Angels and Saints Show

Last Friday was gallery stroll in Salt Lake City, and the reception for our show at Local Colors - Angels and Saints. If you've been following my blog at all you will know I have been painting saints, a bunch of them.

That night we also had a halloween party at the gallery and dressed up. The picture of the ultra-hot guy is Troy Nuttall who I did the show with. He does really cool photography and then adds photoshop effects to them. He created angels with halos of dandelions and neat things like that. Very artsy and very talented. He dressed up like a 50's biker dude.

The other picture is another one of my saints, the Saint of Motherhood. I dressed up as a Saint, but didn't manage to get a picture of myself. I hope to get some soon. I begged Shanna who also did the show with us to send me some of the pictures of the reception. I will post them when I get them.

Shanna is a master bead weaver and makes glorious jewelry. I am hoping to have a picture of her to share here as well.

We had a great show and thanks to everyone who came by to see us!

Saint of Breast Cancer Awareness

It wouldn't be October without a Saint of Breast Cancer Awareness. This is an 8x10 painting with a pink halo and delicate flowers - pink of course!

Tonight I am working on framing all the paintings for my show. Then tomorrow I hope to paint a couple of small saints. I should have started painting sooner. So many ideas and not enough time!

Saint of Peace

A few more days of painting left before I have to hang my show at Local Colors on Wednesday. I finished this painting yesterday and it is titled 'Saint of Peace'.

Peace is an essential part of my life, a necessity for my own happiness. Although I may not always find it in the world today, I can strive to have it in myself. It is a gift from God that I treasure.

Saint of Great Joy

I have about a week and a half before the opening of my show in Salt Lake. It's time to get cranking, since I don't have the number of paintings done that I would like. However I have a number of them started and I just need to finish them!

This painting is titled Saint of Great Joy. Awhile back I ran across an anonymous quote that reads; "Jumping for joy is the best exercise".

This painting is 14" x 11" and is framed in a gold frame.

Saint of Turning Back Time

Onward with my journey of painting saints. This one was suggested by my friend Amy who works for Sundance Catalog as a designer. She is also an amazing jewelry artist and a mom.

Ah if we could have a saint that could turn back time, we could get more done in the day. That's a goal that is worthy enough to merit a saint for it, right?

The Saint of Kind Words

I finished another piece for my upcoming show at Local Colors. As mentioned earlier on my blog, I am doing a theme of Saints. I think the world is full of them! Good people everyday inspire me with plenty of reference material in their kind words and deeds. In my book a saint is anyone that inspire us to live better by their example.

This piece is called The Saint of Kind Words. If we all had a one of these saints, I wouldn't have a to paint a 'Bite your tongue' Saint!

Catching up - Thanksgiving Point Plein Air

This past weekend - well week actually, I participated in a plein air competition. Now landscapes are not my cup of tea, but it sounded like fun so I signed up. In conjunction with the competition they had a two day art festival so I signed up to have a booth as well.

On Thursday I loaded up my paints and went to participate in the competition. Thanksgiving Point has these massive formal gardens and with so much beauty it was hard to choose what to paint. Having visited the gardens a month ago I decided to paint something that had previously caught my eye. It was a statue of herons (I think) located in the Monet Gardens. The competition actually ran 3 days in which I could paint but because of previous commitments I could only paint on the last day. By the time I got setup it was noon and the paintings had to be done and framed by 5:00 that afternoon. I suddenly realized that I didn't allow myself much time!

I set to work, sitting in the full sun, plastered in sunblock as I enjoyed the warm September day. Not being a plein air artist I had chosen acrylic as my medium. It wasn't too long I realized the folly of mixing acrylic and hot sun. It dried almost immediately! Nevertheless I pressed on and painted til 4:10, then hiked back to my car to frame my piece.

I didn't win a prize in the competition, but I surprised myself that I could paint a landscape and I enjoyed the peacefulness that I found in the garden that day. I think I will do it again next year but definately paint in oils instead!

