Small Things That Occupy Your Mind

Sometimes it’s the little things that matter. So I painted small this Thanksgiving morning. After all, I had to go back up the hill to check on Mr. Tom Turkey, bubbling happily away in my oven. 14 people depended on him being done to a golden brown with no trace of sawdust when sliced. So to get too engrossed in the paint works might have resulted in the dreaded failed holiday meals stories that live generations on past the poor cooks. I can see it on my headstone, “The backlit landscape was to die for, but for this, the poor turkey should not have had to give up the ghost.”  I digress.

Thanksgiving morning was early up to stuff and truss that big ol’Tom and pop him in the fourneau, that’s stove for you English types. Everybody else was off to a late start, so I grabbed my brushes and a small prepared board and down the hill I went to record the last gasps of the rabbitbrush. No more brilliant gold. The color is more like the color of worn wheat, a silvery yellow atop sagey green rangy brushes. I did a small piece only 8x10. So I kept my view small.

 I painted the arroyo from a vantage point on the edge of the road. No more bunnies this year, but I heard the quail and the hawks and something else rustling the bushes. I sang a bit. No I’m not musical, but I do have a pronounced survival fetish. Whatever it was, left. I tell you, if it isn’t art critics, its music critics.

After looking at this piece for about a week, I think I might have gone into it a bit darker, but I like the sun-flooded arroyo bright and airy. It's definitely showing a lot bluer than in real life and I have uploaded several times. The color shift occurs at the point of upload to the blog. Weird. It looks fine in Photoshop, where I cropped it.

So I framed it and called it “Thanksgiving Morning, Wind Canyon”. It was a sunny morning, cool the way it makes your nose run. I love fall. 8x10 and it is available at a reduced price this weekend at my Studio Grand Opening.

Oh yeah, that the other thing that has kept me busy besides cooking and an out-of-town wedding and house guests for the holiday. My Studio Grand Opening is this Saturday and Sunday. If you are around do stop by and visit. Its not totally done….its just mostly done. 

Grand Opening! - Its Official

Wind Canyon Studio will have its grand opening this coming Saturday and Sunday. It is located just outside Silver City New Mexico, just off mile marker 107, on HWY 180.

This is the actualization of years of hopes and dreams. In this space I will be able to welcome visitors, art patrons and fellow artists alike. And even the curious by-passers. The facility will allow for groups to assemble and work, for the occasional show, although its primary function will be as my haven to paint and explore.

So what with family, holidays, painting, cooking and cleaning, I haven't posted as much lately. Do look for pictures in the future of my upcoming pastel workshop in February and other events. 

Meanwhile, if you are in the area, do drop in, if only to look about. Hours are 9 to 4, both days.

Finding Time to Blog, and Paint

How on earth do people blog who have a life? I just got back Sunday late at night from the AWA (American Women Artists) Master’s Weekend in Tucson. That is deserving of an entry on its own, so here goes.

What a powerhouse group of ladies in this organization, and even more important, how wonderfully sharing they all are.

The first show in Tubac had some of my heroes in it, so it was a thrill to see many works there by names I knew, if not the people. I have decided to put Nancy Boren on retainer just for her skill in naming works. She had an amazing portrait there of a young sullen cowgirl, and the title was fetching as all get out. All the pieces were blow you out of the water good. I am really going to have to do my duck impersonation and be calm on the exterior and paddle like heck underwater to even come up to close to this group. These painters will prompt me to grow and everybody needs that. Me especially. Its awfully easy to get complacent. Especially if you are selling what you are doing and/or everybody seems to like what you paint. Tack on a studio in the tullies, and you are your only critic. So a group that establishes a high benchmark is a real plus.

Easy complacency is not the journey I want. I want every day and every painting to teach me to be better at this passion of mine. This group will help me do that. Just to get up to their standards will be a stretch. And I don’t do yoga.  I found myself giving myself counsel as I painted in the studio this afternoon “Stephanie Birdsall said this, and Carol Swinney said that……it just keeps getting replayed in my mind.

The paintout was great and at the Sonoran Desert Museum. People were so nice and I painted an absolute bummer of a painting. It needs repair as I spotted a major compositional error after I got it home. So I will fix it when we return from a family do in about a week, or simply use it as a takeoff for a studio piece, but with corrections in place.

I did ask how people blog who have a life, didn’t I? Now if only Texas weren’t so darned big to have to cross.

To see the show online go to http://americanwomenartists.org/events/gallery

Amazing ladies all.