Last week, I had the joy of focusing much of my time on creating a piece of art for Advent (more on that in another post). So far, this week has been all about the WORK associated with being an artist.
Caaaarefully packing the car…it is stuffed!
And believe me, that is not glamorous or particularly creative and mostly it’s not all that fun. It just has to be done.
Monday’s focus was on hanging my part of the “Feathers and Petals” show at Green Spring Gardens (you can read more about that in my Art on Display page). Planning the show goes on for months, literally, making decisions about what the show should look like, which of my paintings would further that vision, and then, in turn, were there ones that needed to be framed? Yes, three. Were there ones I would like to take but don’t have room for (yes, two, at least). I’d been framing, packing, writing up my inventory over the past few weeks, and Monday morning was packing time. Carefully, carefully fitting nine paintings into the car, remembering the tool kit, the paperwork, the labels…
All the paintings out of the car, along with the all-important tool kit—first things first, unwrap them all from their packaging! and then figure out where they will hang…
Hanging the show went smoothly, as far as show hanging goes. It always takes longer than I think it will. Constant decisions: should this painting go here or there? Is there room for ALL the paintings? Is that painting still crooked? And why can’t we get it to hang straight?? Many thanks to my daughter Stephanie who helped in innumerable ways.
And then--it was done.
So that was Monday.
Yesterday morning was all about the website, adding new work to each of the galleries, changing out the paintings on the revolving slides, updating the CV and letting people know about what’s going on in the “Art on Display” page. Realizing I haven’t written a blog post since July -- really?!? Ok, here’s a new one!
And then it was time to deal with acceptances and rejections from shows (one of each yesterday); continue planning for a talk I’ll give in December; write an explanation to go with the Advent painting (only a few short paragraphs, but it takes a while…); gather up news from fellow artists to send off to be published in an art organization’s newsletter.
Also in there, before and after hanging the show, and in between yesterday’s other tasks, is the work of keeping track of my paintings using Artwork Archive. Because at this point, I need a database to help me remember things like: did this painting already get displayed at the Art League Gallery? How big is that painting? What’s the price of this other piece? I’ve found this database to be extremely helpful--as long as I put in the work to keep it updated.
Which is what I’m doing this week!