PORTRAIT SOCIETY OF AMERICA’S 2015 CONFERENCE at the HYATT

Back from the Grand Hyatt Atlanta in Buckhead where 700-some portrait painters filling two floors attended demonstrations, top-quality art vendors showed artist-grade materials, artists demonstrated on double screen, and held special interest sessions, I am tired but empowered. The theme centered around every portraitist’s idol, John Singer Sargent, with a keynote address by public figure Richard Ormond, a Sargent descendant and champion for Sargent in terms of managing a collection for the Met for an upcoming show, and such. For my own special interests, this stroked and joined several of my disparate areas into one package deal–watching a watercolor portrait done by the inimitable Mary Whyte, seeing portraits done in oil by the greats, drawing and drawing media, practice time myself drawing from a model, specific tips and stories from the greatest portraitists, and even a devotional hour on Sunday morning.

It was my 7th year going, a fantastic year for me. First of all, my student from years back and now an adult at my studio, an artist in her own right, Allison Coleman, went ‘with’ me, and won the $1700 Hughes easel–a bear of an easel like you have never imagined before. Since Allison was working for PSoA on Sunday morning and not in the session to receive the results of the drawing, I stood up like the spontaneous person I am and claimed it for her! Then I told her, to screams of delight in the supplies room. Of course, being the friendly person that I am, I offered to ‘store’ the easel at j’Originals’ (my downtown art studio) until she could add on a room to her house for it. Needless to say, she declined my generous offer. I am looking forward to cross-sharing what we got from our concentration sessions in the coming weeks.

Walking straight into the sights and smells of oil paints and other products on Thursday evening was a wonderful treat–we got to walk around 15 artists painting five models for 3 hours with a view to exhibiting and selling them in a silent auction, punctuated by a loud auction at the height of the bidding process. Last year I bought one of these; this year I was not so fortunate. I did, however, participate in the fixed-price, blind auction of 6 x 9’s painted by the famous artists around the U.S. and probably further. I picked one board which had several I liked on it, because if two wanted one painting, there was a drawing, and you lost time. Well, this was SO fun, because, not only was I the only one to raise my hand for the perfect little boy’s face with piercing eyes–it was painted by my very favorite portraitist, Bart Lindstrom. To boot, he walked up saying “that’s my painting,” and we did a photo-op together.  What are the odds?! Now I will get it framed and add it to my own growing collection; I think I have five, now.

Since I have not substantially changed my portfolio, with the exception of upgrades to my website, I did not participate in that this year. I’m still working on accomplishing what I learned from two years back. This year, however: I pledged to myself to publish a short-run portfolio. Off and running, we watched two artists with totally different styles attack one model (well, not literally) in the sense of conjuring them onto paper or canvas to amazing results. Then I chose  21st century promotion for work and career, and believe me, from that I have my direction and work plan set out for me for the coming three years. It was nice to know, however, how far ahead I was in one area due to my brilliance in picking the right webmaster. In short, the trek to gallery and representation is through website, portfolio, coffee table art book, blogging, and shows, shows, shows. My seemingly random directions have turned out to be spot on. Now this will herd me in the right direction. In fact, there was some overlap here in what I would have gotten from the writers’ convention, RWA (did I mention that I write novels, too?) that I have attended a couple of times, in regards to self-publication. So I really was getting my money’s worth. And I loved the presenters and added them to my friends’ professional network already.

Networking was extremely lovely, and bloomed in spite of the hurry and elbow-to-elbow people. I saw a break-out session leader from last year, we greeted one another, and made plans for furthering a mutual area of interest in the society. I met new contacts and misbehaved a little cracking up over her friends’ text message about lying in front of the black curtain in the back. They told us to stop shaking in our chairs. “Never mind the woman behind the black curtain.” Then in another aside, a lovely young Canadian artist invited me to join her at her table and we traded stories and cards, and a Greensboro artist and I chatted about our styles and he gave me clarity about an opportunity I was considering that helped me decide to put it away permanently. I made a fantastic gallery connection to grow to, as well.

