I went out again tonight. I went down town to three different art galleries.
The first was by far the best, because the owner and I are friends, and she greeted me with a hug. She believes in me and has had my work on display twice. She is a talented painter and and a genuinely nice person.
In the gallery were two other artists, and we all engaged in a friendly conversation and one woman kept trying to place me. She was saying she had heard my name, and happy to meet me.
In our town, there is art center in which nearly every artist in town
passes through in the beginning of their art careers. The former director of this art center was a "character" who everyone seemed to like, until, one person was brave enough to say... "Well, I had a problem with her." and then one by one-- each person tells what happened to them, "accused of stealing" "told if I don't like it--go somewhere else" or "she tried to intimidate me." (All about the same woman.)
#2
So I moved to another gallery, and was happy to meet a quilter and felt her kindness even though I wasn't a big fan of her style of quilts. I am likely to send her an email to connect, because there are not very many devoted quilt-designers around in my town, and she has written a book and is giving classes on-line, both of which have been on my agenda. So
a chance meeting could be a good kick in the butt for me.
#3
My final stop was to go to the gallery opening of the most prolific artist in town, who has a formula, and paints abstracts on moving carts. He works on one for a while, then another, and some say he completes, up to twenty paintings a day this way.
Weird and mind boggling to ME!!!!!
What is the artist connection, when paintings are created in an assembly line and the hand makes three passages with paint, and moves to the next-- and to hear the artist tell it- he knows he isn't an artist. He just plays. This is his hobby-- he is a retired salesman, and that is what he is really good at. His painting go for $75-3,500+ so he is having fun. One room had the studio set up as an actual studio space. The other was filled with sofas and a bar filled with wine and cognac. Sales are made better this way I assume. I waved to him, although he was chatting with a group of four woman and polishing his B.S., so I didn't speak to him, he briefly turned his head, and recognized me even though we hadn't seen each other in several years.
"Did you see your quilt?" In his last studio, crumpled, next to the buffalo head and yet a third bar, he had an old quilt of mine, that he had purchased during a buying frenzy when he bought three of mine one evening. I wanted to say thanks for displaying it, but he was surrounded by all those women and I didn't want him to lose his mojo.
Aside from all this, the people I saw that I knew at the gallery, had no interest in chatting to me - so straight out of there I went. The best part was the freight elevator. The operator said it wasn't really working right- he closed two gates, to move it from floor to floor, it rattles the whole time, and then he lifted the entry gate only enough, so that you had to duck your head to exit.
My other favorite part of the evening was watching the young man on a skateboard, riding over old bricks roads, smoking, reading messages on his phone, and drinking an energy drink all at the same time. Multi-tasking at its best.
___________________________________________________________________________________#weird evening #artists #art studio #skateboard #freight elevator #quilt #Pandora's Box #painting
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