Busy Busy Busy
Busy busy busy……….did I mention busy?
That’s the way things are around here for quite some time. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with all my kids and grand kids, even a few extras at the farm. We just set the table with what we could find there and with what we brought in. I even set the kitchen table with the blue and white turkey plates. My daughters brought flowers, my son in law went out to the woods for autumn branches. Good thing that there were a few attractive ones left from all the wind we’ve experienced lately. We even found my mother in law’s grandmother’s old buttermilk pitcher to put the flowers in on the table.
The kids brought their four-wheelers and son in law and son went hunting and got two deer. Great aunt cringed when she heard all the rifle shots as she just can’t bear thinking of shooting “Bambi”.
Studio time is practically non-existent right now……….but soon, soon, I’ll have time. Christmas will be quiet since one part of the family is traveling to Idaho.
But back to packing up about ten paintings…………I have a new gallery showing my work in Chicago. Hilligoss Galleries at 520 Michigan Ave. Go by if you’re near or visiting Chicago.
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Almost finished
The cooking marathon is winding down for today. I’m getting tired of power outages around here though. And right in the middle of my pumpkin pie. This is the one (low calorie with no crust) my daughter had on her lists of MUST make. At least it wasn’t the pie with the crust as it wouldn’t have fared as well in a 40 minute outage. The temperatures dropped in a few hours from 80 to 50’s…and about time as I had to turn on the a/c yesterday with all the baking.
I’ll mix up the sweet potato casserole in the morning and bake it at the farm. All cutlery so I’ll have enough for 16 people and some extra tablecloths along with all the food I fixed and head over there in the morning. Maybe I should stop for some flowers along the way if I have the time just in case there is no time for branch gathering.
The fridge is groaning……….the dressing needs a touch of salt but less is better than more.
The UPS man just delivered my prize for winning ” Best Design” in the Summer Creative Catalyst exhibit recently juried by Ann Baldwin. How nice that I got an Arches watercolor pad and a Canson drawing pad and a certificate……presents already and not even Christmas.
I hope all reading this will have a wonderful Thanksgiving with all the people you hold dear. I won’t warn you to watch what you eat after making the chocolate pie that could be called “high cholesterol pie”…..but it my husband’s favorite so I have to make it.
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The Marathon begins….Rachael Ray I ain’t…
From the title…you know what this means. The marathon is the two days before Thanksgiving and/or Christmas Dinner. Chopping and dicing….making lots of cornbread for dressing has begun. No bread in this East Texas dressing either….100% cornbread, eggs, onions, celery, sage, salt and pepper to taste and plenty of broth from a hen…no turkey. Turkey is a whole separate thing. Gotta have that good ole fat hen or it just won’t do. My son and his wife are bringing a Cajun fried turkey from Louisiana…okay.. okay…only 65 miles across the state line but it’s a good line anyway. It’ll be something new like the year my son in law made tur-duck-in…or however you spell it. I keep thinking I’ve got to make something more healthy and less of it, too. You know that never works since everyone has their favorite thing that we really MUST have.
I’ve been to the grocery store a couple of times already but I must remember to get another fridge ’cause there is never enough room. Then there is the fact that I can’t make up my mind between a couple of different sides so I buy for both just in case. No time for homemade rolls this year either. I try to make them every year but this year I’ll be hauling all this to the farm 30 miles away and I just can’t do it all and haul it, too. Another thing…no microwave and a huge kitchen with hardly any working counter space and work pattern is non existent. I have to do it all mostly here. Wish I could have the time for walking down through the pastures and woods looking for branches and leaves for decoration like my mother in law used to do.
This year I’m dedicating this Thanksgiving day to our dear papa and granny. They passed away 18 days apart in Sept/Oct…..We had so many wonderful holidays over there at the farm/ranch, and now they’re gone. Maybe we’ll have the place next year, and then, maybe not so this year is the year. It won’t be the same without them and their generosity and love of sharing a good meal and talk with the people they love most….but we’ll try.
Oh yeah….the Rachael Ray mention…..such a lovely, energetic young woman and she was on TV when I started this…so I remembered her tip for having a “garbage bowl’…..good tip, too, Rachael. Maybe someday I’ll have my TV and computer in range of the kitchen so I can actually listen and write without running all over the house.
Back to the chopping………….
Continued…
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Whirlwind trip
. 1954-55 Barbara Hepworth, Two Figures
Teak and paint
(57 x 24 x 17 1/2 in.)
A Whirlwind still….I don’t leave here until noon…or the airport anyway.