Meanwhile, back at the Ranch: I kept tracking the moving whereabouts of my National Watercolor Society’s accepted painting via FedEx, and worried it from Mississippi to Arizona. I also discovered that I made a website error that caused my painting on my website to be advertised as “free” right after a top gallery representative had “friended” me, and I, panic-stricken, tried to rouse interest in my plight. Ah, that’s taken care of, now. I hope the gallery owner didn’t look during that time. What can I say? “I’m an artist and a writer, I can’t do everything” never stopped me from trying…and often goofing up.

On Saturday morning we were brought into the historicity of our craft with master artist Everett Raymond Kinstler and Richard Ormund’s insider talk about Sargent. From there, we got to watch Quang Ho demonstrate in oil next to Mary Whyte in watercolor. They each completed an a la prima portrait of the model sitting on the stage, and we listened to their entertaining asides, informative tips and answers to questions. Later we watched the great and famous Daniel Greene build on a portrait he began at last year’s conference which was so informative to a practicing artist. Again he displayed his famous palette of colors, talked palette prep and retouch mediums, the process of oiling out, and other such technical issues which blessed our portrait artist souls.

Saturday evening climaxed the trip with its cocktail hour and fancy dress banquet, where we got to watch the year’s luminaries receive their medals, certificates, and honors in portraiture’s equivalency to the Emmy’s. Allison, my husband, and I joined a group around a table. There were a few surprises, like people’s choice, but most of us had already been through the winner’s gallery and taken photographs of each of the winning pictures and sculptures, some of which I will share with my readers. Excited with others for their wins–always a part of the picture for an artist–I helped cheer on my peers and betters.

You can see more of my pictures at https://www.pinterest.com/joartis/to-atlanta-with-portrait-painters/

The peak was not the end, because Sunday morning brought more insider news of studios of working artists and a detailed demonstration of a pencil portrait by Burt Silverman, one of my favorites. Then, before exhaustion precluded leaving, we headed home on our nine-hour stint which included 2 hours sitting bumper to bumper in traffic–then collapsed at 10p.m., as I planned on being back at work first thing Monday morning. After all, I caught the vision. Now I had to make it happen.

P.S. Monday, I used my Rublev brand artists’ oil that I discovered and bought at the conference, Italian Green Umber, Series 1, and my new “purple ocher” for my painting for the cover of my next novel. These are Old Masters grade colors and mixes without modern additives–and the color was perfect! Thank you, Tatiana, for the introduction to these paints. Again, randomly right on! Perhaps that should be my banner.

Mimosa Legacy

i.                                             Near the spreading mimosa canopy

we sat. Powder puffs soft and Southern formed a pink parade.

Sweet perfume lingered from that world, a world of

Our Father’s filled with hummingbirds and butterflies.

From Lebanon this heirloom seedling came—a love note

Aunt Peggy sent us off the mother tree; a daughter mimosa

blessed our return from foreign soil, home. That tiny seedling

grew, swollen to capacity like a giant umbrella shading our yard,

teemed with life, this year, like Lebanon’s original one had,

like Grandma’s did in Dunn. As children, we girls scaled

the tree, picked its sweet-scented puffs. Other heirloom plantings,

hand cut with love, seedlings and crocuses met us winging

home from overseas. I treasured the poetry of the flowers

Peggy shared, tossed across the highway divide like a bouquet—

heritage flowers bearing names that read like A Child’s Garden

of Verses—lily of the valley, daffodil and jonquil, peonies

and pansies, magnolia, Star of David, antique rose and mums,

silver bells and cockle shells.

ii.                                             I can see Aunt Peggy kneeling

by the great elm oak—bed around its roots trowel-tended,

flowers birthed under deft strokes by fingers which mastered

the ivories as well, bounced over keys. She sang songs appropriate

to every occasion, silly or serious, like Toothpick Alice

who washed herself down the tub drain. We heard her play

the Blues, Broadway hits, Bach’s cantatas, Czerny’s exercises,

Bethoven, Mozart, and Liszt. Peggy and Granny Mac gathered

us around the baby grand with hymns we all would sing.

