Large Landscape Demo - PART II

So, when I stopped for the day yesterday, I was about a third of the way done with my acrylic underpainting and ready to continue on. First step today was to block in the dark accents on the rocky hillside and shoreline.


Continuing down the canvas, I block in the grass on the hillside and the surface of the lake. At this point I'm still keeping things simple. I use two values/colors for the grass, and block in the water as two large shapes without worrying about reflections.


Last, I indicate the foreground rocks, trees, and grass to finish the underpainting. This is offficially what I refer to as "the ugly stage" of my painting - the colors are a bit too bright and nothing is too refined. It's just enough for me to see where I need to go with the oils.


At this point, I had to take a break to go to the store and buy some Viva paper towels. I ran out, and the cheap kitchen paper towels just won't do for painting - I HAVE to use Viva in the studio. Actually, I really wish someone would invent a recycled paper towel that works as well as Viva - then I wouldn't have to feel so guilty about the volume of paper towels I throw away each week. Seriously.

Anyhow, now that the underpainting is done, I get to move on to the real fun! Here's my messy palette - this is about as clean as it gets. Also note my brushes that have been carelessly left in a can of mineral spirits - typical. I've been using Utrecht artist grade paints recently, and I love them. From left to right, the colors I have out are titanium white, cad yellow light, cad yellow lemon, cad orange, alizarin crimson, quinacridone red, burnt sienna, ultramarine blue, a teensy tiny dot of pthalo green, and a big blob of Weber res-n-gel. I only put out a tiny dot of the pthalo green becuase I only use it when I'm painting skies. I stay far away from it when painting grass or anything green - it's way too obnoxious. The res-n-gel is an addiction of mine - it turns paint into butter. Actually, I don't use too much of it, but I like to mix it with sitffer colors to make them flow better.


So, on to the oil painting. I start with the sky as usual, and work downward. In the picture below, I've painted in the sky, and started to block in the shadows on the mountain in the middle. At this point, I'm concerned mostly with shapes. I'm using a number 9 bristle flat and working to keep things simple (as usual).


Next, I start to refine the shadows a little bit, adding in darker accents and a bit more color (sorry - these pictures aren't really good enough to show what's going on).


The next step is to fill in some of the lighter shapes on the mountain. In the picture below, I've inadvertently covered up some of the shadows, and have yet to refine the lighter areas.


Now I work back and forth at the edge of the major shapes, making them work to define the form of the mountain, and refine the color and light.


I follow the same steps as I continue downward, painting in the shadowed ridge that comes down from the upper left corner. You can see here that I'm completely covering the underpainting as I go. It may seem like an unnecessary step, but having it there provides me with a framework to build on as I refine my colors and values.


So this is where I stopped today, after about an hour's work finishing the underpainting, and 4-5 hours spent working on the sky and mountain. Unfortunately, the more oil I put on the canvas, the more glare there is in the photos - I apologize that the final picture isn't the best. I'll try to get better pictures as I work tomorrow.

Large Landscape Demo - PART I

So much for my great idea of doing some smaller painting studies - I have a stack of large canvases ready to go in the studio, and they've been calling my name recently. I just started a 30x40" landscape today, and it's going to take a while, so I figured I'd post it as a detailed demo as I go along. I apologize in advance for the bad quality photos - the light in my studio isn't optimal for photographing paintings, and I was too lazy to square them all up in photoshop.

Anyhow, the first step in doing a large painting? Finding inspiration, of course! The subject of this painting is Lake Isabelle, which is in the Indian Peaks Wilderness area near Boulder, Colorado. This is a popular Boulder area hike because it's short (2 miles one way) and beautiful, so the trail is always packed with hikers. Nate and I hiked up with Aspen back in August. Nate's back was hurting so I carried Aspen in her backpack the whole way - it was a good workout!


I'm working directly from a photo reference for this painting - I've spent a lot of time hiking in this area, so my memory serves me pretty well for the color and feel of the place.

