The Business of Art in Tulare County

This began as a plum orchard, then I added pink and renamed it Peach Orchard. February is so beautiful here in Tulare County!

The drawing is sold, but I can always do another one for you.

Today you can find me at the Farm Equipment Show, also known as The World Ag Expo.

I’ll be hanging out with my cousins who will be demonstrating a wood splitter. (I still prefer an ax.)

UPDATE – that was the best splitter I’ve ever seen. EVER!

It might seem like a waste of time, but I can assure you (and my Very Mean Boss) that I will have my camera so I can take photos while in transit. (Might even pull over and stop to do so.) And I will have a pocketful of my business cards. An artist has to interact with the real folks from time-to-time. This is all about the business of art. Really! The business of art in Tulare County means going where the people are, and they are at the World Ag Expo in great numbers.


Self-interviewing again

Whatcha working on now?

I just finished bidding on 2 murals.

Where??

In my studio.

No, where will the murals be?

The bid that was accepted will result in a beautiful trail scene on the side of a new business in Three Rivers. They hope to open in March, so I could be painting in February.

Will you show the progress on your blog?

Of course!

You said “murals”.

Yeppers, I did! The other will be at a private residence, if the folks accept my bid.

How’s it going with that Adobe InDesign 30 day trial?

Holy guacamole, that is one complicated piece of work. I’ve watched many tutorials, some of them several times. I’m learning, and have a few pages laid out. Plus, I have a very long list of questions that I hope get answered soon!

Anything else going on?

Oh I’m so glad you asked! A winery just asked me for a pencil drawing to use as a label. Would you like to see the first sketch?

Hey, I’m the one asking questions here!

Forgive me. I got confused. How about if we just show that sketch and then go away until tomorrow!

Big Fat Announcement

For a few months I’ve been dancing around the subject of a Very Large Project on the horizon. Today is the day to tell you all what it is. It isn’t a very well kept secret, just a non-published-on-this-blog secret.

If you know me, you know I love to draw in pencil and that I love to draw cabins. Little cabins, big cabins, they inspire me to draw. So, The Cabins of Wilsonia, a book of drawings of (duh) the cabins of Wilsonia is underway! It will be similar to The Cabins of Mineral King.

There are differences.

1. It will contain very little history  because I’m an artist, not a historian, and the history has already been written in several forms.

2. I will be doing this one solo instead of with Jane Coughran, the very qualified former picture editor from Time-Life Books who was my partner on the Mineral King book.

3. It may not contain any photographs, because there are more than 3 times as many cabins in Wilsonia as in Mineral King.

4. It will take longer than a year to produce because it is a bigger book (226 drawings, at least 128 pages and probably more) and I have to learn how to do the designing on my computer all by myself. (deep breaths, deep calming breaths. . .) I’m aiming for Memorial Day of 2013.

5. The cabins won’t all be represented – there are just too many!

6. The cabins won’t be identified by name. They will be in chapters by street names.

There are similarities.

1. It will contain pencil drawings.

2. It will contain quotes from cabin folks.

3. It wil be hardcover (yes Brad, I listened to you!), horizontal in format.

4. It will contain some history and explanation of Wilsonia.

5. It will be self-published. This is the way Janey and I did our book in 1998, except technology has changed DRASTICALLY. There are plenty of assisted self-publishing sites out there like Lulu and Blurb and West Bow Press, but I won’t be using them.

There are challenges.

1. 226 drawings to complete and scan.

2. 40-something quotes to gather and verify.

3. Adobe InDesign to learn to use.

4. Writing the text.

5. Finding a printer.

6. Finding a binder.

7. Selling them all!!

Happy New Year!

This California artist blog will resume the blog’s regular posting schedule of Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. Pacific Standard Time on January 3, 2012.

An Indoor Mural of Giant Sequoias

This week I began painting a mural of Giant Sequoias in the lower story of a house in Three Rivers. As I painted, it occurred to me that there are a number of advantages to indoor murals.

  1. The light stays constant (this particular wall has no light from the outdoors).
  2. The sun will not fade the mural.
  3. The paint does not dry in my palette from sun and wind.
  4. My skin is not aging from the sun while I paint.
  5. I don’t have to keep changing my layers – too hot, too cold, too hot, too cold.
  6. There is no wind to blow over an umbrella or steal my photos.
  7. Nobody stops by to ask if I am the artist.

Wow, much more of this and I will begin making excuses for not doing outdoor murals!

In the morning, the wall looked like this:

When I stopped for lunch (a quick snack – takes too long to eat!), it looked like this:

At the end of the day, it looked like this:

Another odd job

From time to time I get asked to do unusual things with my art abilities. Remember the original ornament? I painted it for the White House Christmas tree in 2007. I wrote about it the following December in 4 parts on my blog.

  1. The Ornament Story, chapter one
  2. The Ornament Story, chapter two
  3. The Ornament Story, chapter three
  4. The Ornament Story, chapter four

A man recently tracked me down via my website and requested that I paint an ornament as a Christmas gift for his parents. I asked him a number of questions about available photographs, amount of detail, and his expectations in general. He answered every question and went to a great deal of trouble finding the kind of ornament he wanted and having it shipped overnight to my studio.

A giant carton arrived via FedEx. It was full of fluffy paper and in the center was a fancy silver box with a purple ribbon. Inside that was more fluff and bubble wrap and tissue. In the very center was this ornament:

Oh my goodness. I hope I don’t mess it up! My customer has great faith in my abilities and I will do my very best on this project!