Aunt Peggy’s wit was a sharp tool that honed a pithy truth,

words sliced facts accurately. Grandma’s character alive

in just three words, “whim of iron.” To the man who died

in a flight of helium balloons tied onto his chair, the word

was, “Let that be a lesson to him.”

iii.                                              Aunt Peggy poured skill

and energy into the arts, brought symphonies to the school,

art exhibits to the county. At First Presbyterian, she chose

the Sunday anthem, taught choir members how to pronounce,

hold notes, come in on time, hit the right key. Her soft spot,

her passion, was her children, inviting cousins in, as well.

Family watched as hope dipped to agony as for two hours

we searched for Gene. She wandered, heart breaking, until

she found him slumped low in the jeep asleep after a game

of hide ‘n seek. She burned the highway up looking for Louise

and me. Lost in the woods two miles down. Anger surfaced

once we were safe, in justice meted out—me banned from

your presence, separated two weeks—one for each hour of pain.

iv.                                             We spent a winter with you

at Lebanon when our heater broke. Aunt Peggy and Uncle Gene

absorbed us as their own; she invited us to Christmas in MacDonald;

where I read stories to Granny Mac in bed. Aunt Peggy followed

each of us with avid interest, detailed her grandchildren’s, great-nephews’

and nieces’ whereabouts, talents, interests, hurts, and victories

with love and concern. She dared tell me when my mothering

should change. Aunt Peggy’s presence lingers among us, joins

that of Uncle Gene’s: their legacy is our heritage. A canopy

of  blossoms rises from green leaves, forms a house like a mimosa

of diversely-grafted children, scented flowers, of rosemary and sage.

For all those of you who have been emailing me, I am doing a blog post to answer you, since I can’t answer individual queries at the present time.

My newest book, A Deadly Provenance, has been doing well, and the new book Stone of Her Destiny has been taking several very exciting twists in its revisit before release. Some of those have to do with the gothic spookiness of the setting, a very famous Scottish setting, by the way, I won’t say more than that, and another twist came with research that turned up new stories in my own ancestry line which figures into the plot. I’m so excited about all that, and I can’t wait to get back in the kitchen (code for unhindered writing time).

I’ve been under a lot of stress lately, honing my painting entries to submit to big shows, like the 2015 International Portrait Competition. Since no one quite understands the world of show entries, let me go through this. First of all, you work like a crazy person to produce the most fantastic portrait or figure painting in the world, because entering this show puts you in competition with thousands–something like 12,000 entrants from all over the world, artists who are training in the best art schools in the universe. Trust me, this is not based on “talent” alone, but taught, disciplined, and acquired skill sets.

You have three chances to impress the judges–internationally known professional artists. You must have finished those three paintings in the last three years, not under supervision, guidance, or in a class, and of course, using only your own original source material. Once you have selected your paintings to submit, then you must hire a professional photographer or work years at that skill, as well, to make a photograph you can submit. This photograph, then, must be sent on floppy disk by mail or online through a professional jurying service. This service names length and file size constraints, restrictions that are a must. You must title your entry, make your credit card payment online by a specific deadline, and presto, your entry or entries (up to 3), are in the painting bank of 5 to 10,000 fellows.

Well, I’ve done this–and actually had one of my students and a professional in her own right, Allison Coleman–submit with me, this year. We are both attending the annual conference held this year in Atlanta the end of April. We won’t know who is in the 1% winning or placing categories until the end of March or better.

But I’ve entered several shows like this one already this year.

I’ve also finished a poetry book to enter a poetry book contest and three other poetry contests which have similar jurying procedures.

AARGH! As some famous cartoon character said in the comics…and that doesn’t touch tax of four varieties.

Which brings me to a thought–if you haven’t signed up yet, please do so, because those of you who sign up will hear about everything first and be eligible for gifts and special considerations only given to my email clients!

Thanks again for the emails, keep them coming, and I will answer them frequently–even if in bunches on the blog–like I’m doing now.

