Art

Here is the thing: Have you ever noticed that cars with overly aggressive political bumper stickers are always occupied with the worst drivers?

It’s true. And it’s not restricted any particular party or cause. This thing runs across the board. Why is that?

Look, I’m not saying it’s the bumper sticker that *makes* you a bad driver, I’m saying the coincidence is more than coincidental. So wtf is up with that? I read somewhere that insurance companies charge more for people who drive yellow cars because yellow car people get in accidents the most often. That can’t be true. Can it? If the correlation of two things repeatedly prove themselves to be connected, in spite of all logic, does that mean they must be intertwined? And if that is the case, which one must cause the other?

I dunno. Weird shit has a way of coming true whether it’s logical or not. This is how I feel about a lot of stuff the last few months. I keep noticing the direct correlation between certain behaviors and certain outcomes. Certain people and certain outcomes. Certain places and certain outcomes. You know something? This is the dead truth: If I am driving east and Fleetwood Mac comes on the radio, that means it will rain in less than 20 minutes. That is a certifiable fact. It makes no sense at all, and typing it in public might nominate me for the tin foil hat club, but I dare you to prove me wrong! Fleetwood Mac on east = rain.

And here is a longer discussion. And by longer I mean rambling, but whatever, bear with me. I gotta talk this out. So. It’s hard to pinpoint where the line between art and craft exists, but I have been crossing it more often than not that last couple of months. This is dangerous territory for someone who makes part of their income as a craft blogger, but familiar territory for someone who spend five years and six figures in art school then never used it. (Backup recap…Nearly twenty years ago I decided I wanted to be a painter, went to school, loved it, graduated with a mountain of debt and set the dream aside, settling for jobs that allowed for some sort of creative output. All-in-all, not a bad way to make a living. Honestly, not bad at all)….fast forward to today, since going out on my own a little over a year ago, I keep finding myself spending my downtime painting. Late nights. Early mornings. It calls my name. And more often than not, I answer. This paint thing won’t quit me. And therein lies a correlation that seems to me more than coincidental.

My Aunt Pat is a geologist and worked for the state of Mississippi for many years, and over time chit chatting about urban planning and municipal regulations with her, I have come to understand the term ‘highest and best use.’ Meaning, say, a parcel of land becomes open and a city/state/somethingorother must ask “What is the highest and best use for this piece of property?” Everyone loves the idea of a park or a library, but maybe what the town needs is a parking lot because the ripple effects of a parking lot would benefit the retailers and restaurants which in turn would benefit the local economy which in turn would benefit all of the people who live in the town. All because of a parking lot. Or a gas station. Or something unglamorous like a 24 hour pizza-by-slice storefront. I mean, nobody likes the idea of a methadone clinic in the neighborhood but sometimes that is what a town needs. The highest and best use of that land dictates itself, the question is if anyone will listen.

This is where I find myself right now. Trying to find the highest and best use of my time. Despite my hopes that it would be some noble cause like saving cats or curing cancer, I keep coming back to painting. It is a devastatingly unpractical and expensive way to spend your time, but it’s all I want. When I am mixing paint and getting ready apply it to the canvas, I can literally feel my cells shift. That doesn’t mean what I am making is any good. But I think it means I am doing what I am supposed to be doing. Do you ever have that feeling? Like you know, you just KNOW that this is where you are supposed to be? This moment, this person, this place?

But what if the place you are supposed to be isn’t actually where you want to be? That’s a real bummer. What then?

Malcolm Gladwell developed this pop psychology rule that in order to be a master of any given field, one must practice it 10,000 hours. Ten thousand. Accounting for an eight hour work day, that’s 1,250 days straight. Can you even imagine that?

Yeah. I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m doing with this painting, and I don’t know where it’s going, but I do know that I am a nicer person when I paint. I’m a better friend. A better listener. I dare say I might even be a little smarter if I paint for an hour a day but that might just be me listening to a lot of audiobooks read by British people and their accents have that effect on people. I don’t know. But there is a correlation here and the idea of spending 10,000 hours to figure it out sounds like great time. There is something here, and it might take me 10,000 hours before I figure it out, but there is something here. You know what else is here?

