I spent the day working on a painting started in the class I teach and I have to say, I hate painting figures even when its simplified! I feel it is important to demonstrate various subjects so I do cover figures, still life, abstracts, but my true love is landscape painting.

I wonder how many artists force themselves to paint subjects other than what they naturally are drawn toward. Maybe its an exercise and good discipline to do that. If I can get this painting to feel good enough to say "its done", I will be posting it in the gallery.

Robin

Today is the opening of a small group show that I am fortunate to be part of, its a new gallery for me and I am looking forward to new exposure (even if I dont have any art sales!) I am not sure if the gallery has updated their website yet but the show runs from Feb. 27-April 27, details soon to be posted on the link below

http://www.alpersfineart.com/pages/index_1.html

question - should your gallery page show a body of work pertaining to 1 subject matter, say landscapes.. or should it be a variety of subjects? like for example, also show still life, abstracts, figurative, oh and should it also be all different medias? I just added 2 still life paintings to my page which up until now was all landscapes (and I am probably going to take still life off my gallery page later today!) Should an artist be known strictly as a landscape painter? is it a sign of weakness to only be known for one subject in paintings?

When you submit work to be juried to a show, do you stick to one subject? is it better to show all the different things you have painted? I wonder if anyone has any thoughts on this.

Robin

I actually paid attention to a lunar eclipse in November 2003, I painted how it made me feel, and it lead me to a year of painting the full moon every month, my "full moon series". Tonight I was unable to see the eclipse but the news images reminded me of this painting and I wanted to share it.

http://www.fineartbyrobin.com/moons/gallerypagemoonslunar2.htm

I recently got a mac and have been slowly learning basic graphic design stuff. Does anyone create brochures or pricelists before they do shows? I am trying to decide how much time and effort I should put into it. I think the best part for me is the ability to visualize all my artwork on a sheet of paper which allows me to decide which paintings will look best together, which ones to bring, which ones not to bring.

Any thoughts, comments, suggestions, are welcome

Can someone tell me what the difference is between receiving a bulletin vs. writing a blog (and reading a blog)? why would you use one vs. the other?

and fyi, I have been trying to figure out how to insert an image in a blog for about a month now and have decided I am just meant to ever be able to do that!

I dont mind being told my frames need to be a certain way in order to be proper for a gallery show but why is it the gallery gets half of the sale, (which doesnt bother me on the actual artwork) but I pay the whole amount of my frames? I know its the way it is but it pisses me off when I have to reframe pieces to please the gallery. Other galleries have taken in my work unframed and have enjoyed framing to please the customer, and then I dont have to give away half the framing costs.. and the customer gets to pick out the exact frame they want.

 just venting here.  later. 

Good news, I won an honorable mention for the painting below, "Mt. Huangshan", at the Swampscott Arts Association winter show. Its always good to get the confirmation that my art is working for more than just me!

p.s. looks like I cant get the image to appear in the blog but it is in my profile gallery.

So I just found out one of my paintings got in to the regional 'works on paper' show but the other one did not and when I picked it up there was a new chip in my new frame. As a watercolor painter, framing is crucial to showing work and I am getting tired of always finding damages after submitting work to these big juried shows. I wish there were some sort of frame insurance carried by art associations or I wish the people that were involved in the take in and jurying processes were a litte more careful! I dont mind being a starving artist but I dont want it to be because I am spending all my money replacing damaged frames! Ok, I feel better now... I guess blogging is another way of venting? (I never blogged until I joined this website).

Robin