SIGNATURE MEMBERS OF WATERCOLOR SOCIETY OF NORTH CAROLINA SHOW

One of the benefits of a long-term relationship with a watercolor society is access to show opportunities all around the state.  This particular one is not divided by region, as are many now with WSNC who has divided its state into four sections to better serve artists in all regions, but one featuring its members who have won top prizes or been juried consecutively into their annual juried shows, thus earning the title “signature art member.” A signature member has the right to sign his or her name with the watercolor society’s initials after it. Yours truly has two societies after her name.

This show brings together what the title suggests, the cream of the state of NC’s watercolor artist crop, into the Cary Arts Center on 101 Dry Avenue–inside the curve at the school property, actually. The room is beautifully outfitted to hang paintings with gallery lighting and wonderful windows.

This coming Friday on July 25th from 6:00-8:00 p.m., the artists and Cary town folk will mingle at a reception which will serve finger foods and refreshments as a part of the Town of Cary’s Final Friday, and so the public is cordially invited to attend.

Some 50+ works will be on display at the Cary Arts Center for the month of August, until the 23rd.

The painting of mine that will hang is Whiff of Opium, a still life of luxury items: perfume atomizers, blown blue glass in a copper hanger, an art glass bottle with swirls, and a wonderful medicinal opium bottle I found in a thrift shop. I love assembling items to paint–no matter how intuitively you pick and join them, it seems they eagerly comingle to tell a story you did not consciously intend. I asked a friend to tell me if he liked the picture, or what he liked about the painting, if anything, expecting a hurried yes or no answer from him.

Instead, I received a bonus. He stepped back from the picture, considered, and then started pouring out treasure.

“I see a woman here who seems to be shallow, to live on the surface. She loves beautiful things, the rich life, and yet, there’s more to her. She’s a famous celebrity I know, who was drawn into the dark side, used drugs, and drugs eventually lured her away from even the beautiful items that she loved, and ended her life.” I looked at my own watercolor again. Sure enough, behind the dark bottle for opium, was a dark slice into her reality. We looked at other of my paintings and found others that had the dark spot–some that friends and visitors had commented on over the years about that very thing. Subconsciously, it was there.

The message was not intentional, a fact I much prefer. Having viewed art in museums in a variety of countries, I have seen propaganda art–or tendentious art, I might call it–and to me, that loses on all levels. Maybe that’s just the problem: it flattens all its levels into one and turns into an in-your-face message. If my paintings have a message, I want it to be truth that is discovered. I prefer authentic art, based on a person’s loves and passions, and not a preaching platform–whether religious or political. In a lot of ways Whiff of Opium was experimental. The watercolor medium is a non-dimensional one, so you are taxed to find new ways of showing things like the glitter on the hanging material on the back of the painting. Reading the painting from afar as one does the impressionists works best here. If you are interested in more of my ideas about the subject of art, do please visit my website, https://www.joriginals.net where you can read blog articles from different months and my philosophy of painting in About You and other places.

And so I do hope you will come by and visit the show sometime during the coming month. I wouldn’t mind if you came just to see my picture, but there are many beauties to feast the eye on there. Come just if you’d like to rub shoulders with us artists there; come on out this Friday evening. I think you’ll be glad you did!

Pt. I, Build Suspense White-Hot Intense  I’M ON THE FIRST STEP, I WANT MY–!

Finishing Dean Koontz’s book, Deeply Odd, was a roller coaster read, or a hide-under-the covers read, if you will. Couple that with a phone call from a friend the following morning saying she woke in the night face to face with a hairy black spider she brushed frantically away, and you have awakened some nerve endings. Seeing no black spider carcass increased her teror. How scary is that, she said. Then she couldn’t sleep, because the very thought of a missing spider struck fear into her heart. Her terror transferred to me. Image and Possibility were enough to pump my adrenalin, even though I hadn’t seen the spider. It could happen to me; maybe it was meant as a warning. I looked at my pillow, lifted it, and looked behind the bed.

