Grape Gallery NM

Catching Up

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Haven’t written for awhile, don’t know why, just busy living I suppose.

I have a leak in my RV roof, haven’t been able to find anyone to help me fix it so I did the next best thing and did it myself.

I didn’t think I could get up to the roof but found I could climb that ladder and it wasn’t as hard as I thought, or scary. Wish I’d gotten a picture to scare my kids with but no-one was around. I used a shower liner and some special tape to hold it down, so far so good, no leak. More permanent fix is needed and the ceiling inside the rv one area should be replaced but now is covered with fabric I am a make-do champion.

My garden has had a really rough time this year, too much heat and wind, I lost everything I had in pots but the garden may recover if we stop having 100 +degree days. I have them shaded with a plastic tablecloth in hopes of survival. last year my flowers did better but the garden worse harvesting only a couple small vegetable………….things, Tomorrow it will be 100.

I’ve been painting using the pour style, what a mess.

I thought I’d quit doing it because you waste so much paint. You must make multiple cups of paint that must be about the same viscosity, then dump them into another cup layering the paint and then use one of several different methods of adding it to a canvas or your choice of substrates and spin it until you like the effect, while the paint splashes everywhere.

I thought to quit making this mess but I had lunch with some friends at a small cafe near here and noticed a large empty wall. I thought that maybe they would like some art for their walls This is a very small community cafe that did well during the pandemic with take out and has been able to freshen up their cafe. I went to find out and found it closed for a short vacation but the store next door, which I though was owned by the same family was open and I asked the owner about it. He is not the owner of the cafe but said I could paint a mural on his outside wall. Hmmm why not? Maybe when it cools down a bit might be fun.

Anyway I had these paintings in my car and was headed into town for groceries and thought I’d stop at the gallery to see what she thought of these poured paintings, though I said I didn’t think they were gallery material.

She loved them! She wanted to buy one of them immediately ! So I left her with 7 oval paintings. Personally I don’t like them so much but other people seem to so I guess I’ll make some more. They don’t photograph well to add here, they are actually pretty cool, you can see what you want to see, the earth, the seas, creation, if you don’t like it one way you can just turn it. I could only find photos of these ,I made 8 and today made 4 more, she wants to sell them for $70, I said okay because they are sold in a gallery, but I would ask for just 35 myself! They are a lot of work, messy messy work!

End of story now I don’t have anything to offer the cafe……yet.

  • This is on a 6×6 canvas
  • I kept this one, I like it but will probably modify the black a bit with acrylic pens.

My voice mail was full,

I didn’t know how to empty it until a friend said she called herself to empty it and so I called myself

40 messages waiting to be heard.

I listened to messages sent a year ago. Sorry!

What does one do to apologize after all this time?

There were no junk messages just family and friends trying to say Hello.

and I wonder why no one calls me!

My voice mail is squeaky clean now

call me.

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Mola style painting

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I’m painting a 20)x20 canvas in the style I call my painted Mola style. Living in Panama for years I appreciate the sewing techniques of the women of San Blas.

Mola painting

It’s very busy but I’m not finished yet, I have to look at it awhile and finish the sides and, then I’ll resin it hoping for a good mirror finish and take it to the gallery. This is the third attempt with this canvas never satisfied and starting over. So the finish on the canvas is irregular and finally limits what I can do here, I’d never have a smooth finish so I had to paint something that would look like it was meant to have texture or add resin which hide the irregular surface. This would look good on any color wall because it has so many colors

I hope for a good response to this style because I really love to paint it.

updating

This canvas has gone through multiple changes. I did resin it but the resin result was poor and I did it over and then it looked better but was sticky. I waited. And waited, still a little sticky, what to do? I rubbed wax on it, felt better but now the colors looked faded. I rubbed some more but finally added more paint. I repainted and finally varnished it.

May make yet another change remove the white lines, maybe

WhoooHooo

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Excited by my first sale from the Grape Gallery!

I almost threw the envelope away thinking it was something I had no interest in, something about a spa. Then I remembered that Pelican Spa is the name of Grape Studio company, I’d gotten a notice from this same company with a $15 check for a couple tiles that were sold a week ago. I’d taken the trash out already when this light came on in my head and I retrieved the trash and found a check for $112 for the sale of a painting. The trash was picked up today so if I had not realized my error in time I would not have known I had a sale. Funny thing, I’m not sure which of the paintings sold, they were named, this one called Cheer-1 I think it must be this painting. What a pleasure to know it will hang in someones home.

I gave away two paintings to a couple that was leaving the park to live in a different state where they bought a home, they were very generous to me, they gave me that beautiful leather chair I have in my studio, a step that has helped me to safely step up into my RV, and a fence for Charley. Good people.

Time for me to start painting seriously, I’ve been stuck on doing much of the same style, abstract stuff and sent them to family and some gifted in the park, I think I am over it now.

Check out that painting in black and white, That is a color modification of a painting by my camera setting on noir, I’d tried to over paint a painting in black and white but was not successful .

I was painting using chalk paint, very interesting, vibrant colors flat!

These are the other paintings at the gallery.