Six Months in the Southwest

  In front of Sun Gallery, Truth or Consequences, New Mexico

My last blog post was in August, when I had just returned from a four-month West Coast solo RV trip.  I commented at the end that I was going to return to my routine, but couldn't remember what that was anymore .

Sometimes it's good not to remember an old story and to start a new one.  That's basically what I've been up to lately.

  Intuition Is My Compass, Mixed-Media on Canvas, 12 x 12 in.

I spent a few weeks just getting reacquainted with Truth or Consequences...hanging out in coffee shops, seeing friends, spending lots of time with Steve.  I also started making some new friends, since I'm now old enough to eat lunch and participate in other activities at the Senior Center.

 Jeff, John, Beverly and Joel enjoying lunch at the Senior Center

 
Something that has come up in my thinking many times over the years since I started spending time in TorC is the possibility of having my own art studio, art gallery, book store, antique store, or any combination thereof.  I began exploring this possibility in my talks with friends.

Desert Eden Mandala, acrylic on canvas, 12 x 12 in.

About mid-September, I decided not to partner up with anyone and to start my own folk art and antiques gallery.  The vision I've had for this type of business for many years has been to be open only part-time.  I've seen this model work in small towns where business isn't heavy enough to justify being open full-time.  TorC has a Second Saturday Art Hop, and I decided to have my new Sun Gallery open each month during the Art Hop weekend.

 Front window of Sun Gallery

 
I found a workable commercial space in the very busiest part of downtown TorC.  I'm in a block that is a beehive of small businesses, one of the hoppingest places in town.  After renting the space, I worked very hard to get it filled up.  I picked up my paintings, sculpture, mixed-media work, etc.,  from other galleries in town except RioBravoFineArt where I will continue to show my work.   

One of dozens of carloads of antiques that I have found for the gallery

 
I also bought many, many antiques in travels to Las Cruces, where I have a great working relationship with a woman who rebuilds, refinishes and even repurposes old furniture.  I also got to buy some great primitives from a local pecan farm where an old house was cleared out. Besides Las Cruces, I've had some fun shopping excursions throughout the Southwest this fall and winter.  

 Me on flute, Gina on djembe, Rich on keyboards, Bob on drums and Mario on guitar at one of our Second Saturday Art Hop openings at Sun Gallery

I opened the gallery in October and have worked pretty hard at it throughout the fall.  I was open for the Art Hop weekend in October, then headed to Arizona to do some antique buying and camping.  Most of November and December, I was open each weekend so I could garner the holiday sales.  Then it was back to just one weekend per month in January.

 A series of four large acrylic paintings about the Elements (Fire, Water, Air and Earth) that I painted after returning from my 2015 travels

 
This schedule is great.  It allows me to travel and make art in between gallery openings.  After my January opening, I had a full four weeks off before the upcoming February opening!  So I've been able to spend a nice long time relaxing at our place in Why, Arizona. 

 Local arts critic James Durham's first review of my new gallery

Just yesterday, I returned to Why from a quick buying trip to Palm Springs!  There is no better place for thrift store shopping than the Coachella Valley.  Driving along Highway 111, the loop through all of those connected desert resort towns, I was able to hit about 20 thrift shops in two days.  There were probably another 10 that I could have shopped if I'd had the stamina.  

 Desert Hot Springs wind farm

 
I had hoped to include some sightseeing in my Palm Springs trip--maybe a couple of nights up at Joshua Tree National Park or a side trip along the Salton Sea to Yuma on my way home--but we got the big winds this past weekend that hit the entire Southwest.  With 25 to 35 mph winds with gusts up to hurricane speeds, it wasn't a good time to drive my little Dolphin on I-10.  So I holed up for a few nights at Fantasy Springs Casino in Indio, which has a nice big lot for free RV parking.  

 The heavy winds that kept me sitting in one place for several days

 
Yesterday on my way back to Why, I stopped in Quartzsite to lunch with some of my Solo Wild-Women RVer sisters.  And today it's great to be back here in the quiet Senoran Desert!  I have a few days to relax, then it's back to TorC for the February Art Hop weekend opening.  I have a few new paintings to exhibit in February that I painted here in Arizona this past month, and I've also been able to start doing some mosaic again now that I have space to work in and a nifty new compound tile nipper that doesn't make my arthritic hands hurt. 

