Thanks for your help Mark, the van is great now.

My schedule is set. That’s not to say I might try and squeeze in another show if one peeks my interest. But moderation is important. This year I will have my van and so transportation should be a little easier. With that I need to thank Mark Lamoureux for helping me set up the van for art shows. Actually, more accurately I assisted Mark in setting up my van.  It reminds me of chemistry class in high school, while we had lab partners, I’m afraid I was more of a lab assistant to my friend Sue.  The other two lab partners at the table (Peg and Rosa) were good at naming the colors of the reactions, cobalt blue, alizarin crimson, in fact it was my first lesson in color theory.

Glastonbury Art on the Green, Glastonbury, CT

So without further ado here goes:

June 3, 2012 – 12 – 6
Beacon Hill Art Walk
Boston, MA
http://beaconhillartwalk.org/

June 4 – June 30 2012
Peterborough Library
Peterborough, NH

July 1 – July 31
Levi Heywood Memorial Library
Gardner, MA

http://www.leviheywoodmemlib.org/

July 7-8
Juried Fine Arts and Crafts Show and Sale
New London, NH

August 11-12
Saturday 10-6
Sunday 10-5
Mystic Outdoor Art Festival
Mystic, CT

Sept. 1-2
Art in the Park
Keene, NH

September 8 & 9, 2012,
10 am – 5 pm both days
50th “On the Green” FINE ART & CRAFT SHOW
Main & Hubbard Streets, Glastonbury, CT.

I’m looking forward to seeing everyone along the way!

Paintbrush Graphics business card, does your business card work for you?

I had planned our hike using a one of the many guidebooks I had bought for our trip. We arrived at the ranger station to check in and let them know our route and get our back country permit. As it turned out, the route I had planned had already reached the maximum number of permits allowed. Also, we didn’t have ice picks with us to go across the pass, which apparently was still frozen even though it was July. That being the case we chose a different trail. It turned out that the trail we would hike was Paintbrush Canyon. The Paintbrush is a wildflower found throughout Wyoming and it is their state flower. It was a wonderful experience. But in the process of hiking I thought I should name my design business Paintbrush Graphics, because if I could make this hike I could do anything.

Now, here it is, 2012 and I’m reviving my design business but it’s a little different. Because I have been doing design work for the last several years for my painting business I thought I should specialize in doing design work for artists. Between my experience and the fact that many artists are, to be blunt, technology averse, it seems like a good approach. Then I thought, my name, Paintbrush Graphics, it works even better than it did when I first thought it up. So, I have re-designed my web site PaintbrushGraphics.com and I will be soliciting work as a designer. I will still be painting so my time management skills need to be fine tuned as well.

I am particularly fond of designing brochures. I think because it seems to be just enough space for pictures and text. Business cards are limited but that makes them a fun challenge. I really enjoy doing more with a business card than occurs to others. There are many opportunities for marketing your work, between web pages and print materials which have become much less expensive to produce. Presently yourself in a professional manner is very important to me. Coming from a publishing background with a major publication based out of New York, my training forces me to make sure all my i’s are dotted and t’s are crossed. While in the midst of that training I may have complained about Art Directors being too picky, but then I became an Art Director and then my own designer, that put my standards at a whole new level.

"Gone to Pot", 18" x 36", oil on canvas

I have too many things going on right now, it’s just the way it is. I realized when I was getting stressed out by it that I was doing it to myself. Yes, there are demands which I cannot control but even some of those are of my own making because of my choices. So, I’m working a little harder on that whole one day at a time, and one thing at a time concept. What I have fallen behind in most of all is my painting. That should be the last thing so I need to re-evaluate my thought process, and I will, when I have a minute.

I did however manage to complete a painting I had been wanting to get to for quite some time. It was from  a photograph I’d taken last Autumn. I’d met a friend to go out and paint with, but we decided to go out to lunch and just go around and take pictures instead. The weather was a bit too cold and it was windy, wind is a plein air painter’s worst enemy. I like strong sun for the shadows and high contrast it brings and this day had that going for it. Now, if I see something I want to paint I will do what it takes to get that picture, just how I want it, it could just be getting a little older we do tend to loose some of those inhibitions.

Bowerbird and Friends Antique Shop, Depot Square, Peterborough, NH

The subject was a row of flower pots and planters on a couple of plank tables outside Bowerbird and Friends Antique Shop. They were behind a little iron fence. I went into the shop to ask if I could go in there and take some photos. The nice lady happily opened the gate for me. Between the random nature of the items, the strong sun and the barn board type wall that were up against, it really grabbed me. So far I’ve completed two paintings from that set of photographs. I think I may just have one more to do as well.

As has become my process, once I’ve completed a painting I post it on Facebook for feedback. It was fortunate that I followed my process with this painting too. One of the posts was from the owner and from that came the opportunity to hang my painting in her shop. So, “Gone to Pot” 18″ x 36″, is now hanging at Bowerbird and Friends Antique Shop, Depot Square, Peterborough, New Hampshire.