The first step is getting the drawing down on canvas. I usually draw directly onto the canvas with thinned paint, blocking in the major shapes and refining from there; however, since this is a large painting and a popular scene, I wanted to get the drawing just right. I have a hard time eyeballing a drawing on a canvas this large, so I sketched in a grid and transferred the main shapes on to the canvas in charcoal. As I paint, I'll move things around a bit to improve the composition, but I want to make sure I have the mountains drawn correctly to begin with. I'm not normally this anal with my initial drawing, but when I work large I like to make sure things are correct right from the start - a stupid mistake in the beginning can result in trashing an expensive canvas, not to mention wasting days of precious painting time.


Once I've finished the drawing, I start in on the underpainting. When I paint larger paintings in the studio, I do a full underpainting in thinned paint prior to finishing the piece with thick oil paint. The initial underpainting allows me to put down the major shapes and colors quickly so that I can judge how the composition and color is working as I go along. It also serves to cover the white canvas - even when I paint plein air, I do a quick block in of the major shapes in thin paint, just to cover the canvas.

I normally do my underpainting in oil paint thinned with mineral spirits, but I'm using acrylics for this one because I'm in a hurry to get in done and I want the underpainting to dry by tomorrow. I also used acrylics to do my underpaintings when I was pregnant and didn't have solvents in the studio, but that's another story. Anyhow, I use super cheap acrylics, and an even cheaper palette. They get covered up in the end, so I'm not too concerned about the quality of the pigments. Here I'm using white, cad yellow hue, cad orange hue, ultramarine blue, burnt sienna, alizarin, and some sort of obnoxious green. These paints are really bright - I do a lot of mixing of compliments to grey things down.


I start by painting in the sky. I don't know why, but I ALWAYS paint the sky first in every painting I do. Honestly, if someone made me start by painting some other part of the painting, I'm sure I would have a nervous breakdown on the spot. I'm a little bit obsessive about using the sky to judge everything else in the painting (color temperatures, etc.).


Once the sky is in, I start to block in the shadow shapes on the mountains.


I try to keep things simple, and I don't bother with variations in color temperature at this point. I only mix up a new color/value when I move to a different plane in the picture (in the case below, the mountains that are closer to the viewer).


The shadows really define the form of the mountains. Once they're done, I go in with a mid-tone to fill in the lighter shapes in the part of the mountain that is in the shade.


Next up is filling in the lighter shapes on the main part of the mountain that is in the sunlight.


Last, I fill in the lighter shapes on the sunlit hillside to the right, keeping things fairly loose and making sure the paint is thin and leaves no texture. At this point, the basic form of the mountain is blocked in, and I can see where I'm going to need to adjust my color temperature and value. For instance, the shadowed part of the mountain is a bit dark, the sunlit planes aren't bright enough, and the right hand side of the mountain needs work to define the rock forms.


And that's where I stopped for today. This is only about an hour's worth of painting, but I had finished another painting prior to starting in on this one, and I was getting tired. I've learned that once I start to get tired, it's time to put the paint brush down and take a rest. When I'm tired, I make bad decisions, and bad decisions just result in rework.

Nate's mom is watching Aspen tomorrow, so I'm planning to finish this underpainting and start in on the fun part - thick, buttery oil paint!

Tag, You're It!!

I've been tagged by fellow artist M.E. "Mike" Bailey, along with four other artists that he tagged in this post. The deal is that I have to post five random facts about myself, and then tag five other bloggers. Here are the official rules:

If you have been tagged, please follow these rules:

1. Link to your tagger and post these rules on your blog.
2. Share 5 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 5 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as wellas links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Anyhow, five things about me:

1. I never clean my paint brushes. I know it's terrible, but I leave them in a can of mineral spirits in between painting sessions. And yes, I use CHEAP bristle brushes!

2. I sing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" about 50 times a day. Actually, now that it's officially the Christmas season, I've added "Silent Night" to my repertoire just to mix things up a bit. Poor Aspen - she's got to listen to my terrible voice all day...

3. I discovered a mouse in my garage tonight - when I chased it it went into my swim bag, which means that I'm not going to be using my goggles anytime soon.

4. I make a mean chocolate chip cookie.

5. I used to compete in Scottish Highland Dancing. I wore a kilt and danced to bagpipes and all - it was actually REALLY good exercise.

Here are the five people I'm going to tag:

Lisa Call could teach any artist a few things about discipline and productivity, and what's more important, she's an amazing artist. I have to admit I wasn't very familiar with textile work before I found her blog, but I love her work!