Plein Air At Gilgal

There is nothing better than spending a warm summer afternoon in a garden painting. Today I painted plein air at Gilgal Gardens 10th year Celebration. It was made by Thomas Child who created in his backyard this sculpture garden that illustrated his beliefs. Here's the link if you are interested; http://www.gilgalgarden.org/

For the celebration they asked artists from Local Colors to come and paint plein air. Our gallery is just around the corner from the garden. I chose to paint the Alpha and Omega arch. I took a picture of my painting and the arch so you could see. It's about a 1/3 way done and I will finish it in a week or so.

Let the Saints Begin!

As previously mentioned I have a show mid October at Local Colors and had decided to do a theme of Saints. So between now and then about everything I paint will be Saints.

This weekend I will have a booth at the Avenues Street Fair in Salt Lake. This is a lovely community day long festival which I have done for 5 or 6 years now. One thing that is really enjoyable about it is that everyone brings their dogs to it. You see the most amazing variety of dogs! I love it.

So with dogs in mind, my first saint painting is a dog! St. DoggyBeGood is the saint of doggy treats. He is very sweet in nature and very popular among dogs.

If you happen to be in Salt Lake this weekend come visit me. The fair will be on 7th Avenue between I and N streets. I will be sharing a booth with John Blumenkamp - an awesome photographer. Our booth will be between K and L street, on the south side #22.

I will be bringing my dog (painting), come meet St. DoggyBeGood.

Dancing with Dogs - Revisited

Last March I had a show at Local Colors and one of the paintings I did for it was Dancing with Dogs. Recently I entered this painting in the Intermountain Society of Artists Fall Show. Tonight was the reception and awards ceremony. I was happy to win a 3rd place award for it, along with a Recognition award for another painting called "What's Next". It is always nice to win awards, it kind of makes you feel you are doing something right with your art.

Being one of the last to leave from anything I attend (I don't know why - probably I gab too much) I noticed a lady that kept going over to Dancing with Dogs. Then she was trying to measure it with a string since there wasn't any measuring tapes around. Well of course I stepped right up and told her the measurements - 3' x 4'. She told me she was a volunteer at the Cultural Celebration Center (where this show is). Her daughter had come in and looked at the show first and told her mom that she saw a painting that she just loved. Then the mom got a chance to take a look and found a painting she really liked. Both of them loved Dancing with Dogs! So.... after calling her son to make sure it would fit above their piano, she bought it! Whoo-hoo, an $1800 painting!

When you sell in a gallery you don't often get the opportunity to meet the people who buy your paintings. I can't tell you what a treat it is when you get to meet them and you know your painting is going to a good home.

So tonight, I am counting my blessings and being thankful and grateful to be an artist. It is a joyful occupation.

Life is Ever Changing

Good news! Local Colors of Utah will soon premiering their new website. I am excited about that because I will be able to offer my gallery work online. If you have looked through my blog you will see that I have a mixture of styles in my artwork. After thinking long and hard I decided I will be upgrading what I offer online on Etsy and Ebay to something similar to my gallery work. I am also going to focus more on a particular style.
It has been tough these past couple of years for artists with the economy being what it is. For my online venues I have tried to lower my prices, paint faster, I have aimed for making a certain wage per hour to try to make a steady income. It's been hard as art is more of a luxury than a necessity.
So after much thought I have decided to focus on making a presentation of art that is more consistent whether it be for sale on my gallery website or on etsy or ebay. I will also be more consistent in pricing, so regardless where you shop, it will be comparable. There will probably be variances, for example; if an item is framed will cost more than one that is not framed, and so on.

So for the next few weeks there will still be a modgepodge of styles in my art and pricing, but once what I have is gone, you can expect the new style and pricing.
At least that's my thought for today. We will see how well I stick to it.

Today I am featuring a little ghost called Little Halloween Ghostie. She is an art doll/ornament and can hang wherever you want some haunting! She is on ebay for $25. Click the ebay link at the top of this page for purchase.

