Preparing for a new year

Posts have been scarce, I admit, over this holiday season. After multiple openings for my exhibit Christmas was another flurry of of arranging rooms and setting out party food. Thank goodness nothing ever happens in January (except the inauguration—I'll be sleeping on a bus to wake up in DC on the 20th!).

With 8 inches of snow we seemed all set for a white Christmas but rain and wind caused the snow to retreat to patches. A record-tying day (62 degrees!) the following Sunday melted the rest and allowed me to open my studio garage door and begin to tackle the chaos left after my show. You can't tell by the photo but I managed to clear out half of it, and started putting up some insulating plastic sheeting over my screens. My machine seems right at home in the mess though!

I'm also starting to apply what I learned in my CSS web design class to a long overdue overhaul of my website. I've redone the homepage and hope to work my way through the site making it bigger, cleaner and more up to date. Check it out.

The wonderful 70's

I'm scanning in a bunch of slides for another Blurb book, this time as a Christmas present, and I came across this one of one of my first one-person shows. This one was the Gaspee Days Art Festival in 1975. The kids on the right are my brother Matt and sister Tess, seated is my sister Nancy. They still come to my shows.

Making books on Blurb is getting addictive. I'm now thinking of making a book of my national park artist-in-residence journals. It would be a good project to work on while I work on my painting to send to Mesa Verde.

Published, here's the link

The catalog for my show St. Hugh's Bones is now available to order online. I'll be sending the link out to those who signed up soon. Those who bought a painting, and the owner of the beautiful shoe machines, without which this series would not be possible, will soon receive a book in the mail. Anyone else who in interested in ordering the full color 40-page book online or just previewing the first 15 pages can find out more at this link http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/459612

The first snow

I woke up this morning to a white world. The first snow of the season was a good solid one, covering the yard, trees, and all the thin twiggy remnants of my summer's neglected gardens. Only yesterday I raked up the last 8 bags of the oak leaves, just in time apparently.

The snow felt good and fresh, and inspired me to tackle some cleaning and organizing of closets, part of my winter's goal of containing my indoor sprawl.

I've always loved painting snow scenes. Their starkness has the same attraction I have felt in the sand dunes of Cape Cod and the Badlands of South Dakota. The monochrome, the outlined shapes, the way the surface of the land becomes visible makes me want to explore the transformed landscape. The painting below is one of a series I did in 1994 called the Elements of Winter. I hope to do some more snowscapes this winter.

My show is over and back in the studio, despite my having lost the brakes on my 20 year old painting-transport-vehicle last week. The old red truck is fixed now, and did a great job of hauling 2 loads of work. I, on the other hand, am a bit achy after loading the 25 heavily-framed paintings from the gallery to the truck, and the truck to the studio. My other goal this winter is getting back in shape after too many weekends spend standing in front of an easel. You have to be strong to be an artist.

The dust settles

My show comes down today, which makes me a bit sad, but I'm also relieved that the intense work is over. At the same time I'm also a bit nervous, I'm not used to operating without a goal or deadline. After the holidays I'm going to have to figure out the next step, but until then I'll coast.

As far as I know, I'll be taking back all the paintings to the studio, and then I will face the problem of storing them. I haven't really been back in the studio since I finished, so it still looks like it was vandalized. But soon I'll sweep it out and set it straight, that will probably put me in the mood to start something entirely new.


I've very grateful for all those who stopped in the gallery to see my show, both at the openings and during the week, and for all the very interesting comments on my work. I should get the final proof of the exhibition catalog early next week, and then I'll put it in the online bookstore and post the link.

Post Opening and Vloged!

My opening was a lot of fun, I was amazed at all the friends and family who showed up. I was also flattered to be vloged by a very interesting artist/brother of one of my co-workers. Check out his other vlogs while you're there...



The opening was followed by dinner at the Cactus Grill, and we pretty much took over one room of the restaurant. They were very accommodating, even though I made reservations for 20 and about 30 or more showed up! Despite the good time, I'm glad to kick back a bit now, putter around and rediscover other bits of inspiration that I've tucked away in closets, boxes and drawers. Not to mention the inspiration I could get by just getting out into the woods.

My show is up until Saturday, so if you missed the opening and still want to take a look, the gallery is open from 10 to 6. The catalog will also be available to order online soon, so send me your email if you'd like the link.