ocotillo

remind me not to blog when i first wake up

Looks like I haven't blogged for a month now. How did that happen? I am much more an avid reader of blogs than a blogger.

So....what has going on? Artlovemagic has kept me just a litlte bit busy in the real world. Finishing paintings, sewing straps onto unfinished bags, making some silver charms and practicing the fine art of henna application onto real human beings.

I am excited and nervous about participating. Actually, the scales are tipping much more towards excited than nervous today. I don't even know what to say about it. It seems that it will have a different feeling to it than the very few and far between wine sipping art events I've attended in the past. I just have no interest in that scene. Or, I'm fine with art & wine, but the snootiness, big bucks and little black dresses are just too un-natural for me. I mean, there must be a better way. And I'm hoping to be a part of it.

My visual brain is just not communicating well with words this morning. Rrrr.

Will post a couple of photos of new paintings soon.

what do you think?

In the beginning was the canvass, and the canvass had Sharpie marks on it. Then the canvass got colored in.

And the creator was happy with the painting. Or definitely parts of it and the direction it had gone. And the creator shared her artwork with some new acquaintances, family and friends. Because what good is artwork unshared?

Anyhow, it was mentioned to me that "no one gets their stuff in a real gallery". Sure, maybe a coffeehouse. And I don't think my paintings at the moment are gallery level. I'm not kidding myself. But could I do it? I cannot see the gallery as unattainable because at one time I had set a goal that I wanted to make jewelry good enough to sell in local galleries. By the end of the year, I had my creations in 5 galleries. That seemed a little too easy. But this was in 1991 in downtown San Diego and it was less sophisticated as now. My point is, it's maybe not as impossible as it seems. Maybe in a year or 2 (now that I have time to really focus on these things) I could.

I usually don't go begging for comments, but the few of you who still read this blog I consider friends. I would appreciate your honest opinions. Do I potentially have what it takes?

drowning my sorrows in a sea of paint

Well, not exactly sorrows. I'll get back to that subject later.

I've been able to be experimental the past couple of days. One good thing about using liquid acrylics is that they leave little in the way of bumps and edges, so paintings can recycled rather easily.

MEADOW

GOLDEN GIRL

ANOTHER DESIGN (looks better in real life)

maybe what matters the most....

Well, with the purchasers of the painting coming this evening, I had self-talked myself into thinking I had created a monster. A rainbow colored monster at that. Something that, as I mentioned in a comment earlier today, appeared to only be lacking Kermit the Frog with his banjo (singing "someday we'll find it...the rainbow connection...the lovers, the dreamers and me...la da da de da da doo...."). The cringe factor was growing by the hour in my head. I had my back-up speech required in case their body language betrayed that they were, shall we say, disappointed. They are very polite people, so I knew they wouldn't be rude anyway. But their initial gasp and genuine outright declaration that it was "beautiful" took me by surprise. It did make my presentation of the asking price that much easier though. I had a range, and though I thought the top end would be ideal, I would be happy with the middle. As it turned out, they gave me the very top. They wanted me to know that my work was worth it. Amazing.

I don't know, at the end of the day, my biggest joy was how much they liked it. I hope it will be special to their daughter too, who is a talented musical composer. Even if I didn't like it so much, that doesn't mean that it wasn't God-inspired for them.

For myself, I will definitely stay away from rainbow color schemes. I have lots of other ideas and things I want to experiment with. It is fantastic to have my own money (sort of seed money) to buy more canvasses and paints. :)  :)  :)

behold the painting

So here it is. And though it is complete, I'm not sure what I think.

I was given the words and general color scheme, but the rest is my "artistic license". Parts I like. Parts I don't. It was good to find the time to really work on something, and I generally enjoyed the process. But this time, the product is being assigned a value (eek!).

While I was merrily painting away at one point, this terrible thought came to mind, "It's Lisa Frank...the Christian collection". There is actually a lot of glistening gold highlights in the painting which the photo didn't capture.

I wish I felt better about it. My parents like it (I'm not sure if that is good or bad). My neighbor, the art teacher, likes it and wants it if the people who commisioned it don't. Hopefully the recipient will like it.

By the way, my father, Man of Few Words that he is, declared me worth $25/ an hour. We had sort of been discussing the payment issue, then dropped it as one of those things I didn't think anyone would really figure out. Then out of the blue he announces that amount. Strange to be given an amount. Honestly, the last time I worked for pay, it was as a bookkeeper way back in the 20th century (1994) and I made $8/hour.

this monday

I got a call this Monday where I "received a commissioning" to paint a painting for a friend's daughter (who is also a friend). She & her husband saw my painting on Saturday and liked it so much that they wanted me to paint something for her college graduation. She gave me some words to put on it and a general idea of color scheme, but has given me license to do whatever I want otherwise.

I told her I would be happy to make a painting for her daughter. My problem comes with my weirdness about money and inability to make decisions when it comes to pricing things. Most people I know don't have the hundreds of dollars that original artworks sell for anyhow, but these people do.

People have the formula: Cost of materials + Time spent = Price of painting. And it drives me crazy. I don't measure the paints ounce for ounce that I put on the painting, and I rarely keep track of how much time they take. Two very similar paintings could take very different amounts of time. Would I be charging too much or too little?

Eegads, you can see why I never seriously got into this business. I did sell jewelry I made for a while, but that is easier to "price". It isn't as personal or expressive.

What to do, What to do? I guess I will get the canvass and start painting when I can. I'll deal with the price issue later. Any words of wisdom from others?

monday & tuesday

I made a painting on Monday and another on Tuesday last week:

Monday's painting:

Tuesday's painting:

Well, these are really faded looking compared to the originals, but it's generally what they look like. I enjoyed making them. I don't think they're all that original (kinda remind of the t-shirts seen in shops everywhere these days). They were experimental and a step in another direction than where I have been. So in that way they are good. I feel that I "learned" something new in their creation. It was just tremendously satisfying to paint on a canvass again. I think it's been a year or so since I last had. They are also filling a huge open space we had on our wall.

jfyi

My neglected blog, the Craftmonster shows what I've been making lately (in case you're interested). I've had a very creatively inspiring weekend. :)