That's me standing on the hill just outside the kitchen of Nate's parents' house in the mountains, trying to catch a quick 6x8" sketch of the sunset. My audience is the daughter of some good friends, who actually had enough interest and patience to stand there and watch me do the entire painting! She's a great kid, and cute too - I painted her portrait a few years ago.
Anyhow, I just wanted to say thanks everyone for providing such encouraging comments on my last post! It's good to hear some positive thoughts from people in the business, and know that I'm not alone here. I spent about a day wallowing in negativity after that post, which surprisingly made me feel a lot better! After that I got back to work on pieces for my show, and I've been making a lot of progress.
I've got almost five weeks left until the opening, and so far I have 17 paintings done for the show. I'm aiming to have about 20 pieces, so I feel like I'm in pretty good shape right now. I'm planning to do one more 30x40" piece, and another 24x36" piece, which will probably each take about a week, and then I'm just planning to work on some smale 8x10" or 9x12" studies. Most of the paintings I have done are either framed, or at least ready to be framed in frames that I already have (don't get me started on the expense of framing an entire show all at once!!). I gave images to the gallery on Sunday to use for the mailer that will go out in a couple of weeks, and my SW Art ad has been designed and is ready for publication. I just have to finish the remaining paintings, get everything framed up, and get all the photos up on my website and the gallery website.
Once the paintings have been delivered, I think I'm going to take a week off and relax. I have some creative projects that I've been wanting to do around the house since we moved, and I'd love to have some time to do them. I think it would be nice to take a bit of a vacation from "work" too. I feel 100% blessed that I get to do this as my job, but it's hard work to be a fulltime artist AND a fulltime mom at the same time. I think by the end of this month I'll be ready for a rest!
Glad to hear you are doing better. Being a new Mom, an artist, and recent ex-engineer and preparing your first show has got to come with a certain amount of stress. Taking time off after the show will do wonders for you. I had the best sleep the night after my opening. You probably will notice as you take your break new ideas will creep in on their own, you will be itching to get back at it.
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