The trip to Chicago has been so much fun. I’ve never been to this city and it is bustling and moving all the time. The Gold Coast B & B was a fantastic place to stay and situated so well for getting around the downtown areas. One of my Paint-l friends, Elin Pendleton and her husband were here and staying at the B & B and that was also a real plus.
The Hilligoss Gallery owner asked me to send him some digitals of my work. It would be a good place for my work….we’ll see what happens.My diptych looked wonderful in it’s place in the show, if I say so myself. It could be seen from the front door of the gallery when entering…on the staircase leading up to the second level. The gallery does a wonderful job of lighting, too.
There were two evening receptions so time for just getting out and about was at a premium. I finally got to the Art Institute yesterday. I didn’t want to miss the Jasper Johns “Gray” show that just opened. Although I thought gray would be a little too much for me, I was intrigued by his work, the mark-making and layering. I should have bought the catalog since it appears to have wonderful photos of the work…I’m.too cheap so I’ll get it later maybe online. I look forward to reading more than you can read walking around reading wall cards. No photos were allowed for temporary shows so I don’t have any. I did take a few of other works in the Permanent Collection….then remembered I didn’t take a photo of the wall cards for them so I only remember for sure a Kurt Schwitters, and Barbara Hepworth piece.
Leaving the Institute there were protestors about the war milling around and a fellow playing sax…what a combination. I walked for a ways and even came across the “Bean” and other sculptures in parks as I walked. Then I even crossed the Chicago River and took this picture from the walkway.
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Am I lucky ???
What a fantastic start to my trip to Chicago. Of course, like everyone else I have wonderful kids. I go to Dallas frequently since my oldest daughter has a condo there. It is always so much fun to experience the vitality of a large city and she lives in a great area for getting around.
When I took my stuff in and put my overnight case in my room….there was a beautiful chocolate box with a ribbon on it on my pillow. She was out of town but took extra trouble to make her mom feel good…I’m gonna cry.
I had time to relax so I went shopping…..didn’t buy a thing. Isn’t that a great feeling…didn’t see a thing I needed. So, I’m set for Chicago whatever weather, As my friend Pat tells me every time I wan to pack everything and anything…..”you aren’t going to outer Slobovia…if you need it, you can buy it there.”
Chicago, here I come……….tomorrow.
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Commissions
My friend Robin mentioned recently she was glad to see that I didn’t have a problem with getting a commission to look like another painting I’d done previously.
All my galleries and a design firm all wanted The Red Thread. So I was asked if I could make another diptych very similar. Of course, I said yes. Yes, that is if it’s okay to make something similar and not an exact duplicate. So I set to work and did this as The Red Thread 2. I realized the color is a little more emphatic than the first one. When I put them up side by side just now, I see that the “sky” is also a lot bluer and this new one is a lot more detailed in the foreground. I like both of them but the first one is a little more subtle and more monochromatic. Hope the design firm likes the second one the way it is since it is “similar”. Guess we’ll see soon enough.
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Same ‘ole, Same ‘ole
I worked like a demon and got the diptych similar to The Red Thread 90% finished. Then I found out the contract wasn’t in the mail after all. Why is it that with design people it’s always “hurry up and wait”? Yeah…I know, they need to know what the artist can do, how much and how fast, then they submit to the client and they also wait just like we do for the final contract.
My large canvases were ready yesterday so I’ll be “prepared” if nothing else.
Oh well, waiting is one of those things we all have to do sometimes. So, it was a good time for a little break……..and those darn trick or treaters, came got their chocolate candy and for the first time in my 39 1/2 years in this house someone threw eggs at my newly washed SUV and house. What gets into their minds you wonder that they don’t know that eggs can actually ruin the finish of paint on an auto? I’m just happy to have found it so quickly in the morning before it set up too long or the heat hit it.
Oh yeah…….these little Gremlins are two of my grandkids. They got the first chocolate picks, of course.
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Back in the studio
I’ve been back in the studio but haven’t found anything to post to the blog. Seems like I’m always prefacing my blog entries with apologies for not posting. I’m going to stop doing that.
Usually I yell hallelujah to have nice sunny weather but I’m getting ready for a little cooler weather and I need rain on my lawn………..SO today the cool front is due to arrive.
We’re still in limbo on the farm/ranch but that will go on for some time. In the studio I’m preparing for a 40 x 70 diptych for a client in Austin, TX……..also another the same size that is not divided into two canvases. The first one will be along the lines of The Red Thread and the other similar to Collioure 3, except as a horizontal rectangle instead of a square. (image cropped and shown).
