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It's about "the quiet".

3/16/2018

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When I’m at a show, it’s inevitable that people visiting my booth will exclaim “they look like photographs”, referring to my drawings. It’s not rare that sometimes a person will argue with me, either facetiously or sometimes seriously, that they must be photos. I take it as a compliment, of course, but my work is much more than that.

A word that’s often thrown casually about is “photorealism”. While there are usually at least a few elements within the whole piece that might fall into that category, my work really isn’t entirely photorealistic. It’s realism, for sure. I strive to create works that take you, through much detail, right into the subject. However, there’re usually far more elements of the compositions that fall firmly outside such a designation. Much of the work is an impression of highly detailed realism without actually going there. It’s a trick of the eye and mind. By including just enough detail in the most important places, I’ve tricked your mind into believing that the entire work has photorealistic detail.

In doing this, I’m not trying to deceive you. I am giving my work a depth of interest that it would not otherwise have if every single little detail were recreated on every square inch of the drawing. THAT would be mere reproduction of reality and, in my humble opinion, a bit pointless when a camera and a bit of Photoshop™ work would be a much more efficient way to accomplish it. And while it certainly makes for a great display of technical ability, it doesn’t necessarily make for a piece of art that is interesting beyond the initial “wow” of technical prowess.

My drawings pull you in with that initial impact, but then they let you explore the forms – the light and shadow – as well as the soul of the subject that goes past that initial smack in the face. You, as the viewer, actually complete the work in your own mind, filling in the details I’ve left out. I’m involving you much deeper with my work by asking you to do part of the work. I allow you to venture into the drawing rather than tell you everything there is to know at the outset. The effect is that each person has their own reaction and each “finishes” the drawing in their own way by pulling from and applying their own life experiences.

My approach of having some extreme detail alongside more impressionistic areas, allows my work to have an impact both up close and from a distance. So often I hear people talk about the idea that while a drawing is compelling from across a room, it looks just as interesting, in a different way, up close. At close range, you see the details – the technical aspects of the work. From a distance, it is the compositional impact – the emotion of the work – that draws the attention.

I’m often told my drawings are “quiet”. Last September at the Saint Louis Art Fair, I was fortunate enough to win one of the Juror's Choice awards. There are three, given by each juror to the body of work they found to be their personal favorite. Jennifer Perlow, a gallerist, curator and the juror who honored me, talked about my work in presenting the award and why she selected it. For her, it was about the quiet nature of my work – "technically proficient", she observed, yet far deeper and, quite simply, "quiet". She got it. She got it to the core! My subjects are many, from big, impressive African animals, to trees and to skies that may be calm and clear or roiling with storms. Still, in each piece there is a quiet feel. A calmness. A place of escape either to a memory or even a fantasy.

When I think of “the quiet”, it is the idea that regardless of the subject, the commonality of all my work is the overall quiet I hope a viewer will feel. The regal lion staring off into the distance, lost in his thoughts; the forest of aspen in the snow waiting for warmer temperatures and the thaw of Springtime; or even the boiling thunderheads amassing in the sky above, all have a quietness, despite what might at first seem like action, that draws you in. A peacefulness that allows you to pause and reflect. You might have a recollection of a place or time or even a story you’ve read. I want you to connect to the soul of my work. Get yourself lost in it. Forget about the technical aspects. Enjoy the work for all that it is. The whole, not its parts. Let yourself go. Be calmed. It’s about “the quiet”.


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How do you speak to an artist? 

7/16/2013

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Much has been written lately, in artists’ circles, about how the “public” should learn to talk to artists. It’s a hot topic, actually, with passionate feelings on both sides of the issue.

As “Art Fair Artists”–how we collectively tend to refer to ourselves–we have come to expect the same fifteen questions or comments or humorous references over and over and over.  We try hard to keep that smile on our faces, that spring in our step and that “snarky” attitude in check while approaching each question & comment for the umpteenth time. It’s not always so easy, especially after three or four 10-12 hour days on our feet in our little 10x10 cells…er…booths.

