Linda’s Barn, a new notecard, package of 4 for $8, available on my website.
I’m not sure what an art administrator is, but that is what I seem to be about once a week, or sometimes once every two weeks. Look at this list of tasks:
Package up a painting to send, find the receipt book, see if a deposit was made, update the receipt, make a self-addressed stamped envelope, write a note, unseal the package, add the paper work, reseal the package.
Do it all over again for another customer, then remember that the package can’t be sent until the replacement calendars arrive.
Email someone who has wanted to get together to look over an old drawing for several months but is too busy. . . how about this week?
Send a thank you note to a customer who provided a generous discount when I bought new tires from him recently.
Change an invoice to a statement for a customer who overpaid me and then chose a painting rather than keep a large credit on file; write a thank you note to go with it.
Contact the great guy who will be letting the Kaweah Artisans use his empty building for our annual Perfect Gift Boutique, coming soon on the Friday and Saturday after Thanksgiving.
Gather the photos and prep a canvas for a new oil painting commission.
Sort out a bank deposit – sold things using the Square, so how much was oil paintings, other merchandise, tax and Square’s fee; how much came in cash and how much of that was oil paintings, other merchandise, tax and drawing lessons; go through the same breakdown for any checks; find a check still in an envelope in another stack of stuff; redo the deposit slip.
Add 3 new notecard designs to website.
Dig deep into a box of orphaned cards to find any of a drawing I did in 1992, and then write a note and send the cards (YIPPEE SKIPPEE, I FOUND SOME!) to the nice lady who asked about the drawing.
Go to the Post Office to learn the best way to package all the calendars that have to be resent.
What’s going on here?? I just want to be an artist!
Sorry, Toots. This is called the Business of Art, and today you are an administrator.
Oh yeah? Does this mean I can paint tomorrow? Promise?
No promises. You might be returning phone calls, scheduling things, prepping for the Perfect Gift Boutique, or responding to new inquiries via email.
Life as an artist certainly isn’t boring. . . always something to do, necessary, but not necessarily glamorous.
P.S. There might still be time for oil painting or pencil drawing commissions before Christmas, if they aren’t too big or too complicated! Use the Contact button or email me at cabinart at cabinart dot net.
“Harvest Festival” is a popular name for an arts and craft show in the fall. I have been in 2 this year, and will soon be in a 3rd Harvest Festival which is more of a carnival (not as an artist this time – I’ll probably be making popcorn.)
New show, new location, new faces, and 5 new paintings along with a now-known faulty calendar.
The most recent was at a church in Visalia on Saturday. This was a First Annual Harvest Festival, and the organizers did a good job for their first time out. It isn’t easy to put such an event together.
A benefit of participating in a new show like this is that the organizers are extraordinarily hospitable and helpful. Another benefit, which might be also viewed as a not-so-good, is that with lower attendance, there is plenty of time to talk to each visitor. People are so nice, so interesting and so encouraging at a show like this.
My sales were surprisingly good, but selling oil paintings always boosts the bottom line. 😎 I even presold a non-faulty calendar, along with coloring books, a pencil reproduction print or two, and lots of cards.
I had the privilege of meeting 2 young artists. One showed me some fun assignments on her phone, and we talked about the possibility of an art career. Another was making something during the show and seemed to have an interest in faces. I had the iPad with me and photographed his face so I could teach him about facial proportions. If the show had been busy, I wouldn’t have been able to meet Hailey and Jacob, 2 delightful people who keep me from falling into deep despair over the future of our youths. (Such a middle-aged thing to admit, but I am middle-aged, so there.)
Honeymoon Cabin #32, sold.Sawtooth #31, sold.
I spent some time coloring in my ag coloring book in between visitors. Coloring is only part of my life during shows; normally I knit, garden or read in my time off. What a life, when coloring feels like work!
Recently, Trail Guy was in my studio and took the 2018 calendar off the wall so we could do some planning. The 2019 was hanging behind it and fell on the floor. He said, “Hey, you have a typo in your calendar!”
How can that be?? I used a template from the printer for the calendar part, and my part is all drawings except for the cover and the months on the back.
If you ordered a calendar from me, look at June: the printer’s template had the WRONG YEAR for June!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME??
But this is a 2019 calendar!
I contacted them and they will be replacing my order. When it arrives I’ll have to send new calendars to everyone who ordered by mail (65 are sold of the 100) plus try to remember who bought them in person so I can replace them.