A whole lot of art.

Yep.

My pop-up shop last fall was great. Unfortunately, nearly everything sold in the first day. So, for six months now, I have been keeping a file of stuff to sell. Art stuff. Lots of it. Most of it is not sellable but some of it, particularly the floral bits, are ready to come out and play.

You know, I rented this studio for a lot of reasons, but always thinking I would keep it neat enough to meet with graphic design clients. And now it looks like two-dimensional flower shop bomb exploded, but messier.

However, in my defense, I always keep fresh flowers around. Interesting fact; if you sell paintings of flowers you claim the purchase of fresh flowers as a tax deduction. Live models, if you will.

Speaking of fresh flowers,  look what popped up in the window boxes!

Not a bad place to work. Also, my studio assistant is super cute.

This shot below is from two weeks ago. I set myself a deadline to stop painting at the end of this month (temporarily) because there is literally nowhere to put stuff.

Note the Princess Diana photo used for floral inspiration. The finished piece came out interesting!

Which brings me to a little precursor announcement: EVERYTHING IS GOING ON SALE NEXT WEEK.

Shop will officially open May 4th so look for a link here then. If you are on my mailing list by May 2nd or follow my personal instagram account (it’s new – I’m using it for art purposes only), you’ll get the link the day before.

What can you expect? Lots of flowers. Flowers. And flowers. Original art, much of it priced under $100. A few prints. And some pillows.

There is a part of me that does not want to sell off the things I have made, but there is another part, a much greater part, that is SO EXCITED to get this stuff out into the world! Hope you will join in the fun. See you next week!

Some twenty years ago I sold a painting of a fountain to a total stranger in a Denver Broncos hat, and to this day, that was the best $18 I have ever made. The best. And it was a horrible painting, but ever since then I have been chasing the thrill that came from selling my art to someone who I knew would love it more than me. It’s been a while since I have tried to sell my artwork, but the time has come: please take a moment to vist my pop up shop on Etsy.

As I mentioned last week, this is a two week online pop up shop. It will close November 23rd or when the inventory clears, whichever comes first. Yesterday I opened the store with 25 items to my weekly subscribers and they already scooped up a good chunk of the inventory (THANKS GUYS), so if you see something you like, I suggest moving on it on the soon side!

What’s in the store? Twenty five snippets of crazy. Let’s take quick tour…

“Bite Me Sheila” (SOLD)
Sometimes people do their best, most beautiful, and most *patient* work in moments of frustration. I’m not sure why that is, but I’m pretty sure it has something to do with our desire to fix things. To balance what is wrong when we cannot make it right. A vase full of flowers is never going to cure cancer but it can offset an otherwise unpleasant day. A teacher of mine once said, “It is never a waste of time to make something beautiful” and I try to remember that in moments when I am feeling frustrated.

One afternoon, I spent an outrageous amount of time on the phone with my internet provider trying to explain that my internet did not work and they needed to send a technician to my home. The service rep, Sheila, insisted that this was something she could service herself by diagnosing the problem via the internet. Seeing as the internet did not work, you can guess how well that went. After an hour of useless discussion and being put on hold more times than I could count (which is a great time to start sketching), she informed me that they would need to schedule an in-person service technician to come out but that the scheduling office closed fifteen minutes earlier, right about the time she was refusing to transfer me to the scheduling office. “You can call this same number 9am tomorrow morning.”

Bite me, Sheila.

“Argument at the Juice Bar”
I’m not sure what it is about fancy grocery stores that attracts people that like to pick arguments with the people who work there, but I see this a lot. Last week I was in taking photos of produce, because that’s normal for me, and some guy at the juice bar was trying to insist that the guy behind the counter remake his smoothie because the grass wasn’t “wild grown” and only “wild grown” grass would do. So this piece is about fruit and shapes and color and the electricity of unnecessary arguments that never needed to happen in the first place. It looks like a happy piece, and it is a happy piece, but it’s the kind of happy that comes from knowing you will have bad days, but you never have to be the guy picking a fight about wild grown grass juice. Congratulations!

