Thursday, December 10, 2015

catching up and the open house


Well, the mad rush to get as much stuff completed as possible in time for the open house, which amounted to ONE piece, is over. The designing and building of the display for the 6 botanicas to show is done (and it looked great), the garden totems sorted and divided into keepers and sellers, the stressful set up on Friday at the hot shop done (major traffic accident on the freeway in delayed us by an hour), and the open house itself now a thing of the past.



We sold one piece, the very last available sculpted bowl, 
to a pair who has collected our work in the past. Everyone seems to still connect us to the sculpted bowls which, with the exception of the three we made for the gallery show in Florida this past spring, I haven't made for about 4 years, maybe longer. Probably longer. Anyway, they didn't seem very tempted by the new work. The garden totems also didn't generate any interest.  People didn't really realize what they were.  Failure on my part when setting up the display (or else wrong market).  I do have a couple interested in the flower piece when I get it finished and maybe made one or two contacts for some commission work. Not bad I guess for a not very well attended event (which is what I expected being a last minute decision on Dick and Kathy's part about doing it this year).

I guess I should have taken pictures of the other four artists work but, well, I didn't.

Anyway, I'm working on some ideas for next year to have other opportunities to sell my work myself instead of depending on galleries which I don't think is a very good model for us. If I can sell directly, I can lower my prices.

So. I've been trying to stay off social media the last week or two, and when I do scroll through, not reading articles that I know will make me angry or depressed. I have enough trouble with humanity as it is and the current hatefulness and fear mongering and stupidity and refusal of our politicians and the justice system to do anything about any of it is not helping matters one bit. Instead I'm spending my time working on being creative. Now that the open house is over, I'm getting the other pieces in progress finished. Filled the flower mold, ordered glass to fill the day lily mold, am doing the finish work on the magnolia leaves, and then, if I still haven't received the deposit for the small animal hospital, I'll start on new models and I need to get the website updated.




9 comments:

  1. You are wise. And incredibly talented.

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  2. I've been too busy crocheting those damned blankets to spend much time on social media. Thank goodness. But I am now caught up on blogs. Love that display of the botanicas!

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  3. The botanicas are great. I'm guessing they don't move because it's easier to just plunk a bowl down on the table rather installing on a wall. Even if it's simply a matter of putting a nail or screw in the wall, people seem to think it's a difficult chore.

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  4. Like you, I find all the political discord troubling and the only remedy I can think of is to find refuge in creative projects.

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  5. I would say make more bowls, except from personal experience I know the risk of having a product you call "the jacket (bowl) from hell."
    I do agree with personal selling, and wish I could. I do no have the stamina to take a turn at a day in the gallery, but if I did, I could sell more. When I worked in this gallery under the previous person who had a gallery there, I sold everyone's work well because I knew how to sell. An amazing number of artists don't relate to people well enough to sell their work. Sadly, they are gone in a few years, working in a bank or retail.
    Looking forward to hearing more about your new plans for retail. As for the current hate, I find the only sanity is representing the faction that will overcome and then getting on with our own bit of space.

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  6. Those wall-mounted pieces are beautiful. I try and keep up with things here, but I missed the fact that you were displaying your work somewhere. Have you ever considered adding a subscribe-by-email widget to your blog? I tend to miss blogs that I have to get to via the WordPress reader. It just takes so long to scroll through everything, everyday. Getting an email saying, "YO! New content!" is better. That way, I know I'm not missing anything.

    As for the recent unpleasantness, I keep going back to the wisdom of the programmers. GIGO, they said. Garbage in, garbage out. It's good to know what's going on, but too much of the 24/7 news cycle, and too much of the back and forth on social media is counterproductive. It can put me in an even uglier mood than the events themselves.

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  7. Last night i gazed through Facebook and saw too many political ones I don't care to read.Two years ago I worked on political commercials for 2 candidates. It is the holiday season for me, and while I travel, hard to negotiate anything other than good times, sharing family memories etc.Hope your holidays are good. I did see a Menorah made out of legos in Tucson.Can't find any matza meal to make some good soup. I am in hotels all month, may be in New Orleans it sounds on the 26th. A friend wants to show me the best restaurant in the world. Need my suit he said, so will have to get out my marrying and/or burying model.

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  8. I'm with you on social media. I've found it a very counterproductive place to be for the last few weeks! Sorry things didn't sell better -- maybe people regard bowls as more useful than wall hangings, and therefore a more justifiable purchase? (Even if it's an art bowl that will never hold anything.) It's all beautiful work nonetheless!

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I opened my big mouth, now it's your turn.