Today’s Art Linky-Poos

Interesting article on buying art.

It must be the season for fund raising, because I’ve been flooded with requests to donate art the past week. Most people know my policy on that, but I think this sums it up nicely.

Hadn’t noticed Mark Kostabi hasn’t done a new piece for ArtNet in a few years, but I like his last article. He’s a prick, and I don’t like his art, but he’s not stupid and he’s no bullshit — so I guess I have to give him credit for that.

This isn’t a dodgy company from Craigslist who thinks you’ll do it for experience or trade, they’ll actually pay you for their logo design. $25,000 to be exact!

Fashion Illustration Online Classes

Maybe you knew, you maybe you didn’t I used to teach fashion illustration. It was fun, and I used to have billions of dresses and weird costumes I would think up — or wish I could have worn out to places. Most of it was for animation characters, but a lot of it ended up getting displayed as individual artworks both at the galleries at CalArts, and a few galleries around the Cleveland area.

Well, now you can sign-up to take an online class with me and studio-mate Knitgrrl aka Shannon Okey. This will be a little different than my usual way of teaching, not only in it being online, but also this class is geared towards knitters and pattern makers for production and editorial purposes. The fashion illustration class is just one of the units of all the online classes Shannon will be going over, and I’m so happy she asked me to help out with this one in particular. Here’s the description:

Fashion Illustration

Description: Learn how to draw/create powerful illustrations to accompany your pattern proposals for magazines and books, as well as for your own self-published patterns. Get additional tips and tricks for editorial success from Shannon, who waded through thousands of such proposals as the editor of a monthly UK-based print knitting magazine.
You will receive: all materials needed for class instruction as well as illustration samples you can use for your own proposals if you like.
Materials needed: will be discussed during the first week of class as we explore different types of image creation.
Price: $65
Registration limit: 15

You can get more info and sign up here or here. We’re already filling up, and have recorded our first goofy greeting. There have also been some examples and templates uploaded, and I’ve given list of supplies you’ll need. I’ll be starting a quickie anatomy lesson later this week so there’s still time to get in on the action.

The Classics

I’m talking about pictures baby, not dusty old books!

If you’ve known me long enough, then you know I’m an old movie fanatic. I think it started with “Top Hat” initially, and some of the old Carmen Miranda movies that my mom used to watch. Sure there were the Shirley Temple vehicles, but I wanted stuff with fabulous sets and costumes! At age 8, I already wanted an art deco bedroom and fabulous evening gowns. Mostly I also liked how my mom would preface each movie before we watched it, like “Flying Down to Rio” she described as, “Dolores Del Rio is so dark, and the guy is so blonde and the whole thing is about how exotic she is, and how blonde he is — they work it out obviously”.  Of course my favorite movies I used to watch over and over were the Topper movies. I’m more a fan of “Topper Returns”; maybe because it is a murder mystery, but also because his wife Billie Burke is so ridiculous in it. It is also fun for me now because of what I know about Carol Landis, and a character in “Valley of the Dolls” (book version, not the movie version) being based on her.

Like many people into the old Hollywood movie thing, I’ve always been fascinated by the studio system itself. It was great actually living in Hollywood for a while, and working downtown, so I could geek out on stuff just walking around; things and places and events I knew no one else cared about as far as industry history. I’m also really into the pre-code films — and if you ever want The List of what you couldn’t do in film after 1933, I have it. It is truly amazing to watch pre-1933 movies like, “Blood Money”, “Skyscraper Souls” and “Baby Face” be so blatant in a context where, when you think of black and white films, you think of them being glossed over and hardly daring at all. My mom got me The Star Machine as a Christmas gift, and if you are into old Hollywood movie history and the business of it all, then you should get it for sure.  What amazes me is that even the silly little movies talked about throughout the book are things I’ve seen, even the bad Deanna Durbin crap. Maybe one day I’ll meet the author, because I know we’d have so much fun geeking out together.

So, if you are like me, you will love: Tired Old Queen At the Movies. That sums up what I feel like most of the time anyhow. Here’s a question: out of all the episodes, which 2 movies does he feature are the only 2 I haven’t seen? It is a good thing I don’t have a collector mentality, because if I did, I would have a film memorabilia collection much like Steve does. I think so far my only true indulgence was buying the out-of-print paperback of Joan Crawford’s “My Way of Life”. It was totally worth it, as you no doubt could tell.

New Products + New Portrait

I was recently invited to join ArtsProjekt.com and have set up a little shop of some merchandise you can now purchase bearing some of my portraits. If you are one of the few who have ever gotten a limited edition postcard from me in the mail, then you know they are fabulous in a frame or on a fridge, and now you can get yourself as many postcards and greeting cards as you want. Yay!

Completed this 5×7″ portrait not long ago. It accidentally tuned out looking like my friend Tara McPherson, which I thought was funny and totally unintentional, but I decided to name it ‘Tara’ anyways because frankly I’m running out of names to give my characters. Funny how paintings turn out so different in the end from how I orginally draw them…

Email me for details if you’d like to purchase her as she hasn’t been promised to any galleries yet; still gotta varnish before I stick her in the frame I picked out a few weeks ago.

Hypnotized by Bob Ross

Normally I save Milkshake related posts for a Monday, but this was the scene this morning. He was going crazy whipping around doing “Risky Business” slides all over the hardwood floors until I switched Bob Ross re-runs on, and it soothed him in a way I’ve never seen. Happy little trees make a happy little cat it seems.

