Wedged in between the workshops I’m currently teaching, I work on my paintings. Actually, I make sure to always carve out the time to paint, no matter what. Or almost always. I’ve just completed two paintings, part of my water reflection series. One of them has been on and off and on my easel for at least six months. A real problem child. But I’m happy with it now. The other one came together in a few months. See if you can guess which is which?

Completing a painting and taking it off of the easel isn’t the end of the story. Finishing touches like painting the gallery wrapped sides, signing the work and painting the title and date on the back are part of the process.

Jim photographed them for me on the very day they were completed, which was great. By photographing the paintings I don’t mean taking a little digital camera, pointing it at the painting and clicking the button. That’s what I would do. Lighting equipment, reflectors, his excellent camera and many years of experience are just part of what it takes to create the beautiful and accurate photographs you’ll see below .

Once the photograph is taken, Jim retrieves the information from the camera and uploads it into his mega-computer. The physical paintings are transported to Jim’s office (lucky for me just on the other side of the house from my studio), for him to refer to as he makes digital color adjustments. Then there’s sizing the images and lots of other technical stuff.

Eventually Jim brings me a thumb-drive with the beautifully photographed and accurate images in there (where is all that stuff in there anyway??).

Assuming I’m able to plug the thumb drive into my computer without something going wrong (and believe me, that can happen at any time when I’m within breathing distance of a computer), I drag the images into my Master Painting Files and drop them in the appropriate category, in this case Water Reflections. Next, I upload the images onto Bento, a great system for organizing the information on every painting. Once the image is uploaded, I add the title, size, media, a description of the work, and date of completion. And from here on, every time that painting travels anywhere for an exhibit and when it’s purchased, all the details of the transaction are also recorded.

Done yet? Well, no, not yet. The brand new fresh paintings deserve more than to be put on my painting storage shelving to languish. I do things like this blog post. I enter the paintings in shows. I send JPEGS to collectors, interior designers and others who might be interested in the work. I’m also in several online galleries such as Saachti Online so I get the paintings into the galleries and note that location on Bento, too. Etc.

Quite the saga for each and every painting. Oh, I almost forgot, each painting also needs to be added to my own online gallery. But if you check up on me, you’ll see that I’m way behind on that. So I’m putting it on the task list for next week!

Agua Caliente Autumn, acrylic painting on panel, 18" x 24"

Stroll, acrylic painting on canvas, 36" x 48"

And now back to my wonderful wall easel, where I have one painting in progress and four panels of varying sizes just waiting for me.