I don’t have that great a memory for all the layers of all my paintings so I’ll just have to wing it and hope it works out. Sometimes later paintings are better and then there are the times that the first ones hold the “magic” that is gone when that one is finished. We’ll see. Someone mentioned a quote (I am so bad at remembering things verbatim)……..to the tone of “good enough is not good enough”. That’s my philosophy as well so I’ll be trying for excellence, not just good enough.
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Guess what, another red painting!
Another red painting! I was working on this one before I left for colony and decided to not take it with me. All the family emergencies have kept me from getting back to it until last night. I think the colony visiting artist, Randall LaGro was right. Some paintings are finished when you come back to look at them again with new eyes. This one had a little tweaking to do but from a distance you wouldn’t know I did any more to it.
I was rushing around today looking for a box to ship a painting to an Austin, TX gallery. They need to be able to show a client my actual work before commissioning a painting. Everyone seems to want “The Red Thread“….these people included, so I might be making a similar painting on down the line. The original just got to the Hilligoss Galleries in Chicago this afternoon. It will be included in the Women Artists Of The West show there, opening November 9 and 10. If anyone will be in the downtown Chicago area on those dates, come by and introduce yourself. I’ll be making my first trip to Chicago for this show.
I’m tired and even more tired of trying to find a good ISP for out in the country.
Wonder what this new red painting will be titled….it’s 48 x 36″.???? Suggestions welcome.
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Good, bad, weird
Good things, bad things, weird things!
GOOD…I got home from colony all fired up with probably 6 unfinished paintings in various stages of finish. I had lots to do and clear out so I could get back to it…..including finishing a 48 x 36 I had on the wall easel.
Do I have it all done, or half??? NO NO NO. I’ve been flitting from one thing to another and not getting anything cleared. AND then the BAD/SAD, my mother in law died…only two weeks after her husband. Not easy to think and talk about. They both had a long life but we’re never really ready to say goodbye…and then we have to whether we’re ready or not.
So in the midst of all this all the paintings are still lining the hall, all the paints are still in their wheeled boxes, the unfinished one on the wall is still not finished and even all the images from Colony haven’t been formatted or the web pages set up. On top of that…………the WEIRD is that just before all this I ordered a new cell phone. WELL, let me tell you, I change stuff like this infrequently and now I even have a different brand so there is a new tech learning curve. This new slider Sony Ericsson W 580i (white) can play music, help you work out and count your steps, take 2 M pictures and who knows what all that I have to figure out how to do. I finally figured out how to get all the stuff from one sim to the other , charge, and make calls at least. Some of the other goodies may have to wait for another day as I don’t know how to get music on it yet and heck it has hands-free and ear buds. Maybe this will keep my brain young.
GOOD……….someone is really interested in Conversations, Blue Green but I was on my way to making “arrangements’. Maybe it will go through and maybe not.
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WOW
Wow…..yesterday my Seattle gallery sold a painting to a music producer in Tokyo. What a great feeling to think that one of my paintings is flying over the Pacific right now and will make its home on a wall in Japan….and on the cover of a music CD.
It’s been a slow week for art making due to the death of my father-in-law. It’s so sad and we’ll all miss him so much.
I’ve also packed up and shipped out two more boxes of paintings to Louisiana…but this time some works on paper. That will be a new one for this gallery as they’ve always wanted the large canvases. Hope it goes well for their big anniversary in a couple of months.
I did get into the studio some though. I’d been mulling around in my mind for some time a painting that I was never really satisfied with. SO that sucker is now painted over. AND, it was so good that it was red. I LOVE red, maybe too much sometime. I don’t want it to be a crutch to have red in its various multitude of values and intensities under ALL my paintings. So far, this new incarnation is very red as well but totally different than the other one.
My order for ten new large canvases barely made it in under the wire. I picked them up Friday before they closed. I am so lucky to have a canvas manufacturer right here in town….saves me a ton on shipping costs. I have to have a good assortment of sizes for the Mississippi Art Colony session next week.
Guess I better decide what I’m taking as I only have tomorrow and Monday to pack it all up. The visiting artist this session is Randall LaGro from Taos. Looks like this could be another great colony.
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National Assn. of Women Artists
Opening reception went great for the NAWA Invitational show, Landscapes, that opened Saturday night. There were four artists from the group there to say a few words about their work. There was a surprise for me walking into the museum……a podium had been set up on the raised stage at the back of the east gallery where the show hung. I’d not thought of the “art talk” as being so formal, but we muddled on through. In fact, it turned out quite well. I’m happy I didn’t know or I’d have been nervous.
This week I’m taking time off for family time. Although you know it’s coming some day for the aging members of the family, you still aren’t prepared for the death of a loved one.
If I’m able to make it to Mississippi Art Colony next week……….it will be back to painting and a few blog entries.
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