The highs and lows of an artist. Last week I mentioned I was entering 4 paintings in the Rotary Wrest Point Art Show; one of which was a donation to charity. When I went to look at the exhibition on Saturday I was surprised and pleased to note I had sold a painting, ‘Spring Beach’. This was good news for Rotary’s coffers as I had donated it.
On returning on Sunday afternoon, I found that I hadn’t sold any of the other three(No red dots). I am philosophical about sales; if it happens that’s great but I am not disappointed if I don’t. There will be someone out there who will see it and love it enough to buy it sometime. Or as I often do I continue to work on it with more layers.
Surprise, surprise as I was signing out I was told that I had sold another and to a well know art collector. I asked them to check as there hadn’t been a red dot. But now I had three people about me very excited about this sale. So I left the particular painting there and went home very happy and excited not by the fact I had sold one, but to whom I had sold it.
My euphoria persisted so I announced my sale(s) on Facebook. Then an hour or so later I received a call from a very apologetic organiser to say they had made a mistake and that it hadn’t sold. Back to earth!!! It has been retained by Rotary until a lunch for Art Appreciators in a few weeks time when they will try to sell it. The story is not over yet. This experience made me realise that I value and aspire to recognition by art collectors; not something I had thought about before.
I have been working on my floral series again this week trying to get looser and freer in my approach. I have used a lot of big oil sticks as well as oils and wax medium. These are nowhere near finished but showing promise. I need to keep the looseness but apply more layers. The third one is a larger 60cm square.
I am doing some small studies for more works in my Oceans series too. Hopefully there will be something to see next week! I continue with my personal development playing with colour this month; learning more about mixing colours, placing colours for impact and creating harmony in colour palettes.
The wonderful thing about art is you are forever learning new things. I love experimenting and taking on new challenges. I also spend a lot of time recording what I am doing and journalling ideas and thoughts. I need to as I am very forgetful. The journalling process is proving very useful to me. In the past I would start but interest soon waned. I think the secret is to spend more time making art and recording things. Spend more time doing what you love!