It’s not easy to answer the same questions a hundred or more times in a single weekend and make the person who asked it feel like they are the first to have inquired. No. It’s actually quite a challenge. In fact, it’s exhausting. I will admit to reaching the latter part of a less-than-stellar show feeling like if I hear “that” question (no…I’m not going to tell you what question) again, I’m gonna have a nervous breakdown. And, I’m sure my responses have sometimes sounded more than a bit on edge. I try to avoid that but I am human, after all. Some days my big bottle of “chill pills” is empty.

Some in our Art Fair Artist circle believe we should be instructing the public in the ways of our business and how they should talk to us. I am not one of those folks.

You see, art in all its various forms is a creative enterprise. We who make it are “oddities”. We don’t go to the office or warehouse or store every day like “normal” people, punch a time card and then go home at the end of the day. Most of us DO put in some very long hours in our studios every day, not to mention the time, effort and expense of going to distant art fairs many times a year. Because we are different, there is an understandable fascination about how we tick and I don’t think it is the duty of the “public” to learn how to approach and talk to us. I think it is OUR duty as artists to give you a window into our lives and our thinking. If that means answering the same questions or laughing at the same “funny” comments every single time or responding to the “what’s your best price?” question (the one on the price tag) over and over, so be it. All of this beats so many other really terrible jobs that exist out there in the world, many of which I have done and have absolutely no desire to go back to.

In the end, we are in business. We are businesspeople and how we handle ourselves reflects on our businesses–our artwork–regardless of how good it may be. At the base of it all and beyond all the “glamour” of being an artist, it’s really just retail. It’s dealing with the public–ALL of the public. The ones who are art-savvy and know exactly what they like and want as well as those who’ve never been to an art show nor even spoken to an artist before.

I love what I do. I feel incredibly fortunate to be doing a job (yes, it IS a job) that I love and am able to make a comfortable living at it. There are times I feel like running, screaming into the sunset to get away from it all, but then I remember just how lucky I really am.

As the “public”, don’t ever feel it is your responsibility to learn how to talk to me! Ask me questions. Learn how I do my work and what inspires me. Find out about what it’s like for we artists to do 10 or 20 or 40 shows a year on the road while trying to find time to make the work about which we are so passionate. DO NOT be afraid you are asking questions that have been asked a thousand times before, because they HAVE. Just do it! All I ask is that you DO remember I’m there to work–to sell and make a living. I don’t always have as much time as I would like to simply chat about the weather or give an impromptu workshop…but if I DO, I will! Count on it!

YOU, Mr. and Mrs. Public, don’t need to be taught how to talk to me. Nope. Just come right on in and let’s have a conversation. Who knows? You might even realize you can’t live without one of my drawings or one of my neighbor’s photographs or sculptures or jewels or weavings!

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Creating a year's show schedule

1/17/2013

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The crowds at the 2012 Main Street Fort Worth Arts Festival.
Filling the year's schedule with a slate of shows.

Now, that seems simple enough. Find the best shows and where they're located. Check the calendar to see that I have no other obligations, taking into account the additional travel and setup time required. Fill out the applications and send in the money. Voila! An art show season is in place.

Well…not so fast, Bucky. It's just a bit more complicated than that.

I do, of course, know which shows have a reputation for being the "best". There's actually a "Top 25 Shows" list created each year by a company that purports to collect sales data from artists all over the country. By figuring out the average sales total per artist at each show, they are rated from the top down. While I am dubious of the methodology used to collect the information and the generally very small samplings of artists, that list can be a starting guide. The best information always comes from my fellow artists. We are the ones with the canopies on the ground, so to speak, and can give firsthand accounts of the good, the bad and the ugly of every show. And believe me, every show has all three!

The tricky part of any "Top Shows" list is that what can be great for one artist may well be terrible for another. It really all comes down to the right handful of people walking into any one artist's booth at any given show. People who just have to have your work. Sometimes they come. Sometimes they don't. And, worst of all, it can vary greatly from one year to the next. There's never an assurance that a show will be good or bad so we approach each of them with a very large grain of salt.

