2017. I performed the story at the Broad with accompaniment by composer/musican David Harrow, who played the theremin.  Here I am reading Magic is the Natural Order just for you, for the first time since that performance, recorded here in my dining room today, with the painting on my left, unfinished, and the one on my right with the dragon, happily finished, Looking forward to hearing what you th...

Poem, The Guru's Lover, written for Burnt Sugar Arkestra

Greg Tate, the leader of the band Burnt Sugar Arkestra ( Tate is also a well-known writer and cultural critic, if you have watched any recent jazz docs you have likely seen him) asked me to write a poem to perform for one of their albums. This appeared on All Ya Needs That Negrocity, and there is nothing to watch on this video, but you can hear me recite the poem to music. It's an extensive jazz piece, 9 minutes, I am on in the beginning and the end, so if you're on the phone or laptop, lay i...

My Books

This morning I was delighted to find a DM on Instagram from a reader who said she was so happy to have found me there on IG because my novel DIVE is one of her "alltime favorites" and that I am an "amazing writer" with many exclamation points. Who would not be floored by this kind of note? During 2020 I experienced a resurgence of notes of praise from readers, which buoyed me as a writer during the challenging year for our globe. Clockwise above is the award-winning story collection GLOW IN T...

Crevice and Bougainvillea in Progress

At any one time, I have about four or five works-in-progress, playing musical chairs on the easel, walls or floor. My Sunday hiking partner saw this piece on the easel and blurted out, Vulva!, then blushed and giggled like an adolescent though he has 5 decades. I agreed that it looks like that, but it's actually a crevice in a hill on El Pescador beach in the Malibu/Zuma area with imagined blowing petals of Bougainvillea from my backyard.

Toward the end of our Sunday hike, on what was a...