lemonart

So the little studio show was fun. If nothing else, I updated my portfolio and met new people. A few took my card and said they may call me....later, depending on tax returns!

Now I am preparing for the little one day art fair at Chroma Colour. It will be next week, Saturday December 5, 2009; 10:00 am-5:00 pm.

There's an older song that says, "Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet, but fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat." We, in our studio show, have each had a rough year with much to grieve. Thus the title of our show. Yeah art!

great tip!

NOTICE!! Don't toss those nifty 'canning jar lidded' applesauce jars from Sunrype! I can't believe it took me so long to recognize their value. I always have a litre can of latex urethane on the go. The trouble is that it can take a couple years before I use up the can. In the meantime, the lid looks like a demolition field and won't hold a good seal after several openings. I tried to keep the can sealed in a ziptype baggie that sometimes worked and sometimes didn't. I was whining about my recurring loss in dried up urethane to Sweetie-pie-love-of-my-life and wondering how I could more conveniently store this airtight. He suggested storing the urethane in a canning jar....

Well....why did I never think of such a thing? And as providence would have it, we had just emptied an applesauce jar, and he said, "What about this?"

Of course, time will be the test, but anything is better than my usual mess of crunched can in plastic.

----Tomorrow is the first day of the studio show&sale. I wish I could be confident of success, but I'm not. I know Friend-with-good-ideas has a significant network of clients; I can count mine on one hand. Regardless, I will go forth and conquer! Yeah art...I go armed with coffee, cookies and lunch. I also have several tiny stretched canvases and my box of paints. It may be a surprisingly productive day yet.

finally...baby steps

Well, here goes. I've been busy. Next week, Nov 25-27, Friend-with-good-ideas and I are hosting a studio show&sale in her studio. I have my little box full of small art pieces (framed sketches, matted pen&ink, small paintings, art cards, etc.) and am ready to trundle off to set up with her. The real fun will be spending the days painting together while we host the show. (Note to self: don't forget to bring supplies!) What I paint there, I will include in my art fair in December.

I'm looking into possibilites to connect with an art co-op. I've been out of the loop and sequestered too long. Coffee with my art friends is great, but I need to connect outside my comfort zone.

Anyway....time for my own coffee. I have a couple art theory magazines (SEEN: the Journal of CIVA) waiting to be devoured!

.....

It is better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.

--quote from Criminal Minds

so cool...

a-mor'-phism n. 1. has no determinate form; of irregular shape. 2. of no particular kind.

Amorphic art was a very popular form of entertainment during the 1500s -1600s. I think it was the precursor to CG and all those special effects that make people say, "Ooohh! How did they do that?"

I had fun trying this: to draw an image so distorted that it looks 'normal' on a reflective sphere.

Believe me!!! There was much trial and error!

all is not lost

Though the venue for the one-day show fell through, I will join my artist friend, Friend-with-good-ideas*, for a three-day in-studio show&sale at the end of November. Then we'll both participate in an art fair hosted by an art studies studio in December. (details to follow......)

I know...I know. These are hardly 'serious' art shows. But when you haven't been very active at all for a long time, you just need the right nudge to get the ol' juices flowing. These shows are a non-threatening spring-board back into business.

Now I suddenly feel the need to get busy. I need product!! This is truly the hard part for me. I have a difficult time making small-art-for-quick-sale. My most successful work has always been those with which I labor emotionally. If the act of painting is emotionally void for me, the end result lacks that 'something' and it looks only like an object with paint smeared across it. But maybe I should just try to churn out a volume of small works for no other reason than to produce plenty--not worry about 'content' or significance. I think I just need to practice painting and drawing again--simply for the love of the act of creation, for myself. If others love them enough to buy them--bonus!

*first introduced on coffeepaint.blogspot Nove 26,2008.

...and the lemon flower is sweet

The venue for our one-day show fell through. Plans are now on hold.
Hmmm. I was beginning to get excited about it.

"To Barbara From Grandma, Xmas 1943" *

I spent a profitable hour at the thrift store and came out with a 4 lb tome entitled Anyone Can Draw! c. 1939. The drawings within are amazing because the sketches are clearly influenced by the then recent art movements of art deco, cubism, the Mexican muralists of the 20s and 30s, and art produced during the important New Deal initiated by Roosevelt to make work during the depression in the Public Works of Art Projects (1933 -1934).

