More about the studio

I was looking at some photos to send to Pam Farrell for her studio image project (more about that later), and I started thinking about what a home the studio becomes for me - and I guess for most artists.

Here are some photos showing the first transformation of my current, luxurious space. I moved in at the beginning of November 2006 and had my first open studio the next month.

It's hard to believe that such an accumulation of crap could ever look neatly arranged and become a workable studio.

Yet, just a month later, this is approximately the same view.

Here's another "before" shot as you enter the studio. I was just setting up my storage shelves.

And here's the "after" shot with the conveniently-sized old painting used as a screen to hide the pile of crap still remaining behind it.

Of course, two years later, it has taken on that lived-in look.

Obama Grassroots

This is one of the things I'm thinking about while making art (and while not making art)

WELCOME, PRESIDENT OBAMA!

Just 20 days until the inauguration of President Obama! What a relief to have a president we can be proud of ,who can speak in sentences and even paragraphs. He will need our help to bring some sense to this mess that Bush has made.

Those of us who donated to or worked on the Obama campaign are part of the valuable Obama database that was tapped recently to form grassroots groups supportive of our new prez. More than 4200 groups met across the country during the weekend of December 13-14 to talk about how they could sustain the enthusiasm developed for Barack Obama during the campaign.

We started a group here in western Mass. - Obama Grassroots of Western Massachusetts (obamagrassroots.wma@gmail.com). We will work locally to help the Obama team organize and will give our feedback on issues important to us.

COUNTDOWN TO JANUARY 20TH

Our first group mission is to organize an event that will benefit our community. We chose to support the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts with a countdown to January 20th. Our group of about 60 people has pledged to donate $20 each and to contact 20 friends/relatives/neighbors/co-workers, etc. and ask them each to donate $20 and to contact more Obama supporters themselves to ask for donations of $20.

WHY DOLLARS AND NOT CANS?

We are collecting donations, rather than food, because the Food Bank is able to purchase $7 worth of food for each $1 donated. This means that $20 can purchase $140 worth of food. The Food Bank distributes about 6 million pounds of food to children, the elderly, veterans, the disabled and working families, through soup kitchens, food pantries, homeless shelters, childcare centers and elder programs throughout Berkshire, Franklin, Hampden and Hampshire counties - all the counties of western Massachusetts.

HOW ABOUT KICKING IN $20 TO HELP AND CELEBRATE?
The Food Bank has a secure website where donations can be made http://www.foodbankwma.org/ in honor of President Obama. (If you make a donation, be sure to mark it in honor of President Obama.) Or, if you want to donate by check, send it to:

The Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, Inc.

P.O. Box 160

Hatfield, MA 01038

Thanks for your help in contributing to this meaningful welcome to our new president!

Bye-bye, Yuck Man!

New Work - December 2008

Here's the newest of the new work - the largest I've made so far. I like working in this format and I'm going to move on to hollowcore doors. I have some 32"x80" for my next project.

Surprise - Happy New Year!

Wow, I forgot I even made this blog. What a surprise. Who knows what else I've forgotten?

So the last day of 2008 - not a bad year for me - how about you? Millions hurt but I had no money to lose and no house to buy or sell. I guess that's success, as redefined these days. I laughed, I cried, celebrated, mourned, all that stuff. I made a lot of work and sold some of it.

I was looking at that pristine view of the new studio I posted initially before I started to work in it. I actually took a few photos last week of the way it looks now, a couple of years later. These are three current views.

Lots of mess but lots of work, too.

It's amazing how much stuff it takes to paint a few pictures. It starts with a selection of canvases, but you have to have bubblewrap for everything and many paints and brushes and tools. Then you move on to panels so you need wood and a saw - maybe two saws - and more tools to add to the brushes, paints, cleaners, etc., etc. And if you work in more than one medium, you need all those supplies. Of course you have completed work and books about other artists. No end to it all. No wonder stuff always expands to fill any size studio.

I was reading about Sean Scully and the buildings he owns for his studios - thousands of feet. I could fill those easily.

I could probably fill those thousands of feet just with wax balls. When will I ever use them? They do make a nice centerpiece for Thanksgiving Dinner.

Being messy is one of the reasons that encaustic appeals to me. Amazing that such glossy, pristine-looking work can come from a mess like this. What fun!

In the Beginning

Here's what I wrote on 12/6/06 and never published:

Moving into a new studio is always daunting. It's not only lugging all that crap in, but it's unpacking it and wondering why you brought it along. By the time you finish unpacking it all and putting it somewhere, the new space that you thought was so spacious has become cramped.

Ahh! Must build storage racks. That will take at least a month and be a good excuse to put off starting the real work of making art. You have already spent all that time packing, cleaning, moving, unpacking and now building.

Well, I never did build any racks, just stogged the stuff in and started working.