I keep telling myself this as the days grow shorter and darker with winter on its way.
One of the best ways to remind myself of this is by sending out thank you notes to others I feel grateful toward. Not everyone I feel grateful toward; there are so many I would do nothing but make little collages and lick stamps and the frenetic non-remunerative activity would get me deemed (even more) crazy.
I used to make a lot of collages. These days I rarely get the paste pot out unless I’m making thank-you notes. Below are a few recent ones.
My show at CORE New Art Space is wrapped up. Sales were good. I’m grateful.
I have one painting, “Cabatisto” (pictured below) accepted into the juried “Red White & Blue” show that hangs at CORE from now until September 30th.
I need to pack & ship paintings and then- (really looking forward to this) switch gears and get into the groove of making some new monotypes at the Art Students League of Denver in preparation for a show at Red Delicious Press.
Also, I’ll have a few small works at a double booth with my CORE New Art Space compadres at the 16th Street Mall Festival of the Arts. It is the inaugural year for this art fair. We’ll be at booths # O and #P on Friday, September 14 and Saturday, September 15 from 11 AM until 7 PM.
I was skeptical when Terri Bell proposed that we mix our work together and hang it as a single exhibit. I usually feel that my work coordinates poorly with other people’s work. I always look like the turd in the punch bowl, the rat within the grain. Her instinct were right, though- the show is wonderful and I think it’s the best looking exhibit in which I’ve ever taken part. Thank you, Terri. I will not doubt your aesthetic premonitions again, and we at CORE are so fortunate to have you with us.
I am also grateful to Pat Cronin for inviting me to take part in the “Creatures” show, opening on First Friday on the other side of town at Zip 37 Gallery.
For an upcoming “Creatures” show, this little painting is a tribute to my dog Melvin. My husband (who never met a dog he didn’t like) brought Mel home from the pound almost sixteen years ago, and shortly thereafter taught him to fetch the morning paper.
Our squirmy black puppy purported to be a lab mix grew to be a gentle giant who looked more like a stocky wolfhound. His morning paper routine has turned into tragicomedy in the past year. He still desperately wants to do his job, but usually forgets what he’s up to halfway through. He struggles to find The Denver Post- Where could it be? If he finds the paper, he drops the paper, pees on it, then wanders halfway up the street with my bathrobe-clad husband yelling at him to come back. He is stone deaf, so this never works.
I admire his spirit to keep working at what he loves until the bitter end , and hope to do likewise.
This is more of an impression of Melvin than an accurate portrait; I have omitted the warty growths on his mouth and the tumor that looks like a third eye. My youngest daughter would say that he has an untouchable face. I think he still has a lot of charm.
Delighted that Heloise & Abelard took a blue ribbon this year. Thank you, Denver County Fair.
This is only the second year that this fair has been in existence. It’s an intriguing melange of the traditional and the slightly subversive. Co- creator Tracy Weil talks a little bit about the fair here.
Paint Fumes 