The two events conjoined to reveal and deliver writing craft strategy, whole. How did it do that, you ask. Wait, wait, don’t be impatient. I promise I will deliver the secret, but before that’s done, I must divulge the name of the very best book explaining how to write a novel I ever read and followed: The Weekend Novelist by Robert J. Ray. Many years later, a book on writing craft better than all others popped up on my electronic device, which completed my education on the secret to writing that I am sharing with you. This book was not just about suspense, but–. TMI, too soon. Now that four balls are circling in the air, hang on. I will explain what the first two events share in common.

One mystery writer actually announced in public at a reading that she hated suspense. I hate she confessed, because that was her sterling lack, imho, lack of suspense. Progression through her books just kind of happened in a flat, plodding way, and the mysteries unraveled in the heroine’s hands as she followed clues in her lackluster style. Dull. I still fervently believe that the driving force in any novel, writing, or even poetry, is suspense. What else makes you turn a page, than good, strong suspense? You must know what happened. Did the heroine get out of that burning car? Was she all right, afterward? Who killed M, and why? Is he still around? Am I in danger? What made him do that? Burning questions have to be answered. As for my friend, did she call for an exterminator? Did she change all the sheets? These cascading questions signify the investment of personal involvement.

So, let’s break those examples down. Dean Koonz’s craft in creating suspense is exactly the same that my friend gave me in her call. Koonz and my friend painted a picture with words that lingered, an image that threatened or portended threat. They said, ‘something’s coming.’ Now Dean Koonz is a master of suspense and I embarked on a path of discovery by reading his novels. My friend, unwittingly, created the perfect picture of horror or suspense: a lost black spider near your head. So I have a picture and a process. Don’t worry, I’m going into further detail about both, right now. I promise. A believable person, innocently proceeding with life, encounters the unbelievable or is being set up for a horrible experience–we are brought in on the experience all at once, like my friend, or a little bit at a time, like the novel.

At first the two events, finishing Koonz and my friend’s black spider, seen in tandem, presented only a puzzle. Dean Koonz and a spider. The novel wasn’t about one, but that’s not to say he hasn’t written a novel involving a spider. Then the reason for my blinding light experience became clear. I remembered specifically searching writing craft books for how to develop plot which I later interpreted as suspense. I read and read. None of the how-to’s proved helpful. They outlined what to do with the plot you already had, but they did not tell how to create suspense from nothing. Frustrated, I began an intense internet search on how to plot. This migrated to suspense building. None delivered answers that created excitement. I stepped up my wordplay. These answers lacked the oomph, tightness, and intensity I wanted. (I talk to myself, did I tell you?) So, when my right brain supplied the word ‘intensity’–the master key emerged. Intense. I looked up the word. “Intense–occurring or existing in a high degree; very strong; violent, excessive, or vivid; as, an intense light.”

Intense meant stretched to the max, strenuous, urgent, fervent. Intense meant strong emotion and firm purpose. All right, I needed a craft book that taught me how to make my writing intense and all those other adjectives. No craft writing book turned up one specifically. Instead, all over the internet popped up Dean Koonz’s book entitled, “Intensity.” That settled it. I had to have it. If a writer of Koonz’s stature had written a book entitled “Intensity,” I bet it was intense. I could learn from the master. I bought his book, read it, my tongue hanging out the whole way. This began my love of his work. That, and one more feature of his books I won’t reveal until later. If at all.

Yes, if you dared name a book Intensity, you had to stand by it. Intense, it was. Suspenseful, it was. And would you believe, it taught me all the things I needed to know about how to build suspense, step by step. Upon writing this article about the process, I began to remember telling ghost stories at camp and striking terror into my friends’ hearts. One saw terror in their widened eyes, constricted lips, their white, gripped knuckles. One hid under her sheets. One ran out the door. I was good at making my friends’ mamas mad, but there’s a downside to everything.

