The next two months...

A friend called the other day, and mentioned the possibility of me showing at the June First Friday (Kansas City) gallery walk.  I haven't shown at this particular gallery before, but I have shown during First Fridays a few times.

I expressed interest, but (honestly) I'm not really ready.  (If he doesn't call me back, I won't feel very bad about not showing next month.)

I don't like putting together a show when I feel that I haven't created enough new work to really justify having a show.  And I've completed only one painting since my last show (last month).  I have another painting almost finished (you've seen it "in progress" here), and I could have it ready by the first week in June--but it might be rushed, and that doesn't always lead to the best work.

I do feel a bit guilty, in that I know there are artists out there who really struggle getting shows, and here I am writing about being offered a possible show that I would almost rather not do.  But, I want people who come to a show to see lots of new stuff.

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I did find out about an upcoming art competition sponsored by a national art magazine.  It's a themed show, and fits perfectly with my current work (no, not the spiders).  I'm going to make three more paintings over the first two months this summer, and enter four paintings, and hope that at least one of them gets published.

Wish me luck!

More progress!

I'm really liking how this is coming along!

New painting in progress (and a painful, but significant, realization)...

Julie Farstad, my seniour painting teacher at the Kansas City Art Institute, once asked me, "What do you want your figures to be doing?"

It's a question I've though about a great deal since graduating in 2008--and a question I still haven't answered.

I've been working on a figure drawing for a painting I've had in mind for a while now.  The drawing has undergone a few permutations, and although I thought I liked the concept, I've never been pleased with any of my attempts to draw the pose.

The painting was going to be of a nude woman holding her arms outstretched, and wrapped around her fingers would be a spiderweb in a loose "Cat's Cradle" weave, with three or so spiders crawling through the webbing.

I realized (yes, only just) now that this is a truly silly idea.

Now, in my defense (if that's the right word...) I have seen numerous extremely well-done paintings of far worse concepts.  Most fantasy and science fiction illustrations are sillier--and more sexist.  I have nothing against nudity, or even overt eroticism, but, I have no real reason why this figure would be nude.  My intention isn't to make spiders seem "sexy".

I've been working on the next of my "Invented Faces" (pictured as it looks, so far) and on an old painting I'm restoring.  Once the restoration was done, I wanted to get to work on some new figure drawings.

Now, however, I think I need to answer the question, before I can really put in the serious time it'll take just to get two or three conceptually rigorous drawings done--not to mention the paintings themselves!