Wow!

Feelgood, 2008, Oil on Panel, 9x9

Sorry for my absence here-it was out of my control unfortunately, but good timing nonetheless.

On Monday evening our satellite stopped working which meant no access to the internet. This happens occasionally and is sometimes weather related, and sometimes not. This time it wasn't. Doug got up on the roof to try and readjust it (if we call for a service crew to do it, they can't usually get here for at least a week) like he has done many times before. But this time he just couldn't get it working. Then he was in NYC for two days and on Thursday when he came back he tried again. After a few conversations with a service guy in India (what?) and a few more trips up and down the ladder (Doug, not me) we got a good number and viola, we are connected again.

While it was irritating to not be online, it was also kind of nice in a retro 20th century kind of way. It took me about a day and a half to stop feeling the urge to check my emails every hour or so. And I got so much work done! I spent most of Tuesday painting the last bit of my studio-the stairwell:


Pretty snappy, huh?

And the last few days were spent finishing up 37 very small paintings for the local show, which I hung today. I am sure that I got much more sleep this week getting ready for that than I would have otherwise. And wow, did I do a lot of reading! Finished a book and got pretty far into a new one.

But I missed reading blogs, missed my emails and I can't believe that I missed the big news about Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck. Dang.

Anyway. Good to be back in the loop and I will start posting regularly again on Monday. A lot has been going on, yet now that I have finished up for this show (the last one that I have planned for the rest of the year, although I suppose a few things may come up) I have nothing urgent to do.

Now I am gonna enjoy the rest of the summer, relax a bit and maybe even get a tan. Well enough to take edge off at least. Heh.

Super Duper Important Electronics Update

Deep Shadow, 2008, Oil on Panel, 24x36

As I have mentioned a few times over the last month, I have recently been having so much trouble with my electronics that it is downright comical at this point. Most of my time since getting back has been taken up with fixing and/or replacing the various items that have broken down.

1. My 2 year old iMac crashed in January, setting me off onto a rant or two or ten. I used Doug's computer and sometimes the kid's computer until we could figure out what was wrong with it. While I was in Vermont, Doug took it to the Apple store in Albany and they said the logic board was shot. Cost to fix that: $950. Cost to replace: $1199. I replaced it AND got a 20" screen, plus an external back up system. Totally tax-deductible at least. But more difficult to get up and walk away from. Heh.

2. I took Doug's old Mac laptop to Vermont, along with the antique power supply cord. People laughed when they saw the cord, it's so old. The battery in the laptop is shot and the computer is so old that they don't even make those batteries anymore, so the cord is necessary. BUT. The power cord is also messed up and you have to wiggle it and set it up just right or it won't work. And I was seldom able to get the wiggle just right. Somehow my 12 year old son is able to get it to work every time which is just typical.

3. The battery in my cell phone died on the second day in Vermont. This was extremely annoying because I rarely even use my cell phone. I am still not even a 100% sure of the number. We don't have a signal at our house and I don't have any business that is so important that I need to receive calls while I am picking up my kids in town. Luckily, Doug just got a new phone (he DOES use his phone all of the time-in fact his phone is actually attached to his left ear) and the battery in his old phone is fairly new so we can just replace mine with that one.

4. This one really breaks my heart: my iPod. Listening to my music in the studio is a big deal to me and I love my iPod. I took it along with me to Vermont and while I was there the sound stopped coming through the left headphone. I tested the headphones on a friend's iPod and they worked fine. I listened to the music in one ear for an afternoon which gave me a headache and made me feel unbalanced, then while fooling around with the connection, I found that if the headphones were only halfway plugged in, the sound comes through both headphones. The drawback with this plan is that, well, the headphones are only halfway plugged in, and the plug tended to fall out easily. But I managed to get through the month like that. Now that I am home though, the music is only playing through one stereo speaker which is driving me crazy and so Doug is going to take it in with him to the city to see if it can be fixed or if it has to be replaced. And naturally, the iPod is about two months past the end of the warranty which is also just typical.