She Would Be Queen, A Catitude

Lately it seems my life has been comparable to a turbulent ride in a plane smack dab in the middle of a storm over a large ocean filled with sharks. Ok, maybe not that bad. Ok, maybe not bad at all, I just wanted to write that.

Today I put on ebay a painting titled 'She would be Queen'. It is the first in a series of 'Catitudes'. I find that cats seem to command that they be treated as royalty, at least those that I have become acquainted with. You almost have to admire a cat that has catitude. They exist so that we may serve them. This ebay auction will end next Tuesday evening, Sept. 7th.

Procrastination (sung to the tune of Anticipation)

Remember the Carly Simon song Anticipation? Well I substituted the word procrastination for anticipation. That's my song for the day, all day long. Here I'll sing it for you;

"Procrastination, Procrastination is making me late, is keeping me waiting".

Today I had a painting deadline for the Utah Watercolor Society Fall show. First I pulled up the call for entry and read that I could email my image, but the entry fee and form was also due today and it had to go to Park City. Heck, I hadn't even painted my painting yet, I didn't have time to run to Park City! So it was without too much resignation to my fate of missing the deadline that I posted my entry form dilemma on Facebook.

It wasn't long before my UWS/Facebook friends contacted me with the glad tidings that the entry form only had to be postmarked today. Woohoo, I was off the hook and could enter the show after all. Or was I ON the hook? I still didn't have a painting to submit. I have to confess I did have a half-way-done painting that I started last winter. I had started it with the intent to submit it for UWS Spring show which was last May. Of course I didn't get it done. Now seemed the perfect opportunity to finish it.

The Fall show also has a theme which is your painting should illustrate a poem. The poem I chose is by E. E. Cummings titled Seeker of Truth...

seeker of truth

follow no path

all paths lead where

truth is here

I finished the painting, took a picture of it and emailed it off, took the entry form directly to the post office, watched it get stamped with today's date. Whew!

So there you have it- a full confession of my procrastination. There is a consequence though. Procrastinating means that you don't always do your best work, at least I don't. The painting is ok, and at least I had something to enter. So I am content in my procrastination today and can honestly say "if it weren't for the last minute, I wouldn't get anything done".

Experimental Angel

I have a show in mid-October at Local Colors of Utah gallery. Of course I haven't started painting for it yet. Can you say procrastination? Good! I probably should legally change my middle name to that.

I have in mind to do a series of saints, kind of a whimiscal perspective of what kind of saints people might like to have, for instance; a saint of chocolate. Anyone who really loves chocolate would adore a chocolate saint, right? And I am not talking about the hollow chocolate Santas that you get at Christmas. Anyway, I have all kinds of ideas for Saints, like all the dog lovers really ought to have a saint of dogs, or one for cats... the list can go on and on.

So today I did a study, not for my show, but some experimentation of painting on a textured canvas. I wanted to try some things out before I actually started painting for my show. This painting is a 20"x 16" and is titled 'Petit Ange' or Little Angel. I enjoyed painting on the texture which included some random collaged papers and then I applied a layer of modeling paste and went over it with a little roller. I liked the effect I got with the texture and will try it again tomorrow.

This painting is currently up for auction on ebay and will end next Monday on Sept. 30th. Click on the ebay link at the top of this page to see all my auctions.

A Wedding Present

On Thursday night my son Brock flew in from Florida to be the best man at his best friend's (Jake) wedding. They've been friends since high school. Brock wanted to give a painting for the wedding present. He doesn't paint, so guess who got to paint it?

He'd been talking about it for several weeks but we never nailed down the subject matter for the painting. So on Wednesday we decided to do something that might be meaningful to Jake. He had proposed to his girlfriend while on a trip to Jerusalem on the Mount of Olives. So I thought maybe I could paint an olive tree and find a scripture to go along with it. However, I didn't get around to painting it and I talked Brock into giving Jake something already painted. Brock seemed a little disappointed, so this morning I decided I would give the olive tree a go. I am not a landscape painter by any means, so it is always a stretch for me to do this type of subject matter.