If you bought one from me in person, please let me know so I can replace it. (I have records of all who ordered from the website.)
They sent me a proof before the reprinting. Another oops:
It wasn’t just the year that was wrong; it was the entire page! (Look in the corners. . . this is a 2019 calendar, folks!)
My head might be a little misshapen from banging it on the wall, but it is okay for you to laugh. I thought my walking partner was going to fall down laughing when I told her. Remember, my very wise dad said, “It’s better to laugh than to cry”.
I’ve worked in 2 different print shops in my varied “careers” (they were really just jobs, not careers), and I remember how when a job started to go bad, sometimes there was just no hope. This is a good printer that gives great service, and I want to help them get it right for me so that I can get it right for you.
Let’s find a bright side, shall we? I will be helping to keep the local Post Office in business.
I need to see something soothing right about now. . .
As a Central Calif. artist in a rural place without galleries, I rely on little art festivals, craft fairs, boutiques and other events to meet the public and sell my work. It is lovely to hide away at home in my studio, but people will forget about me and my work, no one will want drawing lessons or to commission me for paintings or drawings, no one will think of my note cards or remember that I also paint murals. Then I’ll have to get a job.
I’d rather die.
An art co-op in Visalia in 2010.
So, I do these little shows whenever they make sense. Sometimes I have to miss a regular one because of a family wedding or graduation, or because we are closing the cabin that weekend or maybe a new one coincides (collides?) on the same date.
Sequoia Gifts and Souvenirs, Three Rivers, around 2009?
It is hard to decide which will be worth the effort. Is the show established or new? Does it charge an admission fee to the public? Do the organizers know how to publicize? How much is the cost of the booth? Do I have work that will appeal to the sector that is likely to attend? Will anyone attend?
Looks like the Three Rivers Memorial Building and the visible cards on the spinning rack indicate it was in the fall. Looks as if I brought EVERYTHING.
Participants must commit months ahead, fill out applications, pay entry fees, reconfigure electronic files to match the requests for samples of work, rewrite biographies, and fend off requests for freebies. The artist/vendor has to learn if set up is on show day or a day ahead, find out how much space is available (10×10′ is the most common), and learn if there is Wifi available (for taking credit cards).
Summer of 2018, Silver City Store
This artist has to learn if her husband’s pick-em-up truck will be available, or maybe the Botmobile, or maybe I will be strapping display screens to the rack on top of my 2-door Accord.
May 2016, Redbud Festival in Three Rivers, the debut of my coloring books made me feel very very popular. While working on the new coloring book, there wasn’t much time to paint.
As the time approaches, I begin tailoring my merchandise to the area. For example, if it is near Mineral King, I go through my cards, prints and paintings to make sure that everything I have of Mineral King is available. If it is in Lemon Cove, I look through my merchandise and find anything related to citrus or to the area around Lemon Cove. If it is Visalia, I scratch my head and try to figure out what might appeal to city folks. I also take into account the seasons: for example, if it is in the fall, I bring a few paintings of pumpkins and autumn leaves; if it is spring, I include artwork with wildflowers. Sometimes I do something special for the show, like new cards or a few paintings specific to the area.
The day before set-up, I begin gathering all my supports: display screens, screen covers, free-standing pedestals, table-top easels, tablecloths, and anything else that the sometimes unknown and never-before-seen spot will require. Then I figure out how many paintings, drawings, cards, prints, coloring books, Cabins of Wilsonia books, and other miscellaneous merchandise will go.
Redbud Festival in 2007 before I discovered screen covers and wrap-around canvas that doesn’t need framing.
My experience is that I need a giant painting or drawing to catch visitor attention in spite of the fact that those rarely sell at an event like this. People may bring $200 but they want to get as much merchandise as possible for their money, so the least expensive items sell quickest. There are exceptions but this is Tulare County, and what is inexpensive for art in other places is perceived as astronomical around here.
Cards and prints often need to be repackaged and repriced. With or without sales tax? Will I be handling my own $ or will it go to a central cashier? Does it have an old price sticker on it? What is the price of that on my website? Why did the previous gallery put a sticker on that says “6 cards” when it already said “4 cards”? (Have I had these things too long? Why am I doing this again?)
The Perfect Gift Boutique at the Three Rivers Arts Center before I began sharing the stage with Nikki The Fabulous Weaver (and before I discovered screen covers).