“Zamboni Forehead”
The initial sketch for this piece happened in front of a window of a high-end flower shop in Chicago. The woman, who I’m guessing owned the shop, kept coming to the window to fuss with the arrangement. I’m not sure if that was a passive aggressive way to tell me to quit standing in front of her store, or, if my attention on the arrangement made her uncomfortable with its present state of floppiness (which is what drew me to it in the first place). The arrangement, relaxed and lacking in all formality, seemed particularly sloppy compared to the woman. All in black, she was dressed and pressed with precision, including a perfectly smooth forehead (“zamboni smooth”), which I can only assume would have been more obviously scowling at me had she been capable of facial expressions. If you have never been scowled at by someone who cannot physically I scowl, I highly recommend it. It’s pretty fun.

“That Time I Saw Reese Witherspoon in the Airport”
Airports are weird places. If you have the luxury of sitting down and watching, they make for the best people watching. A lot of people like to go to those private traveler clubs, or sit in the corner with their headphones one, but I like to sit in the middle and watch. Air travel brings out the very best and worst in people. I have seen couples get engaged, but I have seen a lot more couples get into fights. I have seen gruff, hardened men bend over backwards to help women and children they have never met. One time I saw an entire sixth grade classroom salute a solider returning from service overseas. One time I saw a nun steal a candy bar. Weird, weird stuff goes on in airports and hardly anyone ever notices it because they are so consumed by their own agenda, which allows for strange behavior. Anyone of these situations or behaviors would stick out on their own, but when you confine them all together into a single space, they dance together without inhibition or intention.

.

“Three Angry Schnauzers”
There is a family that lives down the block from me that has three schnauzers. They get walked at least four, five times a day. Often in outfits, including navy blue and white striped harnesses (of which I am rather envious). Nobody gets to pet them and they never play with other dogs. One time I tried to say hi and their walker/person/parent made them cross the street to avoid me and then all four of them looked back at me very angry. I don’t know if you have ever had three dogs in sweaters get angry at you, but it is downright haunting. The first leg of this painting took a better part of a week to complete, and as I had it on an easel by the window overlooking the street, I saw those schnauzers trot by in their outfits at least a dozen times, maybe more. Taunting me with their cute outfits and personal rejection. I named this after them in some backhanded hope that they will start to like me. You’ll have to tell me if it worked…

****AND MANY MORE****

Interested in a piece? Have a question? Here are a few that have come up…

I’m not sure if I want to buy a piece yet – can I place a reserve? Can you pause the sale until I send you a check?
Not at this time. This is a straightforward online sale. However, if nobody else has purchased the piece by November 23rd, and you are still interested, I’ll be happy to hold it until a check can be mailed.

If I buy more than one can I get a bulk discount?
Not at this time. Everything is already priced to move.

Will you offer prints in the future?
It’s possible. The things is, I have a lot of original work I need to unload. This sale is the tip of very large iceberg. It’s my way of testing the waters. I’m trying to figure out what moves and what doesn’t. I would like to get rid of the original stuff before opening a new can of worms with printing, but eventually that would be nice. If it does happen down the line, the print(s) are not likely to be anything you see here, but, the neat thing about Etsy is that they not only tell me who is buying, they tell me who is looking. Counting clicks  will tell me if an item is popular, even if it doesn’t sell. If I see that a lot of people are looking at one item, that tells me there is enough interest in that type of piece to warrant a print. Selling prints and originals of the same work has some dicey ethical implications, and not a problem I have to worry about yet, but thank you for asking.

Do you offer international shipping?
On most items. Anything that can be rolled into a tube I will happily send international. There are a couple of large canvases that I want to keep domestic, but anything that can be rolled into a tube, certainly.

