A Walk In The Park

I had the opportunity to attend the annual College Hill Arts Festival last weekend in Cedar Falls, Iowa. And for anyone in the least bit interested in art, if you missed it, well, you missed it. (I'm not in any position to judge the quality of art displayed, not being an art critic myself… I just know what I like when I see it and I saw a bunch of stuff I liked, but alas, couldn't persuade the artists to give-up their paintings for free. :) (I will say this tho, the weather was fantastic, the grounds were perfect for an art fair, and the booths were very nicely laid-out.)

Nope, it wasn't all fun and games for me. I went with very specific purposes in mind: to network with other artists, if I could; to get a handle on what would be needed should I apply and be accepted to exhibit in the show next year; and to see where I stood regarding how I price my own work.

I was able to meet several artists, one from Kentucky, (there were something like 17 states represented), and another from Des Moines - cool - all of our work very different.

Of the work I saw that I'd call comparable to my own, I found that I was right in the ballpark as far as how I'm doing my pricing, which eased the second-guessing I was doing to myself. So, if I want to sell my art, it looks like I should be concentrating on its promotion. Makes sense.

There were all kinds of other things I learned simply by paying attention to how I was reacting as I browsed the outdoor aisles, e.g., why I passed-by one booth and not another - back-tracking when I realized what I was doing. (If I hadn't become suddenly aware of my behavior, I wouldn't've gone back to see what I'd missed.)

Some of the exhibitors had inadvertently? created barriers to people walking into their booths to view their artwork - things like chairs, stands, or tables at the front. Their placement didn't completely bar people from getting into the booth to take a closer look, but they didn't make it completely inviting either. I don't think I'm off track when I say, "Uh, I don't think you should do that cuz don't people wanna see things before they buy 'em?"

Another thing I learned was what's best to make available as handouts for visitors - not just business cards - what I'd call from my corporate days, "collateral literature." (I picked up a lot of the most attractive for future reference.)

All in all, it was a productive, enjoyable, and relaxing walk in the park.

That's all for now. (I'm severely behind in my correspondence :( but will write again soon.)

Cheers!

Unit Status Report - July 18th, 2007

The past few days, we've been having Severe Thunderstorm Alerts/Warnings, Tornado Watches/Warnings; and today, Flash Flood Warnings.

As I sit here this morning, listening to thunder coming out of the northeast, I'm wondering if I shouldn't be hightailing it back up to the house… not that I'm surrounded by lightning attractors or anything… like these ancient CTR monitors sitting in front of me - prolly emitting more EMF than the Los Alamos particle accelerator - and the air conditioner; and outside, the biggest elm tree you've ever seen, now soaked from top to bottom.

(GGEEeeeecht-Boom!) (That was a nice one. :) (Fun.) (It's getting closer.)

I had an interview with the editor of a small, local newspaper yesterday morning. Pretty cool. He'd spotted my art hanging downtown about a month ago and has been wanting to do an interview ever since. I've been ready, it's just that for one reason or another, it just wasn't happening through neither of our faults. This morning though, I got the call: "He's ready when you are."

"What do you hope to accomplish through your art?" (That ever-dreaded question.)

Though I think I tried to, I couldn't say… "There's a continuing interplay of existential dynamics going on: the external where our lives are experienced in the physical world, (among other people within the contexts of place and social and cultural norms); and the internal, where our perceptions and interpretations of the world around us - and of ourselves - are filtered and given meaning. By representing in some tangible way, (through my art), these universally experienced moments - as fleeting and indefinable as they may be sometimes - I hope to heighten the viewer's own awareness of self."

(Pompus?)

So I said something like, "I hope to involve the viewer in what they see, perhaps on some emotional level, you know, because he can relate."


(Nice, nice. Simple and to the point.)

The interview was an exceptionally positive experience, mostly because he's a good interviewer. (You'd be surprised how many journalists aren't.) He's also gonna send a copy of the article so if any corrections have to be made, (I doubt it) ... an unexpected and unnecessary though appreciated professional courtesy.

The article will come out next week.

Last night I remember telling a friend, "My output's been low." (Yeah, like non-existent since the 12th - when I finished Glory.) I've managed to gesso a couple canvases but that's about it. Oh yeah, I spent all day Sunday and into Monday updating my website. But that's not the problem... Recently I've been locked into thinking that if I don't have a model, I can't work on the next painting, or any number of concepts floating around in my head - all of which will make up the Exigency Exhibition - which I announced yesterday will be in mid-2008. Now all I have to do is finish the 20 to 30 canvases necessary for the show. (Five down, 25 to go.)

When I started the Exigency Project, I figured it'd be a cinch to find whatever model I needed when I needed him. But alas, the men I know who are willing and able to model have bodies that look doughy, if they're not flat-out overweight and out of shape. The next best thing would be to ask strangers, but without some type of budgeting for such a thing, I mean, who wants to model for nothing? ...Exactly.

Anyway, I started sketching, getting the 'story' out of my head and down on paper, e.g., the sketch you see above. If nothing else, the sketches will provide something to discuss with models when I find them… "This is what I want to do. " Nothing like a good well-planned session, eh? And I suppose if worse-comes-to-worse, I can always paint from imagination, though I've found that when I do that, my paintings lack the human spirit, tension, attitude, or bearing that the model brings to the session. The paintings appear 'flat' and lifeless, (if that makes any sense), even worse than when I paint directly from photographs of models I've never met - never having had the opportunity to take mental notes in the process of forming a type of association with them.