Peter Yesis is a daily painter who always inspires me with his consistency and fantastic still life paintings. I love to read about the motivation and ideas behind his art - I'm tagging him because I figure maybe he'll share a bit more about himself as well!

Rene PleinAir is an artist from the Netherlands whose moody paintings always make me want to visit his country. Like Peter, he manages to finish a paintings almost every day - so impressive!

KT was one of my sorority sisters in college, and she doesn't blog enough anymore, so this will be motivation. Plus, I know she'll have five interesting things to say!

Ramblin' Girl has tagged me before, so I'm going to tag her back. This is a new game, so that's allowed right? It's not like, "Tag, you're it, no touch-backs!", is it? She's been posting some cool photos lately.

Couldn't Have Said it Better

"Primary Colors"
Oil on Panel
8x10"
2007





I was reading the new issue of Southwest Art last night and came across a couple of interesting statements by artist Woody Gwyn. They sum up a lot of my feelings about being a representational painter, and put things into words that I sometimes have difficulty explaining.

On subject matter:

I hope I transcend the subject. If your work is a literal transcription and is not done with a certain level of passion, it's just illustration. And the danger in abstract art is, if it's not done with a certain philosophical underpinning and passion, then it's just decoration. - Woody Gwyn

On choosing a life in art:

No one made me do this. I love being an artist and wouldn't do anything else. But it's strenuous. We artists don't just shake things out of our sleeves. It demands mental concentration, and at the end of a hard day painting, you are drained. The positive thing about being an artist is that every once in a while you make a breakthrough, and you really see the possibilty of new horizons in your work. Anything worthwhile is usually hard work, and you have got to want, want, want it.- Woody Gwyn

Now I'm off to the mountains for a few days. Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Quote of the Week

"The Last to Change"
Oil on Panel
8x10"
2007




I'm a sucker for good quotes. I tear them out of magazines and write them down on scraps of paper, and fill my notes with them when I hear people speak. Some of them are too good to lose, so I'm going to start posting them here every once in a while.

I keep this one in my studio to remind me how blessed I am to be able to paint:

“You can only become truly accomplished at something you love. Don’t make money your goal. Instead, pursue the things you love doing, and then do them so well that people can’t take their eyes off you.” -Maya Angelou

The Show

My first opening was Friday night, and it turned out to be a great experience! A lot friends and family came out to support me, which made the whole experience less intimidating than I thought it would be. A bunch of my (ex)coworkers from my engineering job came as well, which shows what great, supportive people they are. There was a decent turnout of collectors, and we sold some paintings, which is always nice! Quite a few people showed up who already own paintings of mine, and it was great to meet them and talk to them about my work.


I think that just about everyone I talked to asked me the same three questions (or a variation of each):

1) Do you paint on location?
2) How long does it take you?
3) Do you use your engineering degree?


The show hangs through the end of this month, but my work is done for the time being. Now it's back into the studio to get some paintings done for other shows and opportunities!


Now that I'm not working towards a show, I'd like to try some new things in the next few months. First, I really want to try out pastels. Second, I want to start doing some smaller work in an attempt to paint everyday - I like to paint wet-into-wet, so when I'm working on larger paintings I often don't paint unless I know I'm going to have a devoted chunk of time. I think doing smaller 6x8" studies would give me a way to pick up the brushes even when I have less time.

Nervous

Ugh - why didn't anyone tell me I was going to be so nervous the day of my first show opening!?!?

Luckily, Nate was really sweet and booked me a massage at a nice spa, and arranged to have my mom watch Aspen so that I can go relax. Hopefully it will work, because I'm a nervous wreck right now! I just want the opening to go well, be fun, and hopefully sell some paintings while we're at it.

If you're in town, stop by!!

Framed

Welcome to my messy studio! I've spent the past few days framing paintings for my solo show at Angler Art, and I think I've officially run out of room in my house to place the finished paintings.


A while back (like, a really LONG while), Shan asked me to talk about some of my wholesale framing sources, and I figure now is as good a time as any to discuss framing, since I'm up to my ears in it! Just a warning though - I have a LOT to say on this subject, so this might be a long rambling post...

