Busy, Busy, Busy

Okay, yesterday was the first day of spring so I am doing a little "spring cleaning". UGH!!! My studio is a total disaster and I need to get organized so I can work efficiently. Time to get down to business and I can't do that with all the clutter that is in here. SIMPLIFY..... that's my motto as I attack this mess. Tomorrow Bill will have to go to the dump with all the clutter I am eliminating!

I am so excited. A print publishing and licensing company is interested in my paintings so I am going to be a published artist. I like that idea. Now I will get more mileage out of each painting. I put so much detail and work into each creation, and there is only so much you can charge for a painting in today's economy so this will give me a little more income for each work without breaking anyone's back. But all of my paintings are sold so they want me to repaint some of the old ones they saw on my website. UGH! That takes a little of the joy out of it. One of the paintings they like is the one above "Shine on Harvest Moon". Well I have to get back to my feather duster. Talk to you soon.

ICY Day but Finished "The Posie Emporium"

Aah!!!! It's done...taken the full week to complete but "Petunia Philbrook's Posie Emporium" is completed and ready to go up on the auction block. Sometimes its depressing when I look at how prolific some of the folk art painters on Ebay are. They just churn out painting after painting and get an amazing number of bids and huge prices for them. To me they are cookie cutter paintings..all the same with a few different figures painted in. I guess its a great business model but to me it isn't really folk art. For me, a folk art painting should tell a story and have enough details in the painting that the story is credible. I look at the work of Grandma Moses, Charles Wysocki, Kathy Jakobesen, Rosebee, Barbara Appleyard, Will Moses, Sally Caldwell Fisher ... lots of detail so you can involve yourself in the picture. That's what folk art is to me! Although the "cookie cutter" approach is tempting from a monetary standpoint, I just can't "pimp" my paintings. I may be able to only produce one or two paintings a week (and that's a real good week) and they may only get one or two bids and end up selling for $35.00 but I am proud of what I paint and I feel that I am remaining true to my art. That is more important than all the money in the world. My Dad always told me, "Take the time to do it right, or don't do it at all." Those have been the words I have lived by all my life and every time I am tempted do something a little less than my very best, I hear a little voice inside my head repeating that refrain. Scarey but I guess we are our parents!

Busy week, tough week!!!!!

Here we are at the end of another week and I haven't been able to post all week I have been so busy. Monday and Tuesday were "shipping days" after 5 successful art auctions on Ebay. Then Bill had a visit to the VA Center in Togus on Wednesday. Thats a 350 mile round trip and definitely an all-day event. Yesterday I went to the hospital outpatient to have a PH Probe installed in my esophagus. Trying to figure out the source of that chronic cough I have. This probe thing is not a good time. It has had to stay in 24 hours to record the acidity in my esophagus. At 2:30 PM today they take it out. Yeah!!!!!! Ah, the golden years.....you spend all your time in the doctor's office.

But in spite of all that, I have managed to paint every day, even last night with that darn probe thing in the way. I am working on a very "Spring" painting called "Petunia Philbrook's Posy Emporium". I should be able to finish it up so that it can be listed on Ebay Sunday. I think that my collectors will love it!

Just got feedback from the purchaser of the painting shown above called "Footprints in the Snow". The purchaser was very happy when it arrived safely in Spokane, Washington. She loves it and says she'll be back to buy more. I'm just glad she's happy.