Do I have enough business cards? flyers about drawing lessons? flyers about commissions? price stickers? receipt books? pens? signs about prices of paintings and other merchandise?
Is the iPad charged? Shall I take my camera? Did I get small enough bills? (Several years ago I started pre-pricing everything to include tax, rounded to the nearest dollar so that I no longer need a cash box or coins, a brilliantly simple decision.)
Exeter Garden Club Tea, where I was the speaker and took my early paintings, which I painted on boards and put into frames. Glad I don’t do that any more – too heavy, too expensive, and too hard to guess peoples’ tastes.
Everything has to be packed into boxes, and loaded into (or onto) the vehicle. Every single time, I forget the best way to fit it in. Every time I am amazed that it is the support equipment that hogs the room and the merchandise is only a small part of the load. Every time I question what I am taking – enough? too much? the right things?
If set-up occurs the day before the show, it uses up a day of driving if the show is far away, even just 35 miles down the hill (gotta get groceries as long as I’m there!) But it makes the day of the show is easier. If set-up happens the day of the show, it means leaving at O-dark-thirty, unloading, setting up, and then summoning up a cheerful attitude while other vendors waste time chit-chatting, the organizers aren’t sure where your paperwork is, someone else is set up in your spot, and there is no convenient parking for unloading or a clear place to park afterward.
And all that is part of preparing for a show. The show and the break-down of the show is another stack of paragraphs. Are you tired yet?
P.S. I used to do a 3 day show at the Visalia Convention Center that cost hundreds of dollars to enter, required Trail Guy to take a day off work and bring his pick-up, along with my Dad and Mom and their pickup, and my friend let me dismantle her front window store display to use her tables. That show has folded, and no one has matched their grandeur (or high dollars earned) since.
Did you forget that I was showing you the Mineral King oil paintings that sold in Silver City over the summer? Here is the other half:
As before, the sizes shown here are a little whacky in terms of how they are relative to one another. I was shocked by the stellar rise of the Honeymoon Cabin to the top position this year and also shocked by the relative unpopularity of Sawtooth. One, maybe two, are all that sold of that subject, previously #3 in popularity. The second top seller was the view of the Crowley cabin and Farewell Gap as seen from the bridge.
What a year! If the economy keeps clicking along this way, next year I may bring some of my larger pieces. In the past, people admired them, but they didn’t sell and then I didn’t have them when I needed them for other places and events down the hill. But who knows. . .?
Since 2010, the Silver City Store has been selling my oil paintings. It began as a tentative experiment, with no confidence that visitors up that rough road would want to spend their hard-earned dollars on original oil paintings rather than (or in addition to) tee shirts and post cards.
The highest number of paintings that sold in the past summers was 16.
In 2018, the store was remodeled to a brighter more spacious place with a new elegance, and the economy is doing quite well. These two reasons together might be why THIRTY-ONE paintings sold this year! (The gracious store manager says it is also because people like my work. Aw shucks, thank you, Hannah!)
When painting the same subjects over and over, naming becomes a problem, and I rely on my inventory numbering system to keep the paintings straight. But sometimes I don’t include those numbers when I bill the store, so my records are a teensy bit wobbly. So, I won’t show you all thirty-one paintings, but here are half of the ones I was able to track down a photo of. The other half will come later.
The sizes they appear here on the blog are not accurate in terms of how they look against one another. For example, the painting of Eagle Lake was 6×18″, and the one directly above this paragraph was 4×6″.
I gathered a few ideas of what to paint in which quantities and sizes for next year, and hope I don’t lose my notes.
P.S.(If you click/tap on the link to the store website, which will open in a new tab, you may notice some similarities between our websites – I used the same web designer as they did)
My commissioning customer/old family friend told me in our correspondence that she was interested in a pencil drawing of the gas pump at the Silver City Store. If you have seen it, you might understand. If you haven’t, you might consider this peculiar.
What I consider peculiar is that earlier this summer, while delivering some more oil paintings to this popular place near Mineral King, I was struck by a particular view and angle of the gas pump; I took some photos without having any idea that Ms. Customer would make such a request.
We discussed these photos. I referred to the peak in the distance as Hengst Peak; she told me she grew up calling it Mosquito Peak because it is above Mosquito Lakes. I thought it was over Mineral Lakes, but there is already a Mineral Peak in Mineral King (well, duh). It is the one that looks like Sawtooth’s shadow, but I digress. And I defer to her greater history in Silver City, so for purposes of this discussion, it will be Mosquito Peak. Not that we are talking about the peak–we are talking about the gas pump.