Rick, July 2011

This Holiday Season I worked very hard at making it joyous, well maybe not joyous, really I just tried hard for it not to forever become a sad time. Two weeks before Christmas my husband of 32 years passed away suddenly from a heart attack. When the emergency room doctor told me I said “No, you don’t understand, he’s the love of my life” as though that would change what was. It didn’t, it couldn’t, but in fact everything changed.

January 13, 1979

It feels as though family and friends immediately formed a sort of cocoon around me.  I was protected and safe from the world, but my world was gone. Rick was my world. We met when I was 19, married when I was 20 and said “I love you” every night before we went to sleep for all those years. He played music and I wrote poetry and we believed we could do that forever and in some ways we did.

There was a kindness and a gentleness in Rick that was seen at a glance. He was a quiet man. He believed in me and I in him. He mentored young engineers who told me of their gratefulness for his help. He encouraged anyone who wanted to play music and pushed them in his gentle way to practice and told them they could play. He coached baseball until the kids were old enough to need “real” instruction in the sport because what he was teaching was how to play and have fun. They didn’t win games a whole lot but they had fun and they knew what it was to be a team.

And he was a Dad. Our boys put aside their grief to comfort me. It was Rick who taught them to be good men, not by tales of heroic deeds, but by his actions. He taught them about kindness and power tools. That’s right, real men use power tools but they also have big hearts that can sweep you up and comfort and protect you from harm when you cannot help yourself. “Dad didn’t just fix things, he re-engineered them”, Richard would say. Indeed he did, but what his sons learned is you can always make things better.

In a blog posting, not too long ago, while on my road trip to Colorado I was greatly encouraged by family, especially being able to come and stay with them along the way so I wouldn’t be alone for the whole trip. I made the comment, that with such a great family I will never be alone. I lost that feeling, but only briefly, when Rick left this world. Rick had encouraged me in that trip, believing I could do anything. That it would be a great experience. He was right, it was and I believe it prepared me for this journey. But I was right too, I am not alone, all the love and support I have received has given me strength. I can do this.

"Young Man with a Pipe" by Vincent VanGogh

For the last couple of years I’ve been working on figure drawing. You haven’t seen any examples because my progress has been very slow. My first figure drawing class was back in college. Last year I took a class with Marty Kelly, who is a fabulous children’s book illustrator. He’s great fun and I learned a great deal from him, I also learned that you must go very slowly, which is quite contrary to my nature. For me, figure drawing is the Algebra 2 of art. I was frequently told  ”your process was good but you got the wrong answer” in that class. I know what my problem is though, it’s a lack of practice. I must practice everyday and eventually I’ll get there. So I’ve enlisted what I call the Van Gogh Rule. In reading a biography about Van Gogh, “Lust for Life” by  Irving Stone, I read that he spent years drawing before he painted because he didn’t believe he was worthy of the expense of paints. So,  I am calling it the Van Gogh Rule, that is, everyday that I go into the studio to paint I must first spend time working on my figure drawing.

I have set up a drawing area in my studio to eliminate that potential excuse. I have also bought several books on drawing the figure. Every two weeks I attend a class with a model. Again I am learning much but I need to practice for it all to set in and become a natural part of my thinking instead of “oh yea, I see that now”. I have developed a library of books from which to copy figures. Everything from how to draw the human figure to a large beautiful book on Michelangelo that I got at a great price at the going out of business sale at Borders. Drawing his sculptures will be great practice, when I get there. I know it will be very good practice but it’s very intimidating.

Beethoven is going to help me out, I know it.

What I’ve also learned is that people in art schools work from casts, that is plaster casts of heads and feet and hands, etc. Those are quite expensive so I decided to look around the house and see what I had to work from besides pictures in books. That’s when Mr. Beethoven grabbed my eye. When we were first married we attended an auction which included many items that were related to music. I saw the Mozart and Beethoven bookends and I just had to have them. Now they have a new purpose beyond holding up my antique books.

So now, I’ve put it out there and hopefully I will progress sufficiently to post something I’ve done. I wouldn’t put any money on it just yet but if determination (or being stubborn) counts for anything it may happen. It’s why our son thought I would do better than my husband on our backpacking adventure into the Tetons many years ago. “Yea, Dad’s stronger than you but your so stubborn….”

If you will tell me why the fen appears impassable, I then will tell you why I think that I can cross it if I try.   – Marianne Moore

I am grateful to have my little studio, nestled in the woods.

There is so much to be thankful for, I almost don’t know where to begin. First, always first, it is family. I am most grateful to have a big and wonderful family with all types of people making it a joy to be a part. It begins in my home with my husband and reaches across space and time. When you have such a family you know you will never be alone in the world, and that is something for which I will be forever grateful.

Beyond family, there are all the other wonderful people in my life, especially friends who accept you just the way you are, with all your faults and foibles. And who actually enjoy those oddities that make you unique. That’s a real joy. I am also always grateful for the kindness of strangers. All those people who just make day to day living a nice place to be. Living in a small town is part if that as well.