As you can see from these photos, I typically frame my work in pretty classic gold leaf frames, or black frames with a gold liner. Every once in a while I'll use a "silver" leafed frame on a painting that seems too cool for gold. All of the frames I use have finished corners - in other words, there is no seam showing in the corner of the frame as it has been filled in and leafed over. This is a pretty standard gallery requirement in this part of the country.

For this show, the majority of my frames came from JFM Enterprises and Omega Moulding. I buy wholesale from both of these suppliers, using my Colorado state tax ID number.

JFM carries a lot of fairly classic frames, and the prices are hard to beat. Since I live halfway across the country, I usually expect shipping to cost about half the price of the frames, and they still end up more affordable than most places that carry finished-corner frames. The frame I use from them is a gold frame that curves inward, with ribbing on the inside edge (seen on the three lower paintings in the top picture above). Though most landscape painters out West like to use "Plein Air" frames with a flat profile and ornamental edges, I find that the flat profile does nothing for my work. This frame looks fantastic on almost all of my paintings, and it always looks expensive hanging in a gallery. I used a couple of these when I showed my work at the Forbes Galleries in New York, and I had a number of collectors tell me that my frames looked better than most in the show. The only problem with JFM is that they are often out of stock when I call to order this particular frame, and sometimes the frames can be on backorder for quite a while. Otherwise, they've been good to deal with, and have often replaced frames that were damaged during shipping with no questions asked.

Omega is a big company that supplies moulding to (I would guess) most frame shops in the U.S. Although their big thing is moulding, they also have a small line of what they call "Gallery Frames" - these are their finished corner gold and silver leafed frames. There are quite a few people who supply these frames retail, but I prefer to buy from Omega since I can, and since it's easier to buy in bulk directly from them. I like their line of dark frames the most - unlike most black frames I've used, these have a finish that's virtually indestructable, which means a lot when you've been as frustrated as I've been at nicked frames. You can see one of their dark frames on the sunset painting in the picture below.


Another place I buy a lot of frames from is Manny's of Denver. Manny runs a frame warehouse here in Denver, and I like that I can stop by in person and pick up finished frames anytime that I'm in a crunch for time. I used to frame almost all of my paintings with one of Manny's "silver" plein air frames (for the record, I put silver in quotes because Manny's silver finish isn't really silver, it's more of a cool gold). I've stopped using these as much because my gallery in town doesn't like them (even though my paintings in them sold with no problem). You can see the silver frame on the second to left painting in the picture below. I also like Manny's dark frames - the sunset painting in the very top photo in the post is in a Manny's frame. I used to buy a lot of these, but I've had some problems with the black part chipping easily. Since the black finish is actually black over red, with the black rubbed down to show some of the red, it's next to impossible to fix one of these frames once it's chipped. For that reason, I've been trying to steer away from these - it's frustrating to have to replace a frame that you paid $100 for.


What I wish is that I could afford to use custom frames all of the time, but at this point in my career, I just can't afford the expense. As my prices increase, I'm hoping to use more custom made frames. My favorite custom framer, who I used for some of my paintings in the Forbes show, is Mountain Goat Frames. Mountain Goat is run by a local artist and her husband, and their frames are beautiful. I had them make me some dark frames with a gold liner for the show, and they were not only beautiful, but extremely high quality. Their dark finish is extremely durable, and stands up to a lot of beating without the chipping problems I've experienced from Manny's. And because the frames are custom, you can have them do the gold leaf finish in any tone you want. I'd recommend Mountain Goat Frames to anyone looking for a really high quality finish, and a frame that will make your painting look like it's worth every penny.


Last, but not least, I order all of my framing hardware in bulk online. I honestly don't know the name of the place I ordered from last, because the stuff lasts me so long. I always keep multiple sizes of offset clips and screws on hand in the studio so that I'm prepared when I need to get paintings out the door. Nate recently bought me an electric screwdriver, which might not sound like the most romantic gift, but quickly became my favorite gift ever after framing twenty paintings in two days!!

Anyone want to mention a framer you can't live without? I'd love to hear who people use and what their experiences have been.

Feeling Better

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!

Faith, Persistence, and Patience

"Lena Basin"
Oil on Canvas
30x40"
2007




A lot of artists put their blogs out on the web as a marketing tool - a way to get new paintings out there and make an audience for their work. Me?? Not so much. I don't link from my website to my blog, or title it in a way that makes it easy to find if you google my name. Sometimes I question whether I should change that, but for the most part I keep it the way it is because I don't necessarily want it to be read by a bunch of potential patrons.