5. And last, but in no way least, my 1998 Mazda MPV has been giving me trouble for the last year or so. Um just after we paid off the loan, of course. First the air conditioning broke and because of some crazy design issue it was incredibly expensive to fix, so we never did that. Then it was the usual stuff in a car with over 100,000 miles-new brakes, timing belt, muffler, new axels, tires, etc. I have had many worries about the car breaking down on the side of the road and with my tight kid pick up schedule and with Doug out of town half the time I have been pitching daily fits about getting a new car. We decided to wait until spring but then on the way to Vermont, I noticed that the back of the roof was impeding my rear view. I took it to a mechanic in Johnson and he said that the rear suspension system was completely shot. Doug and I debated about getting it fixed (not cheap) and then decided that it was time to get a new car. So my Mazda and I limped home, with the body of the car just a few inches higher than the rear wheels. Yesterday we traded it in for a whopping $1000 bucks and came home with a shiny new charcoal grey Honda Pilot. I am relieved to have a dependable car again and am even more tickled to have the best cup holders that I have ever had in a car. Sometimes it's the little things. Oh, but even better than the cup holders is the fact that I am paying for this car. After years of relying on Doug's income, I am very happy to be able to buy my own car. First one since the '74 VW Dasher I bought for $2000 when I was 16!

I got through all of this thinking that at least my digital camera still works, but then it turns out that I left it in the lounge at the Vermont Studio Center on my last night there. Along with the memory card containing hundreds of portraits I took of the other residents. Luckily, the infamous David Grozinsky found it exactly where I left it on that crazy late night (I can't even use alcohol as an excuse), and is sending it back to me, so I will NOT have to buy a new camera at least. Well, unless it gets lost in transit, which would be just typical.....

So there you go. Who knows what will break down on me next.

Frustration and Fun

I am getting a bit mixed up on the days here, so I guess I will drop the day by day thing. Each day has been filled with a lovely mixture of routine (mealtimes and studio time) and special events (visiting artists and readings by the writing residents) but I am lucky if I know the day of the week, let alone the date.

My laptop computer has pretty much died here. As well as my cell phone, so along with my home computer dying (it was the logic board, whatever the heck that is, and replacing it costs almost as much as a new computer so I am getting a new computer I guess) last month, I am pretty sure that I must have some sort of negative magnetic aura surrounding me. Heh. Anyway, I will try to post when I can, but I am at the mercy of the availability of the two public computers in the resident's lounge. And I haven't yet established whether or not I can download photos. But I will keep taking them and post them when I get back home and get my new computer all set up.

Ok, update on the figures. I am struggling. The underpaintings that I posted a few days ago have mostly crashed and burned at the color stage. They are unfinished because I feel so unenthusiastic about working on them and I have spent most of my time lately avoiding them. Once in awhile someone comes in and says they really have some promise and so I try again, but mostly they suck. I have a few theories on why they aren't working, but I guess mostly I have found that I have to find a different way to handle paint when painting the figure as opposed to the landscape. However, they do each have a few redeeming elements and I have spent some time starting a few small figures by doing a drawing with sanguine pastel pencil (to get the detail), coating it with matte medium and then starting with the glazes. Those are in progress and I am interested in them so far. In the meantime, I did a bunch of small still lifes (plan b in case I became so irritated by the figures that I would flounder and waste time. which I did). I liked the still lifes, but they are more "rigid" and more precise then I usually prefer. I think it's because I worked from life. When I have the subject matter directly in front of me I tend to become more concerned with perfectly rendering the object rather than interpreting it, which is what I am able to do when using photos as reference. Should be the other way around so go figure. I have done the first layer of color on those, but have some ideas about how to soften them when I work on them tomorrow.

I also did a still life which included some beautiful red tulips yesterday afternoon on a primed piece of linen, about 38x32 or so, stapled directly to the wall of my studio. I thoroughly enjoyed doing it and was still feeling giddy when I went to dinner. It is maybe too rigid as well, but I can paint more loosely to compensate when I get to that stage.