 Back to doing mosaic after a few years' abstinence

 
I'll be going back and forth between our New Mexico and Arizona camps for the next few months.  Then I have some big travel plans for the spring (New York City!) and summer (RVing up the Mississippi to the Midwest).  Stay tuned!  I'll try not to get too busy to blog.

For those interested in visiting my gallery, please visit my Sun Gallery Facebook page.
     

An interior view of Sun Gallery

 

Mixed Media and Chicken Soup

When I posted a blog last week, I mentioned my concern about getting enough artwork produced for an upcoming local artists show at my landlord's gallery for the October Second Saturday Art Hop.  I don't think I need to be concerned about coming up with enough work.  I still have almost three weeks to go, and I'm really enjoying being very productive, both at making artwork and in other arenas of my life.

The diptych above is called "Freak Flag," and I made it on two discarded shelves that I found at the thrift store.  I used scarves that hadn't sold on eBay to make the blue field and the stripes with their paisley overlay, and then I did a bunch of painting using acrylics.  A final touch which is difficult to see in the photo is that there are red glass gems that really draw the eye to the non-stripe elements.  It is a fun piece--not my best work, but someone is going to love it and take it home.  I will probably wait to show this one in November at the Trash Bash show that will feature recycled artwork.  

 For the October show, I'm mostly creating works on canvas that combine fabric and acrylic painting.  The one shown here is called "Swirl," and it's an extension of all of the mandalas I've been drawing by hand for the past six months or so.  Basically I'm just taking the mandala drawing into another medium.  This one was fun to paint, but a little more precise work than I usually enjoy.  I like the sense of being able to slap paint on something, without having to be too exacting about it.  

This one, called "Wild Thing," is a little more my style.  Yes, it's a painted mandala with fabric elements, but it's more haphazard.  This one was really, really fun to make, and I think the end result shows that.

Here's another mixed media picture that I completed yesterday.  This one has some floral scarf pieces overlaid with those leaf-type shapes from a vintage Vera Neumann scarf.  I call it "Viva Vera," and I hope it will be the first of many tributes to my favorite textiles designer.  


In this picture, I wanted to echo the flowers from the Vera scarf, but there was so much going on already that I was hesitant to paint a lot of flowers.  So I simplified it by making some potato prints of flowers instead of painting individual flowers.  The prints make the flowers more uniform in size and color than they would be if I'd freehand painted them.  

The main challenge I had with this piece was that it was too, too much!  Each fabric had a lot of color and texture, and some of the colors were really bright.  For a while, this work was so wildly colored that it looked the Easter Bunny had exploded while breaking through a stained glass window.  But I was able to tone it down and bring more unity to the picture by doing a lavender watercolor wash over some of it.

In addition to creating artwork, I've been getting a lot of scarves listed on eBay.  I also worked three partial days in a row in the new store, where we sold quite a bit of my landlord's old furniture.  Now I have some time off from working while the store is being painted and readied for being officially opened in October.  

I am thrilled by some of the developments as they have occurred.  It looks like I'll not only be selling the larger furniture that comes into January's, but also the clothing!  That will be really fun.  There are two dressing rooms already built into the new store space.  I'm looking forward to dressing up a little myself, after several years of wearing mostly T-shirts and jeans or shorts.  

Also, we're going to use a gallery picture-hanging system in the new store, so it will be easy to change out artwork.  January is open to my ideas about doing some calls for artists to put together some theme shows.  I can hardly wait!  I am going to learn so much from doing the PR and curating duties. 

My pace of producing artwork has slowed down a little the past couple of days.  I have a cold and I'm spending a few days taking really good care of myself.  Back when I lived in the Pacific Northwest, my colds often used to escalate into sinus infections or bronchitis, but that hasn't happened since I moved to the Southwest.  The hotter, dryer weather helps, and so does the fact that I use a Neti pot and give myself the time I need to rest.  Earlier this week, I made a big pot of chili with lots of garlic in it, and that seemed to help.  Today I have a big pot of homemade chicken soup on the stove.  I hope I'm back to my higher level of energy soon!