I started this blog to document my attempt at becoming an artist. The two reasons I keep it up are to record some of my thoughts and feelings so I can see where I've come from, and to put my experience out there for anyone who might think it's remotely interesting or helpful. I want be honest here, or else this has no purpose.

I haven't posted much lately because I haven't felt like I had anything positive to post, and I didn't want to post anything negative because well, you know, you never know who might read this blog. But I feel like I'm cheating myself that way because I think I'm in a spot right now where I'm really moving forward, and I don't want to move on and forget someday what a struggle this part of my career was. So the following paragraphs are going to be me being honest about the status of my career and my feelings. And this post is probably going to be really long and rambling so be forwarned. I just think it's important to be honest, so here goes...

Nate and I keep talking about how stressed we are right now. We're both thrilled to be doing exactly what we want to be doing - him building houses, me painting. But because we both love what we do so much, there's this added level of desperation to make it work, and right now we can't see the outcome. We don't know where we'll be a year from now, or even at the end of this year. We've come to the conclusion that God is trying to teach us a big lesson in faith, persistence, and patience. Faith that we're doing what God wants us to be doing and that it will work out in the end, persistence to get the work done that needs to get done to make it successful, and patience as we wait for the outcome. We've both taken that leap of faith, and we're just hanging in the air waiting to see where we land.

If somebody asked me to describe my life lately with one word, I would choose the word, "overwhelmed." After about a half year of just trying to get my wits about me after quitting my job, having a baby, and moving, I've finally settled into a bit of a routine that has allowed me to feel like I can finally try to move forward and expand my business. I've been spending all my spare time getting paintings ready for my first solo show, and starting to approach galleries to show my work. My mom watches Aspen two days a week for about six hours, and Nate's mom watches her one day a week, so I'm getting more time to paint than I ever have. The other days of the week I spend enjoying my little girl, and squeezing in painting time during her naps and after she goes to sleep. It's tiring, but I love it, and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

The gallery I show in here in Denver is doing a one-woman show for me in November, which I'm totally excited about because it's my first, and also because I'm hoping it'll bring in enough people that there'll be some decent sales. I'm working really hard to put together twenty quality paintings for the show. Once it's been hung, I want to know I did my best. I also just want it to look good and be successful, and I'm putting a lot of pressure on myself to do the best paintings I've ever done. Of course, not every painting is a success, so I've had some moments of frustration, and I have a growing pile of paintings destined for the trash bin. It's a small pile, but I still hate to add to it. At the same time, I think it's important not to get attached to my failures, so into the trash pile they go. Luckily I'm also starting to accrue a big stack of good paintings at this point, and so far I'd say I have about 12 decent paintings done and either framed or ready to be framed for the show.

In the process of getting these paintings done, I think my work is improving. I'm trying to be more sensitive with my brushwork and bring more mood across in my paintings. If it's a rainy day scene, I want it to feel like a rainy day. If it's a bright sunny day, I want it to feel like a bright sunny day. When someone looks at one of my paintings, I want them to feel where I was. I don't just want to copy a photo of a pretty scene. I think this is something that I'm going to work at for the rest of my life, but I feel like I'm at least making some progress right now, which is great.

I'd love to say that all that matters is my art, but with Nate starting his own business right now I actually depend a little bit on my income, so it's important that I'm selling too. Hence the search for new galleries to carry my work.

One of my goals at the beginning of this year was to have representation in a number of regions by the end of the year. I quickly realized I wasn't being realistic, since I had just had a baby and hadn't figured out yet how to find enough time to paint to supply more than one gallery. But after we moved in May I finally got into a groove and started to get a lot of work done, and at the start of August I decided I had enough good paintings in my studio that I could go out and bug some galleries.

Since I'm busy getting ready for the show, I sent packets out to only two galleries. I've visited each numerous times, and felt that my work would be a good fit for the gallery and location, and felt good about the way the gallery was run.

