I was scheduled for a solo show at the Rancho Linda Vista Gallery next February, 2014. The gallery is located at Rancho Linda Vista here in Oracle. It is a well regarded gallery in a well regarded artist’s community which has been around since it’s founding in 1968 by a group of University of Arizona art professors. Next February was a long time away. I was already thinking about the show and starting some work (potential candidates for the exhibit). Plus I have a lot of new work that has yet to be shown anywhere. So I was totally relaxed about the whole thing.
Well, a week or so ago, the April 2013 artist dropped out, leaving an opening. I had my name on the waiting list so I got the offer to show earlier than planned. 10 months earlier to be exact. Of course I said yes!
As it turns out, this February through May are extraordinarily busy, which I didn’t exactly factor in to the equation when I took the leap. But I’m okay, really. I’m trying not to think about the upcoming Tucson Festival of Books for which I need to make a couple of books for the PaperWorks exhibition in the Special Collections Library. Plus a bunch of books to sell in the PaperWorks tent adjacent to the Special Collections Library. Then there are my workshops, scheduled nearly every week. And a previously scheduled 3-day US Route 89 work trip happening in March.
Well, anyway you get the idea. It really is great to be so busy doing the art related things that I love to do. I just need to get organized. Actually I need to get organized enough to start getting organized.
Here are five of the paintings I’m working on, all in different stages of completion:
If I can figure out how to do it, I’m going to paint the dried sunflowers (see photo below) on the surface of this painting.