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 "Dog Dog"

4x4 oil on fiberboard panel

The past few months have been very busy with so many different things.  It's been great working solidly on my new collage style with a few forays into little oils and such. I was glad to gather people together to work in some way as an organized art group...which has come to a conclusion of sorts.  Oh my...which first...Well, I'm starting with family! Today it is my son.

A few weeks ago; out of the blue...my son asked me if I had any of his stuffed "guys" from when he was little...YEA...my son thinks of his childhood sometimes!!  YEA...again! Of course, being a mom...I did...Specifically his favorite "Dog Dog".  I gave him a bath and fluffed him up a bit and happily (with a little tear...I'm sure you understand) sent him off to California to live with his owner.  Jonathan's birthday is next week...so I painted a little portrait of dog dog to immortalize him for my son.  Being an artist I couldn't do anything else!  Now, just praying he dries well enough for shipping!  Got any tips you oil painters out there for drying something quickly??  Aarrgghh...it has white in it...the slowest drying "color"!...

My show and upcoming workshop at the Aar River Gallery are coming along...getting ready for that was a flurry of working to amass a large enough body of my new work to hang...whew...planning for a workshop is a job in itself...especially since I like to add new things every time I teach!  Keeping it fresh is good for me as well as any students I have...my energy is best when I'm fresh!

Getting my wax collage work ready for Cloth Paper Scissors has been fun, but challenging.  When preparing a workshop on my process I've learned that I need to do what they call "step outs"...which means I need to do a separate piece for each stage...NEXT I send it all out to them with finished work for their photographers to do their thing...THAT is all but ready to pack and ship...WHEW!  I am excited.  It reminds me that if we just keep experimenting...asking ourselves questions (I went through that on this blog a few months ago) about what we want our style to be to most accurately represent our artistic vision.  I am SO glad I did that as it led me to my conclusion...eventually! 

The group I've been trying to get together up here on the mountain is coming along.  After a meeting we had a couple of weeks ago it was first decided that we wanted to be a guild...When I sent out a call for some to sit on a committee to form this guild I didn't hear back from any who were willing to do that.  THAT is ok as during the process I found a guild that is already established that is just at the base of the mountain.  A great group of people that were only too thrilled to include any of us who wanted to be a part of a group already established with venues and everything!! YEA...The other good thing that came of it was we found a place to gather on a regular basis to paint and commiserate and work together...not 10 minutes from where I live...at an unheard of price of only $2 a person!!  YEA!  That will be my focus as I try to get that up and running!  We even had a name we liked for the guild...BUT since it may not go any time soon, we may take it for our regular working group..."285 Arts Association"...or some such thing to be amended to fit just what we are!  So, I call this a win win! 

Next on my agenda is to paint a big rooster for my mom and another large collage piece for the "Up the Mountain Steakhouse" gallery as my other large piece looks like it may sell soon...

As I've said before...on to more and more!!  HAPPY CREATING!!