It took me most of the day and then I framed it, put a big bow on it and it was ready for the reception this evening. The scripture I found for it was in Psalms 52:8.
'But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God: I trust in the mercy of God for ever and ever.'

I often like to use symbolism in my paintings so I looked up the meaning of olive tree. It stands for peace, strength and prosperity. Good things to wish for a newly married couple. I hope it will also remind them of the day they were engaged.

So... busy day.

Cats Have Never Forgotten

One of my favorite quotes about cats goes like this:
"Thousands of years ago, cats were worshipped as gods. Cats have never forgotten this".

I happen to know this to be true. All the cats I have ever met expect homage - just short of a curtsey. No doubt they'd expect a curtsey too if it were in their vocabulary.

This painting is available for sale - just contact me for information. It is 16" x 20" x 3/4" on gallery wrapped canvas. It is done in acrylic with some collage. The sides are painted black and it is wired on the back and ready to hang! Just $200 for buy it now! Free shipping.

August is Zipping Along

Today I painted ACEOs - Art Cards Editions and Originals. Since it's August and kids will be heading back to school soon I did a theme. Back to School! Only instead of kids I painted animals.

I have four of them today, the bunny one is called 'Learning to Write Your Own Name', the dog one is called 'Bulldog Genius', the cat one is 'First Day of School' and the pig one is 'Pig Latin'.

They will all be on auction on ebay starting today and tomorrow.

A Frog is a Frog is a Frog Except When It's Not

Gertrude Stein said "A rose is a rose is a rose".

My art teacher in high school introduced me to that quote. Unfortunately I can't remember why. But it did come to mind when I thought about posting my newest, most fantabulous art doll creation. This little doll started out as a 'frog is a frog is a frog', but ended up as an exception, as in 'except when it's not'.

I titled this little art doll "Frog child'. I think that whatever it is, frog or child, it appears to be quite contented. Frog Child is 9 inches tall and when it was an itty bitty thing it was called the Tadpole Kid. At first I wasn't sure if it was a frog or a toad, but now that I wrote Frog Child on the back, I guess that makes it a frog. Artistic license allows an artist to do stuff like that.

Frog Child is now on auction at ebay and is hoping someone will adopt it and give it a real name.

Cherry Popsicles

Gee, here I was sitting, eating a cherry popsicle, thinking the world was grand when all of a sudden I hear the sound of water running- not where it's supposed to be running! My son was doing some laundry and the drain was clogged and well, it kind of made a mess. But not too big of a mess. I caught it before we drowned.

This week I made a couple of dolls. One is titled Tattered Ballerina, just because she is antiqued and her tutu is bit tattered. She is made of cloth and is sculpted in paperclay. The other is Bizzel the Witch Girl. She is a painted lady. I think that's what I will call my dolls that are just painted and don't have any paper clay sculpture on them. By definition, painted lady could be A. a victorian house, B. a butterfly, or C. a lady of the evening (you know what I mean...) or the most newest definition: D. one of my folk art dolls that are painted. Ta Da!

Did I mention that both dolls are on ebay? The ballerina ends on Tuesday and the Witch (aka painted lady) ends next Sunday. I think I need another cherry popsicle. Life is good as long as drains don't get clogged in the middle of eating one.

Success!

Yesterday my sister dear and I walked 7 miles. There is no one better to walk with than a sister or good friend. In my case, my sister is also my bestest of friends! Then in the evening I walked another mile and half with my friend down the street and when I got home I then went walking with my son for another mile. Now the cool thing about walking with wonderful people is that you get to talk to them and hear about the great things happening in their lives.

Today I painted an acrylic and charcoal painting called 'Success'. It will be listed on ebay tonight. I put a quote on it by Ann Landers that I really adore: "The Lord gave us two ends - one to sit on and one to think with. Success depends on which one we use the most".

So I have to say that based on that philosophy, yesterday I had a very successful day because I certainly wasn't sitting much!