New books are great, but sometimes the real jewels are found among the old and discarded. Besides....nothing beats the smell of an old book, except perhaps a book case filled with old books!

*inscription inside book cover

this could be fun

Right now we are negotiating the details of the contract for the space rental for our one-day show. If both sides agree on all points, we'll have a show Nov 21, 2009.

I'm finally getting excited about my art again.

grief is a nasty and unpredictable thing

Shutdown mode is a safe and comfortable place to be. I can pretend that nothing is out of the ordinary. It is truly amazing how quickly a day can disappear when I bury myself in marvelous time wasters and distractors like my DVD player and my computer games page. I can begin each day with enthusiasm and an ambitious to-do list, but then I pour myself a coffee, grab a book, and then notice that, "Oh my!!! It's 5:30. I need to prepare dinner. Sweetie-pie-love-of-my-life will soon be home from work." Not only does the day whiz by, but the months have whizzed by.

I try to pretend that I am functioning and coping and doing 'just fine.'

Best-sister-in-the-world called me up on it the other day. "Ellen, I don't think we are grieving well." She's right. In less than a year, among too many other grievous things that happened as well, we lost both of our parents. Orphaned much too young! The pain of missing them is sooo great that it is easier to pretend that they are still safe in their condo, ready to call me to be careful in the snow or to invite me to work a jigsaw puzzle. Best-sister-in-the-world has trouble staying home for even one day. I have trouble leaving my home for even one day. We hide our tears, and we smile--we are fine!

I notice that throughout my previous Coffeepaint blog, I never once mentioned what I was going through. Safe is pretty boring. I hear of artists who grieve and can barely be pryed from their studio because they receive comfort by working through their grief in paint. So why do I hide, wrapped in blankets on the sofa, planning which coffee flavor I'll try next, watching DVDs in oblivion? Why am I avoiding painting? Perhaps the act of painting is too hard because it is too honest. I can't pretend that all is fine and whole in my world when I smear my soul on canvas for the world to see.

Enough!

It's time to stop screening myself behind excuses (Oh, my studio is too full of boxes), and now I need to decide to get to work--like my pastor once said: when things are too difficult, do the opposite of what you feel. If you feel poor, give. If you feel tired, get busy. If you feel lonely, reach out to others.

A few of us have had to deal with much grief for awhile. Is there a better reason to have an art show? We'll call it, "When Life hands you lemons, make ART!" We tentatively set it for next month. It is just a little one, but it is enough to force me to sort, find, and paint.

I hope.....

time for change

NOTE!!!! I wanted to change my blog name. Apparently, the only way to do that is to open a whole new blog. What was once Coffeepaint.blogspot is now ellenpaints.blogspot.

For continuity, I am rewriting my last coffeepaint posts here:

time for change (oct 16, 2009)

OK.....I have decided to change my blog name. What was once Coffeepaint is now shePAINTS. I wanted a name that would reflect my intentions as an artist.

After too much stress during this past year, which left me preferring to hide at home and play solitaire and read books and watch endless reruns of my favorite programs, I have been gently prodded into action by friends who love me more than I deserve.

We tentatively have a small, one-day group art show scheduled near the end of November. Details to follow....

I protested that I had no work to contribute, nor did I have anything in mind to do. But these girls are my friends for a reason, and I have been given suitable encouragement--I will set forth to participate with gusto.
Maybe I'll even paint something.

time for change--part 2 (oct 18,2009)

I thought changing a blog name was a simple task, that if I changed the name on the setting of this blog, the name was changed. But the 'coffeepaint' name remains the name on the active search. When I searched for shePAINTS I was directed to another site, not mine. So, since 'shepaints' is taken, I'll now use 'ellenpaints'.....so.....that's settled. However, this doesn't solve the problem of the search name. I have no choice but to start a new blog all over.
I invite my faithful coffeepaint readers to join me at 'ellenpaints.blogspot.com'

P.S. Please take the time to read my dozen or so Coffeepaint blogs. They'll give good background to this blog.