I have had many people in my studio visiting and while the feedback on my work is wonderful, I am having some difficulty wading through the conflicting comments. I forgot about all that from art school! About half like the faceless faces and half don't. They are only faceless, because I couldn't get any of the detail in in the underpainting so planned to do that at the color stage. Not sure though that faceless is a direction that seems right for me and my people.

We have had two visiting artists, and one writer. I have been able to get to talk to of them at length (one just arrived tonight; he will visit my studio Friday morning) but I think I will write more about that next time. I'd like to discuss the studio visits as well as put up their links and I am too tired to do that tonight. I should go to bed but I suspect I might end up chatting with some of my house mates. I am enjoying that part of being here too!

Number 18 (plus a rant)

It seems my computer's problem is hardware related, given it's symptoms. Um, especially the not starting up part and maybe the noise that comes from the back too. Doug is going to take it down to the city next week to see if it can be saved and if any of my info can be retrieved. I did manage to back up my jpegs before it totally crashed, but it will be tough to lose the files I didn't save-family pictures (don't get me started on how much I resisted storing our photos online, for exactly this reason! And yes I know that I am a complete moron for not backing up everything.) and my emails especially. And naturally we don't have Apple Care, so no matter what happens, I will be parting with a big chunk of money. Can I just add here that my computer is only two years old? Shouldn't this stuff really be lasting longer? Our iMacs from 1999 only lasted until 2003 before they too crashed and burned. Literally. Smoke came out of my computer. This technology crap sure is handy but is also infuriating and I totally suspect a bit of planned obsolescence going on here and it's really ticking me off. I am going through this with my car as well. Just after the car loan was finally paid off, it started breaking down. Big things too-axles, the timing belt, all kinds of engine thingys. I am very suspicious of all of this.

Ok, I am done with my rant. Sorry, got a bit carried away. Haven't I ever mentioned that I have a tendency to believe in conspiracy theories?

Anyway, in December I came across this post and was really interested to see who ranked where. And because I am completely self-involved I immediately high-tailed it over to technorati to see what my ranking there was. Seeing that it was pretty good and concerned that I wouldn't get my due, because, you know, this is all SO important, I left my technorati link in the comments section. Kim updated the list in January and I admit to being pretty pleased to see that I am in the top 20. Number 18 to be exact. Lisa is Number 12-cool! I am also slightly shocked that anyone finds me even remotely interesting; in my real life, I have noticed people looking around nervously for an escape route when I approach to say hi and no one wants to chat on the phone with me, which is one of my very favorite things to do. Heh. I am only partially kidding there.

So go check me out on Kim's list and then take a look at some of the other artist blogs. I frittered away a whole day looking through all of the ones I hadn't seen before.

Zero to Eighty in Less Than a Week

Front and Center, 2007, Oil on Panel, 18x18

So for no apparent reason our satellite dish, yet again, moved just enough so that it lost the signal. Usually when this happens Doug goes up on the roof and fiddles around with it while I shout up to him through a window to tell him what number the signal strength is from the computer. We used to call for a serviceman to come out but they would take days and sometimes weeks to come and just do what Doug can do anyway. But naturally, this time, he was in Chicago most of last week at a trade show and didn't get home until last night. And while I can do many things, climbing a ladder (not to mention getting back down) to the roof is not one of them. The internet went down Friday, with just a few brief minutes up on Saturday and Sunday morning, leaving me feeling alienated from the entire world. For instance, I only just learned today that Larry Birkhead may soon be getting custody of his daughter and taking her back home to the US. Heh. It wasn't so bad actually, I got a lot done around the house, but did have to redirect whenever I wanted to look something up or check on the news or whatever.

Anyway, a few interesting things happened on Saturday, which I'll discuss tomorrow when I have more time. For now I just wanted to say hi again and to mention the fact that last Monday the kids had a snow day, while this Monday was 80 degrees and perfectly sunny and beautiful.

Gotta love spring around here!