Remember, it is TOP-SECRET! If you recognize the house at anytime during my showing of the process, DO NOT UTTER  A WORD TO ANY MEMBER OF THE FAMILY!

Thank you. I have faith in your ability to keep secrets. It is not as if this is the World Wide Web or anything. . . right?

A New Idea

What if 3 people requested reprints of my photos in the last several months? What if I realized that within my photo archives of 15,886 images there are a few really good pictures? What if I contacted my web designer and asked her to add a photo page?

IT IS HERE! Photographs

Autumn in Mineral King 4

A little bit of information about the page:

1. It currently only has fall photos (with one exception).

2. I have to decide how to organize and categorize all the photos.

3. The photos will be ordered for you as you order them from me – they are not “in stock”.

4. They will only be available in 8×10, unframed, and will be $15 each.

5. Thank you Cathy, Melissa and Dianne for inspiring me to do this!

A List and request for your opinions

Hope you all enjoyed the week of fall photos! I loved taking and posting them for you. Okay, I did it for me too. 😎

With shows on three consecutive weekends thus far, I feel a little tired. Lists are an easy way to blog choppy unrelated ideas without sounding choppy and unrelated.

  1. This is the last week of drawing lessons for the year. I have a waiting list to get into lessons now so will have to ask the folks who aren’t attending regularly what their intentions are. Sometimes that feels very awkward – “Sorry to hear of your troubles – will you be continuing in lessons?” Or how about this version: “Haven’t seen you for a few weeks. Since you haven’t come, called, or paid, did you quit and forget to tell me?”
  2. The Perfect Gift Boutique was fun for several reasons. I like that little old building, it is a chance to hang out with some artist friends, and it is a chance to see folks who regularly visit Three Rivers over the Thanksgiving weekend.
  3. The Perfect Gift Boutique wasn’t fun for several reasons. It was hard to be indoors for 2 very nice days. It didn’t seem as if we had nearly as many visitors. Sometimes it feels as if shows aren’t really worth the amount of work. (I must be a little tired to be admitting that!)
  4. My husband thinks maybe I cram too many paintings into my booth and it overwhelms customers. He may be right. May I have your opinions in this matter?
  5. The handful of blogs I regularly read often use bold in the middle of their posts. I wonder why. Do you find it distracting?

Thanks for stopping by. I’m glad we had this little talk.


Show Summary

In the interest of following up on Friday’s post, here is the summary of the weekend show in 8 points.

1. My booth looked great.

2. My booth neighbors were delightful, as were the show organizers and all the visitors too!

3. I saw many old friends and made some new ones.

4. This wasn’t really the right place for my art work.

5. Stuff sold anyway.

6. Not as much as I hoped.

7. That’s okay – I have another show next weekend (Three Rivers Senior League Bazaar), and the one after that too!

8. There was a neato star thingie on the ceiling of the convention center.

Rural Living

Homer’s Nose, 16×12″, oil on wrapped canvas, $225

As a California artist, it is a little strange to have chosen this rural, central valley for my home. I like living in Tulare County. Sometimes I actually revel in it. Representing the beautiful parts of my home motivate, inspire and give me purpose with my art.

Only once in a blue moon do I wish I lived in or near a city. Here is one of the reasons that it sounds tempting to me:

I Heart Art: Portland — a collaboration between handcrafted retail site Etsy; the Pacific Northwest College of Art and the Museum of Contemporary Craft; and the Portland Etsy street team, a group of local artists who sell on Etsy — had initially planned a series of professional workshops. Instead, a member of the artists’ group suggested a way to hook up makers with sellers.

Just like speed dating, artists rotate on short “dates” with businesses and must make an impression in a short time. Their elevator pitches help determine if their art gains a buyer that night.

“The idea of an elevator pitch is very familiar to the business world,” says Watson, but not so much in the art world. “This whole idea of going to a shop and trying to build a relationship and get an account … was very foreign to a lot of people. It became really apparent to us that we needed to do something like this.”

via I Heart Art: Portland is like speed dating for artists | OregonLive.com.

Can you imagine having so many places to sell and so many working artists that such an event is actually necessary???

Tulare County has about 450,000 people in it. That is a large number, but small enough that I can pick up the phone, call any artist here, state my name, and whether or not we have met, we know of each other and respond with instant friendliness and enthusiasm. Maybe that is a better situation that so many galleries and artist that they are strangers to one another!

List of Random Subjects

Not For Sale. Pencil on Paper. Approximately 5×7″. Currently Untitled.

Today is a list of thoughts for my regular readers. Irregular readers may peek too. (Take that any way you wish.)

  1. Congratulations to Sophie, Leslie, and Kim on winning a prize. They were the first 3 folks to subscribe by email via a new gadget installed by my oh-so-capable web designer. It is under the FEED ON thing on the left. “Feed on?” It is more of that computer talk which takes normal words and makes new meanings, leaving literalists such as myself mumbling to ourselves.
  2. I just chased Bambi off the front porch. Speaking of FEED ON, he is developing a taste for and a dependency on cat food. His mom posed for me at a distance.
  3. A blog I subscribe to called Blogging With Amy explained how to use a new gadget called “Press This”. Why do you care? It is the reason you are seeing quotes from other blogs on my blog. There is so much interesting  and inspirational information out there, and this is a great way to share with others.
  4. I love to blog.
  5. Almost as much as drawing.
  6. Definitely as much as painting.
  7. Oh No. I’m picking up horrible grammar habits from reading too many blog.
  8. Tatting is a dying art; so is spelling correctly and using good grammar.

Thank you. I’m glad we had this little talk. Bambi’s Mom eavesdropped too.