Taking into account the shows that have been historically good for me, shows that are rated highly in the "Top Shows" lists and the scoop I can gather from my colleagues in the business, it's time to go about deciding which ones to apply to. Since doing shows all over the country also involves a lot of road travel--hauling the art, canopy, display walls and everything else required for a booth makes flying impossible--it's also necessary to consider circuits that link several shows together, rather than traveling a long distance for one show and then back home again. It's always better to link two or three. Sometimes it just isn't possible, though. For me, doing a string of art shows can be a challenge as my work takes so much time to create. Having and transporting enough work for two or three shows in a row is an iffy prospect. If one of the shows sells far better than I had hoped, there may not be enough left for the other show(s). So, it's a game of juggling a lot of unknowns.

As of this writing, I have applied to (or will) 17 shows for 2013--more than I have ever even considered before. Now, I will not get into them all, depending upon the jury results (more on that later). In fact, so far, of the shows I have applied to whose jury results have been announced, I've been invited to four, put on a wait list (to be called if an invited artist cancels) for two and not invited to one. Results for the rest will trickle in over the next several weeks or months--generally 4-6 months prior to the date of the art show. My record so far is good…knock on wood!

The application process these days has gone high-tech. It is done entirely online. There are a few different systems to which shows can subscribe but they are all basically the same. Artists create an account and upload a library of images of their current work as well as images of their display booth as it looks set up at a show. When an artist applies to a show, they fill out some basic information about their work and select several images to be attached--most often four photos of the work itself and one booth shot. It is required that the images of the art do not show an artist's signature and, likewise, the booth photo cannot show the artist's name. The jurying of the application is a "blind" process and not to be done with knowledge of who the artist is. For this reason, even an artist's past shows and/or awards and honors are not taken into account. The theory is that the jury will select the work based only on it's quality and uniqueness. I call it a "theory" because jurors are often fellow artists and, as a juror, you often know who created the work even without their name showing. That's where the professionalism of the juror comes in. They need to set aside that knowledge and simply judge only the work they're seeing at that moment. There are various and sundry criticisms of this process, but overall, it works pretty well. I have participated as a juror for several major shows and it is a fascinating and daunting task. There are always far too many great artists who just don't get into a given show. It's a big responsibility to know that as a juror, you hold an artist's livelihood in your hands.


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As an example, this is the group of images I used for my application to the Cherry Creek Arts Festival in Denver. It's always tough to decide which four images of the work to submit, but this group got me into one of the most competitive shows in the country. WHEW!
Once a show has gathered all of the applications received before the deadline they've set, the jurying will take place. It's done in various ways by shows but, essentially, a panel of 3-5 artists, collectors and/or 'experts' will convene to go through every application, scoring each individually as they go. After what's often several rounds of eliminations, the top scorers will be invited to take part in the art show. There will also be a wait list of artists who received high scores but were just below the cutoff for the initial invitations. If anyone declines an invitation to show or they cancel before the event, another artist will be called off the wait list. Pretty much everyone at most shows has to re-jury each year. The exceptions are usually only the previous year's award winners who get an automatic invitation.

The "top" shows receive far more applications than spaces available. A good example is the Cherry Creek Arts Festival in Denver, held each year over the 4th of July weekend. This year, they received  something over 2200 applications for about 230 spaces. So, less than one in nine artists who applied got an invitation to Cherry Creek. I was fortunate to be invited for 2013--my third invitation in six applications to the show.

Realizing how many artists apply to those top shows, you begin to understand how even the most carefully planned annual schedule may be thrown for a loop when the odds of getting in can be stacked against you. And that is why I have applied to more shows than ever before. I know I will not get them all and by the time it all shakes out, I hope to have a good, very doable season. So far, so good!

While I wish it was as easy as deciding in January what art shows I will be doing for the rest of the year, I can only make an "ideal" plan and then cross my fingers. The rest is often up to a group of jurors who I will consider brilliant if they choose me or completely ignorant if they don't. 

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If I land all of the shows I've applied to (or will) for 2013, this map shows what I have in store for travel... Some 15,200 road miles (in blue) and at least a couple round trip flights (in green) while I park my van with all of my work and display materials between some shows.



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