I never got a response from one of the galleries, which is kind of surprising because I enlosed an SASE so they could return my packet if they weren't interested. I don't like to call and bug gallery owners when I get no response - I kind of feel that if they liked my work enough to sell it, they'd follow up. (This goes against everything I've ever been taught when job-searching in and out of college, btw, but it's just how I feel when it comes to my art - I don't want someone selling it unless they want to). So anyhow, who knows - maybe they kept it on file and they'll call me someday. For now, I assume they just aren't interested.

The second gallery is apparently looking for new owners, so they aren't taking on new artists. But they liked my work and went to the trouble of passing on my packet to another gallery down the street. The owner of that gallery then contacted me saying he might be interested in looking at some paintings in person.

I was also familiar with this gallery, and hadn't sent him a packet in the first place because, quite frankly, I felt it was out of my league. It's the sort of place I see my work in a few years down the road, but not now. So I was pleasantly surprised and with a little bit of trepidation followed up and took some work in.

We chatted for a long time about my work and where I think I'm going and the art world in general - I actually felt like I was being interviewed for a job, which I wasn't fully prepared for. It was good though - forced me to verbalize some things about my work that I might not otherwise.

At one point he took some paintings down and hung a couple of mine on the wall. The painting next to them was by a former instructor of mine and had a $50,000 price tag on it. The painting on the other side was a fantastic painting by a favorite artist of mine, again with a huge price compared that what my paintings go for. I cringed as my paintings went up on the wall, thinking they were going to look elementary next to paintings of such a high caliber.

The good news? They didn't look all that bad. I think they actually held their own. They looked simple, but I'm starting to realize that that's just part of my style, so that's okay.

The bad news? He couldn't decide what to do, kept the paintings overnight to think on it, and then called the next day to say he couldn't keep them at this time. In the end, my initial impression that this gallery was out of my league was right on. He just didn't think he could take me on and be loyal to his existing commitments, which is honorable. He didn't have much constructive criticism for me and I came away feeling like my work showed well and I was on the right track. I actually walked out of there feeling pretty good about my work and where I am.

But the thing is (and here's where I get honest), it still just sucks to be rejected. Even when the person likes your work and thinks you have all the potential in the world, it hurts to be told no. I've been trying to be all positive and productive, but underneath it all I'm bummed out. I'm waiting on responses for a couple more things, and I'm just dreading that I'll get another rejection or worse, no response at all, and it's just got me down. But I think that's okay - sometimes it's okay to just feel it when things hurt.

So that's where I'm at right now - I'm feeling that rejection and trying to use it to grow and improve. I have confidence in my work. I think it stands on it's own next to people who have been painting much longer than I have, and I feel like I have a lot of potential. I know my work is just going to get better, and I love working toward that - it's a challenge with every painting. I just wish I could find the right person to see my work and love it and want to sell it for me right now. And it's a struggle to figure out the best way to do that when I'm busting my butt working on the upcoming show.

So anyhow, I've been wallowing in self-pity for the past day or so. I finally decided to just allow myself to be sad and dejected for a while so I could get through it and move on. And it's been good. I finally came to the conclusion that even though I feel like I need to be selling more, I need to table the gallery search until my show is over, and spend this time focusing on putting together a quality show and making sure that people come to see it. I don't want to spread myself thin trying to do both, and then not succeed at all. I'd rather spend the time making sure my first show is a success. After the opening on November 2nd, I'll jump back in to marketing mode and try and get my work out there - for now, forget it.

I'm at peace with that decision, because I think all of this has been pointing me in a direction of focusing on my work alone, and that's a good place to be for now. I've actually started to feel like I want to learn and push myself again, and I've been figuring out the best way to do that. Five day workshops just don't do it for me right now - they're often watered down and I never learn that much anymore. I also want to work with someone who can teach me on a long term basis so that it applies to what I'm doing in the studio, not just what I do on location.

To that end, I contacted a guy I've studied with before who I know does a mentorship program for artists, and I'm planning to go through the program with him along with a few other artists. It's a pretty intense six month program with lectures every week and assignments that will push me in the studio and in the marketing department. I admire his work and his business skills, so I know it's going to be a great opportunity. Unfortunately, it doesn't start for a few months, so I'm on my own until then. Then again, I guess that's a good thing since I'm going to be stressed out to the max getting everything ready for this show!

So, that's the full story of what I'm up to right now - I think this must be the longest post ever. I really really hope that a year from now I'll be able to look back and think that I've come a long way from this point - who knows...