Claiming the Art

The Midnight Necklace. Make that the 4 am necklace...

What do you think? I have been wanting to do something around the idea of connecting pieces to create more involved necklaces. So this is my first foray... and it was fun. A fun foray. You can see it better if you come by tomorrow. (I tried to model it, but its darn hard to get a good photo of your own neck!)

I spent yesterday making room for my Underground buddies to put their work for tomorrow's Open Studio, and creating spaces for my own. Oddly enough, I really enjoyed the aspect of displaying MY work in MY space. I never thought I had a good handle on display, but I'm learning. I learned alot from the women of Riverside Studios in Truckee; very innovative. Inspired by them, I took a branch that had been part of an old piece I recently took apart, and hung it from the ceiling with my necklaces draped over it. I really like the way it looks. I was thinking of Carole Sesko, who I mentioned yesterday... in her studio space, her art is always out, visible; when you walk in there you really get a sense of who works there, what she's about. It radiates her vision.

I haven't done that in my studio yet. (It's been almost a year in this new space.) Partly because the space is fairly small. (Can I also blame the dust?) But maybe it's mostly that I haven't fully claimed the work as my own. So maybe that's why hanging the earrings and necklaces yesterday felt so satisfying: I get to start inhabiting my space in different way. I think I'm going to leave it out.

the Most Boring Post of the Week

I'm so glad you Virtual Reception visitors can't actually SEE my studio. Unless I post photos, which I'm not going to do! I spent yesterday ripping my studio apart, and today I'm going to start putting it back together. It's a good excersise; gives one a fresh start, and it's a good time of year to do it, too... I'm not sure if it'll be an improvement until I actually do some work in there, but the rather large Dust Bunny population has been cut back to a manageable size, and at least I've found a pencil that fell behind the flat file.

This will be my Most Boring Post of the week, and if you can find something to comment on here, you really deserve those earrings! Your name will go directly into the faux-leopard-skin-pillbox hat!

Open Studios Continue

Life is good. It's been a long and interesting week, and tomorrow is the second event in the Underground Artists Holiday Open Studios. I've been working on more earrings; my new favorite pair is pictured below. I'm focusing on earrings and necklaces, as they make great gifts. I'll also have some older pieces at sale prices.

I'm looking forward to the mulled wine and DESSERTS at Kristen's house. The fact that it finally snowed shouldn't be a problem, though it is cold...23 degrees at the moment!

But if you'd rather stay inside by your cozy woodstove, there's always the Virtual Reception. I'll be hosting that next week, right here. I'll be giving away a pair of earrings. Details on Monday!

There Are No Words

Okay, well, there's a few. But I can't really think of any good ones that don't sound trite.

xxx

Our first Holiday Open Studio at Barbara's was yesterday. Good food, good friends (see? trite.) Wonderful people who wanted to come see us and pick out fun handmade gifts for their loved ones. All three of us Undergrounders had an amazing experience. My thanks to everyone who showed up! You made it happen (trite! I know!).

xxx

Everything I do with the Underground Artists turns out to be more than it seems. Each experience brings out some issue I have, or somebody has, and it feels BIG. The dynamic of being part of a group is very powerful. I highly recommend this sort of "group therapy" to any artists out there, especially women who have been mothers and as a result have a somewhat skewed idea of our worth...and what our time is worth.

xxx

I saw a very funny print ad today, for Absolut Vodka. It's a husband and wife standing together in their living room. The woman is slim and smiling, glass of vodka (presumably Absolut) in her hand. Her husband is standing besider her, looking a bit rumpled, with a huge pregnant belly...ha!

can you picture it?

But I digress.

xxx

As moms, we're used to working literally 24/7, with no pay. (I laugh when my husband comes home and complains about his job...(I think: "YOU'RE GETTING PAID FOR IT... how bad can it really be?") And really, my mom job is great. I'm not whining. It's just that we're used to our time being worth "nothing": no money. So to get back into this art thing, this business part of it, we really have to change our thinking about what our time is worth. What WE are worth.

xxx

Just an aside: Why does Google's Blogger do away with the spaces in between my paragraphs? And where do they go? Does some other blogger get them...loads of space between her paragraphs? Anyone know the answer to this? I am forced to resort to creative measures to make it look like there's a space in between them. Like so:

xxx

And speaking of answers: the question I asked in my last post, about the ridiculously irrelevant tag in my hat...my husband figured it out. He held it up to the light: it had a microchip in it, to guard against stealing. Luckily it didn't guard against "shoulder shopping".

Colorforms

Anybody remember Colorforms? This part of the process reminds me of playing with Colorforms as a kid. Only I played with them recently, and this is actually more fun! It's down to the wire for our first Underground Artist Holiday Sale/Open Studio affair this weekend, so I'll make this brief. But I also wanted to mention that I'm going to borrow a page from Carrie Cahill Mulligan's blog and host a Virtual Open Studio on the date of my actual Open Studio. (Carrie makes beautiful hats!) Stay tuned for more information.

UA Shows

It's been a long week, and between the holiday and not feeling too "yippy-skippy" (I'll spare you the details!) I haven't written all week. But I'm back on my feet, and looming large on the horizon is...



our Underground Artists Holiday Open Studios (or "Triple Holiday Sale", depending on whom you talk to...). We're hosting a series of holiday events, for three Sundays in December: December 2, December 9, and December 16, from 1 to 6 pm. All three of us: Barbara Wesson (pottery; pictured at left sporting an art helmet), Kristen Schwartz (fantastical illustrations) and, of course, Yours Truly will be at each date. Our intention is to feed you lots of sugary items, or at least some wine or appetizers, and entice you to purchase various wonderful handmade gifts for your friends and family. Or, if you're like me, for yourself. If you live in the Tahoe area, or plan to be in the area then, please email me for more information.



I recently sent out a mailing and included a link to this blog... If anyone reading this is new to the blog, it's EASY TO COMMENT. Really. Just click on the comment link and register with Google if you haven't already. (Google is going to take over the world, so you might as well just go ahead and register with them now. Go ahead, get it over with.)



I tried to create an avatar (isn't that a great word?) for my Etsy shop yesterday. Yes, I should have been creating things for the first Open Studio this weekend. Why wasn't I? Well, I, um... I was also adding a couple of pieces to the Etsy shop at the time, and my little "avatar space" was looking rather bare and depressingly empty. So I thought, "how hard can it be?" And then I found out: impossible. At least for me. But I had alot of fun taking photos of myself, using a mirror to see what the camera screen was showing... This is the one I liked, but couldn't get it to work. That is why, if you go to my Etsy shop, you will see a BIG BLACK SQUARE where the avatar should be. I'll try again someday... but not now. NOW, I have to get back into the studio and make some more pieces for this weekend.