You’ve heard the old adage about the ticking clock, I’ll bet. If you want to move a book along, create a deadline, increase the pace. Have your characters running against the clock. So as a writer, you think, increase the pace. Suspense is all about the ticking bomb, tight deadlines, and racing cars. It’s a Schwarzeneger movie or a Dan Brown thriller with cars racing up the Vatican steps.

All right, we now have the principles. First—start with somebody you can empathize with, and second, relate something terrible that just happened, or better still, is about to happen, or better even than that, both has and will. The third thing, then is to increase the pace, right? Wrong.

Instead, the third thing to do is the opposite of speeding up. It’s, Slow Down. Slow down? Surely that old brain has tricked me again. Everyone will laugh me to the curb and back. Slow down. Then the flashback picture of camp days and the scary story I told and embellished, the one about the former occupant of our room who had bitterly fought a friend, got so mad that he cut off his toe, and the man died of gangrene, so now he haunts the former friend’s descendants or anyone who enters his room, returned to mind. “I’m on the first step, I want my toe.”

And immediately you return to those days in a flimsy cabin, the night black around you, and there you lie in the dark without a weapon, sweating, crickets and frogs creaking, and you imagine a disembodied spirit walking up from the swamp, wanting his toe. Maybe you lie in the antebellum house of your childhood that actually claims ghosts as inhabitants, where there are more steps for him to climb, and the slow creak of stealthy pressure on old wood rubs every nerve raw. The same story works with a tweak here and there. Worse still, you have to go to the bathroom which is outside the cabin in the dark, where the Thing is lurking. Or it’s all the way down the hall in the antebellum house, and you have to go past those stairs.

You lie there, waiting for the next floor board to creak, for the whisper, for the scratch against the window. You  slide further under covers. “I’m on the 6th step, I want my toe,” the storyteller goes. Oh, God. Wait. How did I miss hearing the second, third, fourth, and fifth step? Was I not listening? Did he skip the warning? Is he playing tricks on us? No he’s not consistent; he’s not fair. Oh God. And then you remembered the back story, how the person who stayed in the room you were in died, but maybe he didn’t, really. Maybe he lived and turned psycho, went to a madhouse somewhere, and now, he’s escaped and visiting you. Don’t those people sometimes take to the countryside and find their way back to the one thing they obsessed on? “I’m on the seventh step, I want my toe,” the storyteller says, his voice grating menacingly, a sharp creak emanating from the stairs again, and you scream. Was that a laugh you heard?

See how I’ve caught you? Not by speeding up, but by

steadily, eerily

creepily

slowing

so you can hear the sweat drop

listening, ears keened  to the silence

the silence pregnant with evil

wavery red like eyes

malevolent forces

gain on you

through no fault of your own–

a door slams–

you jerk–

is it the  wind?

an accomplice?

you leap up

move deliberately to the door

to the hallway

that hides another door  you know is there  but he doesn’t

where you are either safe

or a sitting target

while menace

crazy evil

irrational motives near you–

you hear a slurp

a pant

an “8th step–I want my toe”  and

you, nearly crazy with fear—

Ohmigosh, I have reached my article limit, and fear I will have to make you wait for installment two in the series, I’m on the Second Step, I Want My– ! From Intense to Suspense and then, Victory. You can’t be upset with me. I gave you what I promised so far, didn’t I? And with it, the fourth principle, which is to interrupt the anticipation yet again and again, making you more and more demanding and needing an answer. Withhold information, always withhold something crucial. Don’t blab it all out! Now, just pretend you’ve laid the book down on the table because an important stranger has knocked on your door, and you must find out what he wants. Do come back, however—oh, and don’t unlock your door for the stranger, even if he must use the bathroom or the phone, or God knows what. Even if your husband is there with you. Remember, I warned you. Don’t. And by the way, building suspense this way works in any genre. The fear principle just hypes up the romance, or whatever. You want to know what I know, don’t you? I hope I’ve done this in my book, A Deadly Provenance (http://www.amazon.com/A-Deadly-Provenance-ebook/dp/B00D4ANOZQ/ref=sr_1_fkmr2_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1370089422&sr=1-1-fkmr2&keywords=books+by+Joanna+McKethan). Read it and tell me, will you? And look for Installment Number Two on Plotting. Coming Soon.