Sorry.
But then she requested a photo showing the road too, so on my next trip up the hill, I took these photos.
More discussion ensued. More clarification. This is normal. . . these things take time to figure out on my end and to decide on the customer’s end.
Finally, it was time to do some little sketches to be sure that I am understanding her wishes.
Good thing she knows that I know how to draw. We’ll see if I caught her vision for the gas pump in pencil. Stay tuned, for as you know, more will be revealed in the fullness of time.
There are a few small fall shows coming up beginning in October, and I don’t have any small paintings for these venues. I have large Mineral King paintings, but this is not what typical customers are seeking at boutiques, festivals and fairs.
Hence, I pulled out some photos and began planning new small oil paintings. There will be 3 on 5×7″ boards which sit on miniature easels, 3 4×6″ and 3 6×6″ oils on wrapped canvas. All will be citrus. For now. Let’s see how things go here. . . if I finish these, I might do a few pomegranates too.
Then I heard one of my favorite sounds.
Oh boy! My new walking shoes are here! I took them into the house, thought about trying them on, reminded myself that I was supposed to be working, so I had to parent myself: “Try them on when you are finished painting and go back to work NOW”.
Because these tiny paintings don’t sit on my easels, I hold them in my left hand to paint. Or I lay them flat on my rolling thing (it has an art name but I can’t remember what it is).
However, there was another distraction.Tucker was very needy, but willing to sit still on my lap so I worked around him.
More rough beginnings, but that’s okay. It is hard to concentrate when there are new shoes and kitties who need me. Besides, I was tired from getting up early to walk fast and far in the dark in worn out shoes. (A goathead went right through the bottom last week!)
I came into the studio to get some work done, to post to the blog, to cross things off my inventory list that have sold recently, to sketch a little. . . you know, just the normal art business tasks.
This time Scout was very needy. She will not sit still, licks my hand and arm and bites my watch, steps on the computer, and changes position every few seconds.
I had to smash her down with my hand so the laptop could photograph her. (Wow, my hand is scary looking. Someone please tell me that it is the Photo Booth application or I might go into shock.)
Isn’t that title redundant? Probably. Every time I begin, it is on a new project.
A thoughtful mom bought a painting of an iris for her daughter named Iris.
She has another daughter named Camille and requested a camellia for her. Luckily, I have a good photo of a camellia in bloom, remembered the month it blooms, and only had to look through the February photos of 10 years to find it. Maybe it is even more lucky that Customer Mom liked the color and lighting and angle!
This will dry and then I’ll be able to detail it, my favorite part.
C and Friends, pencil drawing, 11×14, unframed, $200
About 2 weeks ago, I took the brave leap into admitting that I have unsold drawings and that it bothers me. I also admitted publicly that those drawings were heading to the shredder if unsold for another month. This is not something many artists are willing to discuss, but I am not normal. (Thank you for playing along with me as if I am normal – you are very kind.)
Apparently, that was a good idea because almost all of those drawings sold! And there is still time. . . as of the date that I am writing this post, there are a few left that someone is pondering. (Those are labeled “Sale Pending”, as if I am selling real estate.)
Sometimes I go through those flat files and look at the unsold drawings, wonder if I could do any better, alternate between dark thoughts such as “Why bother?” and “But these are good!”. Then I go around and around: Could I have drawn it from another angle? Should it have been cropped differently? Should it not have been cropped? Is the subject irrelevant to my “collectors”? (Why does that word sound so pretentious to me?) Did I not show it to the right people? Who are the right people? Where are they and how do I find them?
Then I shut the drawers and move on.
Telling The Blog about the situation was a good idea. Thank you for listening.
P.S. There are more. Maybe in the future I will have the courage to put them on the auction block (The Blog) or the chopping block (The Shredder).
Recently, Trail Guy was in my studio and took the 2018 calendar off the wall so we could do some planning. The 2019 was hanging behind it and fell on the floor. He said, “Hey, you have a typo in your calendar!”
Tucker was very needy, but willing to sit still on my lap so I worked around him.
More rough beginnings, but that’s okay. It is hard to concentrate when there are new shoes and kitties who need me. Besides, I was tired from getting up early to walk fast and far in the dark in worn out shoes. (A goathead went right through the bottom last week!)