Being healthy is a blessing. Sometimes it takes small set backs to make you realize how lucky you are to not be faced with permanent and chronic illness. I feel fortunate to have been able to take that drive out to Colorado to paint, and that all went well without incident. That coupled with being grateful to live in such a wonderful country and thankful to those who keep us safe and able to live in freedom.

To be honest I am also thankful to all those who have bought paintings, prints, etc. and made this my most successful year yet. In such a tough economy that means a lot to me. I am also thankful to be able to paint pictures,  having been given the ability is a gift, given the drive to improve and given the time to work on my painting skills.

And so, in closing, I’d like to wish everyone a very safe and Happy Thanksgiving!

Painting by Edwin Havas

Whenever I am struggling with a painting, I reach for my art books. You know, those beautiful table top ones that are suppose to be for show. Not for me, they are my instructors. We all learn from those who have gone before us. But I also have a personal tutor as it were. It’s Edwin Havas. Mr. Havas (now retired) was an art teacher at Seton Hall Prep School in South Orange, New Jersey. My brothers loved him as an art teacher, even though they weren’t inclined towards art, so that tells you something right there. For every fund raiser the school had Mr. Havas would donate a painting, my Mom would buy lots of  raffle tickets but never win. She too was a great admirer of his work. So eventually she put her pennies together and bought a beautiful piece which now hangs in my home. Now it’s hanging on my living room wall.

I was always envious of my brothers to have such a great art teacher and since Seton Hall was an all boys school I figured I’d never have the benefit of his instruction. Well as luck would have it, Mr. Havas eventually moved up to Seton Hall University. The Fall semester of my Sophomore year I was unable to get a dorm room in Boston where I had been attending college at Northeastern University. In light of that I spent that semester at home and took my course work at Seton Hall University, which included a watercolor class with Mr. Havas.

Indeed, my brothers were right. He was a wonderful teacher, fun and engaging and full of information. And that class was in fact my first college level art class. It had a huge influence on me. To this day when someone complements me on my trees in a painting I say Mr. Havas taught me how to paint trees. Well with my recent dilemma with this painting, I came in from the studio, trying to reason out how I should handle it, I sat on the couch and looked up. Yes, Mr. Havas had the answer, it was right there in front of me with his painting.

To see more of Mr. Havas’ paintings you can go to his web site (http://edwinhavas.com/).

Lois Griffel demonstration

Lois Griffel and myself the last day of the workshop.

Iowa sunrise

Well, here’s hoping I sleep well and this time tomorrow, I’ll be heading into my own bed.

So tomorrow, I am once again heading into the heartland. The workshop is over, and all the information gathered has yet to be fully digested. The long ride home will be a good way to do that. This whole journey has been a learning experience. Heading back tomorrow I leave with a new perspective. It’s a culmination of the knowledge gained from the workshop and learning that I could make such a journey by myself. While I had my doubts, my family and friends believed in me and it gave me courage. Facing the many miles home is easier now, because I’ve already done it, in a sense, but mostly because I miss Rick.

While the weather may be questionable tomorrow, I’m hoping for one more good day. Snow is predicted for the mountains here in Colorado. That is in addition to the snow that’s already fallen in the highlands last night. Just a few good pictures of Nebraska will make this trip all I asked for. Keep your fingers crossed and be on the lookout for future paintings of the heartland.

So for the last 8 years I have been taking art classes and workshops. My knowledge base previous to that was a limited amount of college courses and whatever information I could glean from books and experience. Some classes are pretty straight forward while others start dipping into the vocabulary of art and artists. That’s where the trouble starts. I believe that’s true for a lot of occupations. Just think, computer lingo. Understanding the vocabulary is not just knowing the definition of such words but when you find yourslef using them. That’s the first step to truly understanding, because you find no other words really work as well and it becomes an ah ha moment.

Then you get into the more you learn, the more you learn what you don’t know. It can be sort of a moment of truth for the faint of heart. Learning how to paint well is work. That’s right, I said it out loud, it’s work. Not like digging ditches or mining coal, although hauling your gear can sometimes feel like that, but the combination of learning color theory, perspective, materials, proportions and drawing in general along with hours and hours of practice, well you get the idea. Just because you love your work, doesn’t mean it’s not work. The real challenge to measuring your competence is history, I mean the work that fills museums around the world and if you really want to beat yourself up, take a gander at the Sistine Chapel.

Then there’s the getting back to reality part. That scary blank canvas part that gradually becomes less scary. The point at which all those classes and all those hours of practice come together. That’s one of the reasons why I traveled so far for this workshop. My style of painting took a dramatic uptick the last time I took a workshop with Lois Griffel. More firmly establishing my style with the person who had lead me down this road seemed to be the only logical step. That’s not to say I haven’t worked on other skills with other instructors, but the person with whom I most closely align my style with, has to be Lois. I can’t thank her enough for her generosity of information and support. Her methods of teaching are excellent. She is a student of Henry Hensche, who was a student of Charles Hawthorne, who studied under Charles Merit Chase, founder of Parson’s School of design and one of the first American Impressionists who studied in Europe. Such an educational lineage is one I am thrilled to follow.