Aquarius National Watermedia Exhibition 2014, Southern Colorado Watercolor Society to Exhibit My Watercolor

“Congratulations, your painting, “Crab-Net,” was accepted into the Aquarius National Watermedia Exhibition 2014,” Jan Steers, the Shows Chairperson of the Southern Colorado Watercolor Society, writes me. What wonderful words to hear from an organization I have wanted to exhibit in ever since I began painting in watercolor and exhibiting my work.

This painting is the picture of summer fun, centering as it does around the most colorful and lively of creatures, the N.C. blue- shelled crab. Learning how to maneuver with the crabs and pull the teeming, gyrating mass up from the water was an experience like no other. Had I not seen these creatures up close and personal, I would never have believed the vibrant colors they sported. I remember the frequent pulls and the workout it gave my shoulders as though it were yesterday. Nice of a friend to bring a newbie into the arena. I gave out a little early, as I recall. Oh, did I mention that blue-shelled crab taste delicious?

‘Crab-Net’ (https://joriginals.net/paintings-for-sale/sea-escapes/crab-net-watercolor/Crab-Net) was

crab-net

fun to paint, as well, in one of my two favorite media. For all that it was a difficult subject, as entangled as the crabs were with all their multitudinous parts, and as many concentric spiralings as happened in the net’s weave, in the metal clamp, and the outher rim. I have always loved to paint the subject of weaving, and prefer a puzzle to keep me inspired. If it wears me out or makes me crazy, well, that’s just part of the challenge. Painting in negative space–a necessity in watercolor since the white that remains in the finished painting is the white of the paper beneath–is always a challenge. A bit like patting your stomach and rubbing your head simultaneously, you must get the move of what lies beneath, as well, even when it turns in the opposing direction from the action on top.When I took off for my painting and writing sequestration last year, I worked on this piece as well as a book. I kept seeing new patterns emerge in the drawing phase, and so I would erase portions and re-do the pencil lines, once to introduce the metallic inner circle, the radiant vortexes of the simple trap. In a circular pattern, all the spaces between are wedge-shaped and organic, so working them together correctly was tricky. The subject emerged entwined in spirals of knotted twine which revealed more holes in the net than it did crabs. String has always fascinated me and is such a simple thing to outmaneuver cranky crabs, as fisherman from time immemorial have known.

‘Crab-Net’ just took a trip to Texas back in the spring (https://joriginals.net/texas-hill-country-foray-for-the-arts/) when it was accepted into an 18-state and Washington, D.C. Regional show, Southern Watercolor Society’s, of which I am a signature member. This became the occasion for a fun trip and seeing relatives in their part of the country. The 29 x 37 matted and framed work will exhibit September 27, 2014 through January 3, 2015 in the National Watermedia Exhibition at Sangre de Cristo Arts and Conference Center, 210 N. Santa Fe Avenue, Pueblo, Colorado. An awards reception will be held on November 14, 2014, from 5-8 p.m.

Colorado’s Southern Watercolor Society is not looking forward to having my painting in their exhibition nearly as much as I am. Who knows–maybe we will be needing a trip to Colorado for my birthday and can attend the Awards reception. Whether or not one wins anything other than the juried acceptance into the show, I find it exhilarating to rub shoulders with my peers in other states who create in the same media, find new friends, and make new opportunities. And I would be remiss not to mention my local watercolor society, The Watercolor Society of North Carolina (WSNC) and its group of wonderful members whose input has helped me along the road over the last few decades.

Paint to Sell–in Front of Everyone!

Never did I think I’d hear myself refer to my painting on stage again! The first couple of times I did that I thought were a fluke. But a few Fridays back at “Evening Walk on the Beach,” they planted me center stage under spotlights, painting my little heart out. At first the credits rolled onto a screen that hid me–credits for sponsors of Grace College of Divinity’s First Annual Spring Banquet last Friday the 16th. They are an accredited school for training ministers emerging from the 5- to 6000-member Manna Church located on the main Cliffdale Road campus in Fayetteville (https://joriginals.net/up-coming-events/).

