
My studio in action
This photo by James Cowlin is a shot of my studio in action, with unfinished paintings on tables and on the easel in the foreground on the right side. Thank you to Jim for capturing scene. It’ll always bring back good memories of this period of intense creating. The studio was a beehive of activity for many months. The paintings on the wall are in a holding pattern. They’re either finished and drying or finished, dry and waiting to be photographed.
Last week I packed up the paintings and hauled them to the Chandler Center for the Arts Gallery, Chandler AZ where I’m delighted to be in a 2-person exhibition, “Organically Askew”, with Autumn Rose. The show opens this Friday, Jan 25, 6-8pm.
I got back to a studio with empty walls and tables. So naturally I got the harebrained idea to paint the dirty, paint splattered and pock marked walls. Thank you James Cowlin for pitching in! He did the tough part, rolling on the paint. I did the taping and touch-ups with a teeny 1″ brush, see photograph at top of page.

Jim, painting up a storm
Next up, since I had Marie Kondo’s “The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up” on my mind because son Mathew just got inspired and tidied up his apartment and then made us watch Marie Kondo on Netfilx, I decided to get at the messes in my studio and reorganize.

This fairly small mess turned into a gigantic pile
I piled everything in sight onto my tables. What you see above is just the start. Books, art supplies, magazines, and all manner of miscellaneous stuff, until the whole thing was a teetering catastrophe. I didn’t take a photo of this stage as I didn’t have the heart to face the situation I’d created…
Since then I’ve made some progress but my enthusiasm is fading as I look around at all the areas I haven’t started to attack. I have a vague memory of this happening the last time I attempted de-cluttering. An exhausting business!
On an upbeat note, below is an installation photo by Peter Bugg, the City of Chandler’s Visual Arts Coordinator, of part of “Organically Askew”. Thank you Peter for the wonderful curation, installation and photos of the show!

Autumn Rose’s beautiful painting is on the right, the rest are my paintings