Will you be doing another sale?
I sure hope so! If this goes well, I’m going to take what I learn and set up a more established online storefront. It most likely will not be until sometime in 2016, but I do have a few hand painted ornaments and garlands I would not mind sharing in the near future. So stay tuned …

Still interested? Pop over to the shop before all 25 are gone. And

And as always, thank you for supporting me. Even if you aren’t in the market to buy original artwork, or don’t dig my stuff, it’s a privilege to be able to have a platform from which to share. That’s a big deal in my book. Art, at any level, is deeply personal, and I don’t take your interest lightly. I’m just glad that we can share this first adventure together. I don’t know what the next adventure is going to look like, but I’m happy to be sharing this one with you.

Thank you.

Welp. I’ll be a donkey. I just realized it’s been a week since my last post, which isn’t a huge deal but it’s probably the longest break I have ever taken since starting this site in 2010. Hee-haw. I would love to say it was because I’m too busy, but honestly it’s because I’m selfishly devouring every last morsel of summer, being lazy, and procrastinating deadlines. This is also the big ‘pre-season’ for autumnal/holiday bidness, so there are things going on that I’ll publish when the time comes. Nobody needs to see glittered snowflakes in August.

Also. My painting binge continues…

I’m going to be honest with you. There was a particularly bad day last week…negative feedback from multiple directions, a deal feel through, and then technology decided to throw up on me — you know, that sort of day….and normally it would have put me through the emotional ringer, but you know what? I just went out on the porch and painted. For like an hour. And I don’t know why, and I don’t know how, but it made everything okay. Nothing improved, but it untangled my brain enough to straighten out priorities. It was incredible. It was also another reason why I want to keep on putting time and creative energy into my painting. I’m hoping to get a little online store up to sell a few of the better pieces, but in the meantime, I’m just digging flowers. Lots and lots of flowers….

If you follow me on Instagram you know I have been doing this #followersfor30days. It started August 1 with the intention of going through the end of the month, but I’m thinking about carrying it over another month or two. There are a handful of days in August when the work never made it to a photo before sundown, or, I just didn’t feel like sharing (not every day is a winner), and I don’t want to cram it in this week (remember – I’m being purposefully lazy). These aren’t masterpieces, but more elaborate doodles. I do all my work from life observation, which also means I’m giving myself an excuse to keep fresh flowers around at all time. In fact, all four of the photos in this post are taken from the same vase of flowers. One vase – four days. Sometimes I’ll finish a piece a week later, but I’m liking the challenge of doing ten variations of the same scene. My hope was that this exercise would help me build a consistent body of work, but I’m finding that it’s making me generate more variety than ever. We’ll see how this goes…

In any case, if you are on instagram, feel free to follow along. And if you are doing any sort of daily creative challenge on Instgram let me know about it so I can follow along!

Oh friends, what a week this has been! This week has been a parade of tiny delights, not least of which is this incredible painting my friend Laura sent me. Look!

Most of you don’t know, I have an obsession with hairless cats. They are my thing. It started years ago when I worked in an office with my friend Noeleen who HATES the very sight of hairless cats, and then when she would get up from her desk I would swap out her screen saver for a photo of a hairless cat in a sweater, or cleaning himself, or just looking plain evil. Sometimes I’d send emails with businessish subject headings and attachments like “monthly report” but then the monthly report would be a photo of…you guessed it: a hairless cat family dressed as Elvis impersonators.

It’s a good thing I no longer work in a an office.

But, my fixation continues. I follow a bunch of hairless cat accounts on Instagram (one of my favorites) and even though my cat is the very opposite of hairless, she is okay with me admiring from afar. As my creepy, and very-much-married, junior high school principal once said whilst ogling the hot moms in the carpool line; “Just because your full don’t mean you can’t read the menu.”

In any case, Laura’s talent for rendering animals is just remarkable. Now that I am getting more serious about my painting skills, I find myself with new admiration for people who can render with such accuracy. I’m okay with style and color, but rendering something to look like that person/place/thing has never been my strong suit. Laura’s cat here has blown me away! I’m still deciding where to hang it. My art situation at home is in chaos right now as is the rest of the house.

Don’t believe me? Look.

Yeah. This brings new meaning to the term “hot mess.”