I was invited by the event coordinator, Diane Sharp, who was familiar with my work and was told by top brass to hire the artist she knew (moi) who had painted on stage before. Yep, she praised me to the skies in front of everybody. Two of my studio-finished works I brought that shared the stage with me. My watercolor painting of NC blue crabs, Crab-Net, the one juried into the Texas show was on an easel to the left of me Friday, and Castaway Shell, a 3-foot by 4-foot oil painting, framed, hung right of center,  bracketing me on either side down front.

Then the screen rolled up for the great reveal: me at work, painting, finishing paintings to auction off that very evening. Nothing like a little pressure to provide an adrenalin rush and laser-sharp focus. I had my mini-art studio set up so all seated at beautiful banquet tables of evening sea decor could watch me paint, adding strokes to seashells and giving them surf backgrounds. My worship art performance was aided by the most beautiful “Celtic Worship” CD recorded by Eden’s Bridge, one I listen to as I paint in my studio @ Art on Broad Atelier, known as j’Originals’ Art Studio in downtown Dunn. The songs were worshipful and dreamy, lending to the flow of waves and my arm moving to the music in watercolor.

With my 16 x 20 watercolor board set on an upright easel, a not-so-usual position for painting watercolor I learned from Charles Reid, I and my brushes swayed to the music. The watercolor board responded a little differently from the paper I normally used, soaking up wet paint instantly. I had bought a new palette which clipped tightly shut, was compact, and into which I poured all the colors I would need, a process picked up to have what I need ‘at the ready’from the travel demo of Linda Doll, President of the National Watercolor Society, when I attended a pre-exhibit demo in Kerrville, Texas, recentlly (see  https://joriginals.net/2014/04/ ).

Erin Kolbe was assigned to help me; she is also an artist. She arranged the paintings I had begun in painting order, decorated tables that would exhibit the finished watercolors beside the desserts, brought me water both to drink and to paint with, emptied the colored water, plus she video-taped me while I painted.

All during the presentations I painted. Dr. Crowther, the head of the operation, spoke, and a singer sang, “It Is Well,” which was just incredibly beautiful and provided the crescendo for nearly completing my main painting with artful flourishes. I’ll have to brush up on my performance quotient, I think. At that point, the screen descended and hid me again, and students told stories of how the school had helped them. In that interval, I finished two more, for a total of four seashells in the hour and a half, a half hour for each one. Had I not had the shells well underway before I started, the total time would have produced barely one painting. Unlike some performance artists, my works contain a lot of detail.

Erin took my paintings as I finished them down to the tables so people could get dessert and study them for purchase. After a leisurely beginning at dessert, Diane began the auction, sending a young man around with the first one, holding it up for people at each table to examine up close. The auction started out slowly with a minimum bid having already been set by me. Suddenly the first one went, then the second, then the third. A phone call later, the fourth was bought by the wife of the husband attending who had already bought one. Those proceeds went directly to the college.

At the end, the proud new owners of Joanna McKethan Seashells came up for a photo op with me, and their new acquisitions. Of course, I have their names to add to my growing roster of owners of my watercolors and oils. I think everyone was happy with the results, all round. I know I was. Tired, for sure, as we had made a full 14-hour day of it, but stretching and pushing the envelope are two codes of mine, so it was terrific. Once I’d begun to conquer my stage fright and tune people out, getting ‘into the zone,’ became a lot easier. Accompanied by the lyric, melodic , Celtic folk voice and music, painting before a crowd turned into second nature. So I’m up for invitations to my next painting gig before too long–give me awhile to recupe from this event first, and learn a few things in retrospect. This time I did the gig for love, entertainment, and an honorarium, since the proceeds from sales went to the sponsors. I rarely give it all away, just in case you were wondering. I’m in league with too many professionals who wouldn’t let me, even if I had the tendency.

Thanks for the opportunity and the stretch.