BDAC Opening Reception

On Friday night I attended the opening reception of the Bountiful Davis Art Center's State-wide Show (boy that's a mouthful). As previously mentioned I had a piece accepted in it and so did a number of friends. I thought I would be the artful reporter and take pictures and report on the opening. However after 3 pictures the battery on my camera went dead. So much for artful reporting.

The first image is of Cara Koolmees, an award winning watercolor artist, known for her colorful splashy watercolors. Two of her paintings were accepted in the show. She is shown here with Dancing in the Rain, or was it Rain Dance? Gee am I a good reporter or what... I didn't take notes. Oh well. I really liked this painting.

The second image is of Pat Rivkind. This is the first juried show she has ever entered. She said it's my fault because I told her about the show a couple of weeks ago at the UWS miniature show opening. She does some nice work and she just needs to have confidence in it. I hope getting juried in this show helps! Great job Pat, and I love your black and white jacket with your painting - the truck on the bottom, a watercolor... didn't get the name on that one either...duh!

If you are from Salt Lake, you might be familiar with Tanner Frames, a high quality frame shop owned and operated by Travis Tanner. Did you know that he is a talented artist as well? This is his piece, an assemblage and beautifully framed, of course. Travis always gets juried into all the major shows here in Utah... Again I didn't get the title of the piece, but Travis does have cute dimples.

After my camera died, I hi-jacked my Mr. Joe's camera and got a few more pictures. If I can get them off his camera in the next few days, I will post them here.

Listen With Love

Today I painted another study for my show. This is a vast improvement for me. Not only am I NOT painting the day of the scheduled show but I am doing studies. That's good, right?

As an artist I am always questioning myself, or should I say my art(?). If you have read my blog much you would see that my art roams. Roams in style, that is! So as I think about these studies that I am doing, and I ask myself " is this what I want in my show in March?" I am like a fish out of water... flip, flop. I can't make up my mind what style I want to paint. So... I would appreciate any input from anyone who happens to read this: Should I be painting my more realistic paintings for my show or a series of these whimisical paintings, like this study which is titled: Is Auditor Per Dilago (She Listened With Love).

Either way, both styles would still be on the whimsy side, but I would surely appreciate comments and welcome your opinion!

Hot Flash!

The other day I was at a board meeting and the ladies who were present started talking about hot flashes. There were some pretty humorous stories that brought a smile to my face. So today as I thought about what I wanted to paint for a gallery show in March, I couldn't help but think about those ladies and their stories. I had already determined I wanted the theme of my show to be about women and everyday things that happen in their lives. So you guessed it, I painted a study for the show called Hot Flash. I am thinking I will do the whole show in my stylized women, instead of realistic ones.

Guess what? I got notice today that my 'Carpe Diem' painting was accepted into the show! Hooray!

Carpe Diem!

Well another show to enter... I can't help it, I like to enter shows! This one was a state-wide call for entries at the Bountiful Davis Art Center.

Not sure I liked what I entered, but since that's all I had painted, I entered it. It seemed ok yesterday, but now that I look at it, there are things I would fix if I had a little more time. But hey, it's titled 'Carpe Diem' and if you saw the Dead Poets Society, or maybe you just happen to be fluent in latin, you will know it means seize the day! That's the title of the painting. My son thought the girl in this painting was looking upward in a positive manner, like she was planning something good. But 'Planning Something Good' wasn't a very good title. So after some quick thinking (I was running out of time) I came up with the title! Now if the painting will just get juried into this show.... I will know it really was Carpe Diem-ing!

Award of Excellence - Yipppeee Skippeee!

Tonight was the reception for the Utah Watercolor Show. There was a lot of really good paintings there, a total of 110. It was a great evening, what could be better than mixing with dear friends who are also artists!

I was very excited to learn that my painting 'A Hypothetical Question' won an award of Excellence, which is next in line to the Best of Show. Yippeee Skippeeee! Best of Show went to Ian Ramsay. If you look back in my blog to October of last year, I had taken a workshop from him and had posted one of his paintings there. You can see what a truly fine artist he is.

There was a time when I would be blushing three shades of red to tell you about this award, but over the past few years - especially once I joined a gallery - I had to learn to talk about my art and do more than just mumble an embarrassed 'thank you' when someone paid a nice compliment. If you are an artist and want to market your work, you have to learn to talk about your art. I mean, would you have much confidence in an accountant if he shyly said he probably could do a good job on your taxes? No, he would tell you why he is qualified! So once I realized that being an artist was my profession and that I needed to have confidence in my work and talk about it, I don't blush quite so often anymore. I just say Yippeee Skippeee!

A month later, the ebay test

Over a month ago, I decided to see if I started my auctions at 9.99 if would bring more sales and more importantly with more views would the prices go up. Then I would report back on what happened.

Well, I mainly sold ornaments and the good news is that most everything sold. They didn't go as high as the ornaments that I sold before Christmas, but then it twas the season for ornaments then. I have had so many show deadlines this past month, that I didn't produce enough to really test it properly. I think I need to put more than ornaments on auction. One thing I really liked about starting auctions at the lower price is that my ebay fees have been immensly lower.

So would I continue starting at a lower price? I haven't totally decided if I will do it on a continuing basis. But for today, I thought I'd give it a shot with something other than ornaments - Today I put up an 10"x 8" oil painting titled 'Canine Thoughts'. Now on auction!

Happy Valentines Day!

It's a great day when everyone is thinking about love and the people they love. I hope everyone is have a lovely Valentine's day.

I made my first artsy doll, she was for a challenge on the cloth and clay doll group. It was to make a Queen of Hearts by Valentine Day. I made one, and she is delighted to make an appearance on my blog today. I guess I have never quite grown up, as I found she is as much fun to play with as she was to make.

My favorite subjects to paint are people and animals, so I am finding that making art dolls are a natural extension to that. I love the small format and look forward to exploring sculpting in paperclay and then using my hoard of odds and ends that I have kept around, hoping one day I would use it in my art. So really this is a theraputic de-junking exercise! :-)

Utah Watercolor Miniature Show

Well, if you have been following my blog, you will know I have a problem with painting for deadlines. Today the entries were due for the UWS miniature show, and I was kinda busy painting this morning! I was going to do two paintings but ran out of time since my car decided to have brake troubles ( I wasn't painting in my car though). I needed to address the brake issue and that took some time. Then my phone wasn't working again. Everytime it snows or rains it loses the dial tone. So I had to call the phone company AGAIN. Anyway I completed one painting and then decided to crop another existing painting that hadn't been in a show yet that I had painted in the past year. I think I may have posted the full version of it here before. I think it worked better cropped down. The call for entry said that the painting AND frame could not exceed twelve inches in any direction. So my images were approximately 5" x 7" and then framed were a total of 11" x 9". The titles are "A Hypothetical Question" and "Look!".

There were a lot of great entries in the show. It's going to be a good one. The opening reception is Wednesday, Feb. 17th from 6:00 to 8:00 pm at the Michael Berry Gallery, 163 East Broadway, Salt Lake City, UT.

I meant to post this on Saturday, and now it's actually early Sunday morning, but pretend it's still Saturday because I want to post a 'Happy Valentines Day' entry and I don't want you to think I'm a dork for posting twice on the same day.