I could lie and say this was cleaned up shortly thereafter, but no, it’s been like this a few days and will likely be this way at least a couple more. I’m revisiting that Japanese decluttering book I told you about, and I need to do some deep level purging before I can get to the fun stuff like rearranging art. That top bag there – the oversized one intended for fall leaves – is comprised of around 200 scarves. I don’t wear them like I used to, so it’s time to go! Along with a bunch of other stuff. Holy cow is it liberating (or should I say, Holy cats!)

Thanks again to Laura for this treasure. Check out her shop!

I have a strange affection for chain link fences. Cyclone fences, as some folks call them. Some of my west-coast friends think they are horribly outdated, but they are still a mainstay here in the backyards of middle America. They are old. They are charming. They are sturdy-as-all-get-out. They are are also an interesting canvas for all sorts of artistic adventures (which is a valid and nobel excuse for avoiding regular yard work, which is probably what I ought to be doing right now).

Look!

Sources:
Cup and bottle designs (also called “cup rocking“)
Michael Jackson
Positive thoughts
Bottle flowers

Or for those who want a little more approachable DIY method…

Marilyn and other art by Put-in-cups (<<these are seriously nifty)
Lace embroidery
Fish Cross stitch

And this one below…. Guuuh!

My friend Geri sent me this video of an exhibit that was at Rice University in 2013. It’s chain link meets rainbow meets every Lis Frank file folder I ever left on the bus. Sigh. Man, I miss those file folders.

Soo Sunny Park: Unwoven Light from Walley Films on Vimeo.

Gut is a weird concept. It’s a biological location, but it’s also an abstract word for something nobody knows how to describe, we just know that it’s important. We are supposed to follow our guts. Listen to our guts. I get annoyed when people use phrases like “I love your guts out” or “I’m going to run my guts rotten” because nobody would ever say “I love your pancreas out” or “I’m going to run my mental and emotional meridian rotten.”

It just doesn’t work like that.

When I was in art school there was a more-than-slightly obnoxious Scottish drawing instructor who liked to torment his students into “drawing from the gut” which usually meant looking at your finished work while getting yelled from behind one ear, in the path projectile spittle, eventually leading to a saliva drenched canvas. One time he made everyone in class draw trees while holding conte crayons between our teeth. I hated him. But I will say, as much as I hated him, and he wasn’t a very good teacher, I feel indebted him because he gouged a nugget of something into my brain that has never left. In his spittles streamed Scottish brogue he yelled at nobody in particular; “Pretty speaks to your mind, art speaks to your gut.”

That rule applies to just about everything I suppose; music, writing, dramatic performances…even boring stuff like business, or complicated stuff like relationships. The world is filled with plenty of fantastic, beautiful, interesting, pretty things, but very few of them itch your gut, and when it’s art.

Sometimes people ask me the difference between art and craft, and I suppose that standard applies too. Just because you make something with your hands doesn’t make it art, but when you make it from your heart, from your guts, that’s when it’s art. There are artists who make crafts, and crafters who make art. I usually don’t feel much need to compartmentalize the two, but the other day I was flipping through pinterest and I saw an image of one of Anne Ten Donkelaar’s flower collages and the caption read “This would make a great craft project” and I nearly leaped out of my bathrobe and through the screen to say THAT IS NOT CRAFT THAT IS ART.

Pretty speaks to your mind, art speaks to your gut. 

So. Ten minutes of cyber stalking later, I come to scour her website and am totally blown away by these delicate works of art. I believe they are mostly photos of flowers that are then cut and glued pieces onto real pieces of dried twigs and grasses, then mounted on pins and frames. You can see the shadows…

Is that not incredible?

This soooooo speaks to my gut.

I’m tempted to try and DIY something similar on my own, but I don’t want to. I want to remember the impact and the feeling I have just looking at these works as they are, over the internet, on my laptop, speaking to my gut. That’s art.

Go see more incredible art over at Anne Ten Donkelaar’s website. Because even if you aren’t into to flower collages, she has a number in the middle of her name and that is really badass. I’m pretty sure that’s just a Dutch name thing, but I’m not above switching my name to Aunt Seven Peaches.

It could happen.