Today I contracted to provide oil paintings to a local gallery for a year's time. It is a very good gallery, and I am a bit intimidated by it. The other thing that intimidates me a bit, is that I will be, locally at least, changing the definition of who I am. When people ask me what I do, I have always said that I am a tapestry designer and weaver. Now, I am expected to attend and participate in gallery events as a painter. I have known some wonderful tapestry artists who took up painting, as I have done, mainly to enhance the design process, and who have over time drifted completely away from the loom, becoming 'only' painters. The decision was always an economic one. Their paintings sold, and their tapestries did not.
As I have signed a year's contract, I will be painting more, and that means I will probably be weaving less. I don't know what that will mean for my future as a tapestry artist, but it did seem the right time for me to take this step. I do not have galleries clamoring for my tapestries, and there are fewer and fewer exhibits for me to enter them in, and the process is becoming more and more expensive. With my husband's retirement coming around a very close corner, these things need to be considered.
I didn't get a chance to paint much today or yesterday. I'm still working on the bakery piece, and, since I can't see the goodies in the photo I've been working from, I searched these two images out to pull a few yummy things from. The top image is a photo I took in a pâtisserie booth at a Farmer's market in Quebec. I took the lower one in a bakery in San Jose last week when I was there with my folks for the Connections opening. I thought I'd share them, so you could drool over them, too! I'm having a hard time not jumping up from the easel and running to the kitchen to bake!
6 comments:
Drooling!! What delicious looking chocolate confections! Good luck with your oil painting venture - needs must, I guess, but hope you still manage to find some time for those tapestries too.
Kathy,
Go where your muse leads you. You are an artist. Whatever your medium happens to be is not the point--the medium is only there to give voice to whatever visual expression you want to share with the world.
Tommye
One of the things that I loved about my husband being accepted to a guild here was meeting artists who reinvented themselves so many times. Potters became jewelers - jewelers started in glass. it was an amazing concept, but what I saw was that the artist was not defined by the media. The artist is the artist. You know your inner creative needs, see if this satisfies it.
Well, you are on a new adventure, and you will still make some choices along the way. I love your paintings, and I love your tapestries. I'm looking forward to watching you soar!
Which bakery in San Jose is that??
Emily
I don't remember the name of it, but if you go down to that square by the museum where the fountain is, it's right there on one of the corners by the fountain. It's 'Something?' bakery and cafe. (They also have sandwiches.)
By the way, Hi! Emily! Sorry I didn't get to talk to you guys again at the opening!
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