Encaustic Week 2011

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Hard to believe that all these months of waiting are nearly over and The Fifth International Encaustic Conference begins THIS WEEK. This is the fifth year that Joanne Mattera, Conference Founder and Director, has brought the conference to us and I have perfect attendence. As you've read me saying for months, the conference will be held in Provincetown this year at the Provincetown Inn on June 3-5. Following that, the festivities move to the Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill for a week of post-conference workshops.

This year Joanne has invited me to participate in the Saturday morning panel on Mastering Media. I will be talking about blogging based on my experience with Art in the Studio as well as the two blogs I have set up in conjunction with the conference -- last year's All Info On Art Blogging and this year's Art of Bricolage.

I've been doing research on Art in the Studio to analyze exactly what has happened in the 250+ posts I've published -- who, what and why I wrote what I wrote. I've at least skimmed through every one of those posts and am writing a somewhat sketchy PowerPoint as a guide for speaking about this blog on the panel. Perhaps I'll publish that info here once the conference is over. It's been an interesting study for me to see how my writing and my approach to things have developed over time.

I will be blogging from the conference, as I did last year. This year I have my new Iphone and a mobile blogging app so I'll really be able to go live from wherever I am. Typing on that little Iphone keyboard is not one of my favorite things, so I'll probably just send some pictures. At least something will restrain my usual verbosity.

(I'll be able to look out at this breakwater from my room at the Inn.)

The weather forecast looks really great -- cool and sunny for the most part -- just what I like.

I will also be teaching two all-day post-conference workshops (both the same) at Castle Hill on Making Fine Art With Unconventional Mixed Media and Encaustic. In preparation, I've been writing the Art of Bricolage blog especially for my workshop students. I am pleased to say that Joanne Mattera has signed up for one day, and this will be the first post-conference workshop she has ever been able to attend. Cherie Mittenthal, Executive Director of Castle Hill, and her great staff have taken over the organizing tasks that Joanne usually has to manage.

Photo credit: Ewa Nogiec, iamprovincetown.com

Provincetown is a great place to people watch, dine out and, oh, yeah, look at art. There are three shows in Provincetown organized in conjunction with the conference and featuring work in encaustic:  Kobalt Gallery (Beeline, the conference exhibition) , Ernden Gallery (invitational show of work by gallery artist Deanna Wood along with Milisa Galazzi) and Bowersock Gallery (Art in Motion).

Also, Joanne Mattera and gallery owner Marla Rice have organized a show (Surface Attraction) at Rice Polak Gallery centering on materiality in work by selected gallery artists along with work in encaustic by Joanne Mattera and Lynda Ray.

Photo credit: Ewa Nogiec, iamprovincetown.com

In addition, there is an invitational sculpture show at Castle Hill, curated by Cherie Mitenthal, in which I was invited to participate along with Kim Bernard, Catherine Nash, Miles Conrad and Laura Moriarty. I'm excited to be included with such accomplished artists and to show my encaustic-based work beside theirs.

So look for a surge of posts about the conference with my news and views. My pal Binnie Birstein and I will be driving down to the Cape Friday morning to be there in time for the Monotype Marathon that begins Friday afternoon. All the P-town shows will have openings Friday night and it should be a happening place as 243 (and maybe more) waxers converge at the tip of Cape Cod.

Note: all images in this post are from the internet
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