I'm thinking now I know why artists are drawn to abstractions - you can paint whatever you want without having to worry about finding the subjects to sit and arrange.

I want the next painting to be the first of the white canvases, which I've been anxious to start… all of which will represent the end of the story… all completely positive and upbeat - that stage of life I believe I've found this past year... uh, trivial, life-stuff annoyances like Severe Thunderstorm and Flash Flood Warnings aside.

(Ba-Boom!)

(Coool.)

Cheers!

Acres Edge Revisited

I took this photo a couple days ago. Lots of new construction and blue skys. (See Immortalized.)

Cheers!

The Thrill Is Gone

Half of an as yet untitled
work in progress.

AAHHHGHRG! For crying out loud! This painting was started on the 30th and it's still not done!

I've gotten way too precise and way too worried about too much concerning this painting, taking way too much time in the process. This is NOT 'sposed to be draftsmanship. It's supposed to be paintin' - expressive - free.

Friday nite? Going out an' kickin' up my heals? Nope. I knew when I stepped foot into the studio this evening it'd be a washout. (Not that I'm your regular party animal anyway, for pete's sake.) Just, well, you gotta strike while the fire is hot and I was in the mood. So here I sit at 4 in the morning after spending the night, well, right now I'm just trying to back-off and take a breather.

I've rounded the bend though, past that point where I keep thinking, 'It's gonna be crap.' Should be okay. We'll see, unless I do something idiotic that'd totally bollocks it up.

K, so feeling a bit better now… Stay tuned. Time to get back to it.


Cheers!

Immortalized

Acres Edge
Unfinished
14x11" Acrylic on Canvas.

I woke up in one of my foul, (or black), moods yesterday. Who knows why… something I ate before going to bed? dreamed during the night? falling barometric pressure or moon phase? Who knows.

Emotions… they come and go - sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly - and sometimes don't even have anything to do with what's really going on in life, though you'd think so even when they don’t, eh? they can be so damned immediate and persistent sometimes.

Anyway, when I'm in one of those moods, I know enough to keep a lid on it - not inflict them on the others around me. I also know enough not to work on anything important, because, well, no matter what I'd do, it wouldn't be good enough and then I'd just get madder and start making even worse mistakes, getting wound-up tighter in the process.

So it was that I set aside the painting I'm currently working on and 'paged through' the canvases I'd started but left unfinished. Yeah, I know. I do that… start things I don't finish.

Well, not like that... What I mean is sometimes you can start a painting and after a point know it's just not worth the effort anymore - it's turning out to be crap and you wouldn't want to put your name on it. So, rather than throw good money after bad, so to speak, you set it aside hoping for some future inspiration on how to rescue it; or, failing that, you can paint over it and start something totally new and different.

Of the six canvases with that fate in store, I ran across this little painting, (above), of a spot just north of town where a row of small, basement-less bungalows butt-up against farmland. A few days ago, I remembered, I'd past that same scene thinking that a small tornado'd taken out everything except the three houses closest to the highway, trees and all. I remembered I'd thought I must of been mistaken, until I saw that painting again. There it was, the scene semi-permanently recorded in paint, just like it used to be. I hadn't intended to do that, you understand, painting it only because of how the sunlight hit the back-ends of those little shacks. But I did. There they were and they'll never be the same again.

I heard second-hand from my partner that one of the men I'd painted was all jazzed and stuff that I'd painted him. I just didn't understand why and said so. "What's to understand?" he suggested, "you've immortalized him."

I guess I'm slow on the uptake sometimes, (maybe a lot) - because I still didn't understand, at least, not until I saw that odd little painting I was holding in my hand.

Cheers!


In real time: Thursday July 5, 2007 - 07:31pm (CDT)

The Joy of Painting

An enlarged detail from
an as yet untitled work in progress.

"…Then that delightful amazement took over… the fascination with how shapes, hue, shades, and tints - even when lacking precision - can combine to become something recognizable…"

- Reprinted from another blog of mine.

A Slimmer Me?

Trust me, if I lost much much weight at all, people would have a hard time finding me. Okay, so bad analogy to what I'm about to say...

With everything that I thought that needed to be done - I was finding it hard to find the time to paint. That is, afterall, what I'm supposed to be doing, right? So as a last ditch resort to figure out where all the time was going, I became friends with a calendar where I carefully logged how each and every minute of every day was being spent. I've done that for the past month now. A couple days ago, when I took the magic markers to the calendar, highlighting blocks of time in different colors by types of activity, well, don't tell me that wasn't an eye-opener. Something's gotta go.

While I can't say that a lot of time's been wasted, per se, changes are badly needed to more efficiently get what needs to be done, done.

One area for improvement is the amount of time I spend blogging, and while it can be an important source of new traffic to the online "eGallery," - this one taking a back seat to other more popular blogs - maintaining several blogs at the same time is, well, a waste of time. So I'll be looking to write blog entries that can be essentially duplicated across the board, at least until I can find the time to figure out how that blasted RSS thingie works.

Anyway, in the midst of everything going down - including doing website design for others to keep cash coming in - I've managed to see several new canvases leave the studio - (see online eGallery link) - a couple of 'em I'm even proud to say, "I did that."

"Goldfinches" is gone too, hanging in a friend's shopt. Whoever wrote the artist's commandment, "Thou shalt not price by talent or time taken, but by size," I'm thinking, should have his head examined. I spent something like 7 hours on it when it's only a 5x7" canvas!!!!

Anyway, I promised I'd post it so here it is!

Hope all is going well with you all.

Cheers!