You have to keep in mind Milkshake never cares what is on TV, ever…oh except for maybe a BABY FOX!

Call The Cops

As The Happy Mondays would say…“Call the cops!”

Actually, last night I had the cops called on me! It is quite an honor really, as it has never happened to me before. Sure I’ve been caught up with some people when the police showed up for various reasons while in high school and college, but somehow I always got out of ever having to be cuffed, put in the back of a squad car, or give a have my name appear on a police report. I’ve also been the one to call them on a few occasions and they were always so happy I was sane and calm, instead of acting a fool. I like police and they like me, we get each other — so it seems.

I should explain. My next door neighbor is a paranoid schitzo. I never even knew anyone lived next door to me until one day a memo appeared under my door stating she didn’t like people hovering around her front door talking about her and making comments about her quiet lifestyle (huh?).  All was in fact quiet, and for the past year I thought she might have moved out. Keep in mind I have never even seen this woman let alone had a conversation.  Then, last week as I came home from grocery shopping — 2 minutes after I shut the door — I hear her screaming saying she was going to beat my white ass if I didn’t get away from her door and stop talking smack. I thought she was talking to imaginary people quite honestly. Honky this, whitey that, cracker-ass-cracker. Yeah it was fun. I just figured she was having a bad day and her meds were changed — or something.

Then last night as my husband and I are in bed and there was sudden banging at the door — the kind that jolts you,  and actually kind of scares the crap out of you. Husband kept asking who it was, and no answer — so when he yelled to the person they must have the wrong apartment, we heard, “are you scared? are you scared? I bet you’re scared, I’ll call the cops on you!” and other not so fluffy remarks in-between. When I get threatened twice by someone who is paranoid banging on my door at midnight, I get the baseball bat because I don’t want some Son of Sam crap happening to me; the case of the two artists who were shot by a man with a similar condition here in Cleveland not long ago also came to mind. Anyways, we tried to go to sleep after this, and within 15 minutes the cops suddenly showed up (great response time for something DUM don’t you think?) knocking on our door. It was clear the police knew within 10 seconds that our neighbor was not right at all. So we stood talking with them privately, called the landlord (who she had accused of being a full on Nazi it seems), and we just sort of laughed about the whole thing while at the same time all of us were clearly annoyed by the woman’s actions. They liked my shirt, and they played with Milkshake by letting him chase their laser pointers. They told us that she had made it clear she planned to keep calling the police on us for anything and everything, and therefore we were to avoid her, talk quiet, tip-toe in and out of the elevator, and don’t open our door loudly with our keys as it clearly sets her off. Screw That! I am not changing my habits because someone isn’t taking their meds and might beat my honky white ass with who knows what! So we shall see, maybe about moving her to an apartment away from people and the elevator would be ideal. But yeah, that was a fun waste of time don’t you think? It kills me these cops showed up in 15 minutes whereas other friends will call them 3 or 4x and they never come at all.

I love my building, neighborhood and apartment and have been here 6 years, but maybe the Gods are telling us to buy a house? Between this neighbor, the pedophile my husband had kicked out and the bank robber living next door who the FBI raided our building for, maybe I should check this puppy out? WANT.

Velázquez Remix Show: Sneaky Peeky

I’m just about done with her! I chose the painting “Lady with a Fan” and made her just a tad naughty. Gallery liked just this teaser so much, it’ll be the image on the postcards…

The show is taking place Friday, February 19th at Wall Eye Gallery 5304 Detroit Ave Cleveland, OH 44102, 216.640.7769. I’m told the Cleveland Museum of Art will be sending some of their curators and experts to come have a gander.

Gallery Closings

Well, moving with the trend of more art galleries closing, two that have represented me have already closed this year. A third one is shutting the doors, and although they didn’t rep. me, I was a fan of their exhibitions and surprised about the news. It is sad when people can no longer see work in person in larger cities where the rents are so high that it impedes any gains the artists or galleries make in order to continue exhibiting in the future.

In various parts of the country the rents are fabulous, people who run exhibition spaces sometimes own the building or even live in the space and they do it as a labor of love (hence many good Cleveland galleries that have survived the economic downturn), but it might not be an area where there are serious collectors or art lovers. It is a catch 22: high rents that deplete any sales or low rents but low sales to go with it. Chicago dealt with the high rent problem where by people started to have apartment galleries; it might become a further trend if the economy keeps going this way — depending on how people feel about strangers using their bathroom and combing through their medicine cabinet.

Guilty feelings about buying artwork, or collecting objects that might be considered frivolous, is unnecessary. A lot of people earn their living making art, teaching it, writing about it, and selling it, so you should never feel guilty but instead consider yourself a patron, and be proud of that fact. Many galleries are going under because they didn’t play fair, they cheated people, or had no business managing or taking anyone’s money — those I do not feel sorry for. But, despite the art market corruption and prices on some artists becoming ridiculous — or someone like Steve Wynn buying Sly Stallone’s abstracts for $40,000 each — there are plenty of people who are not Damien Hirst or Sadie Coles HQ who need all the help they can get and whose works can cost less than a flat screen TV or even an iPhone. Certainly, their work will last longer than any electronic gadget.

“Evangeline” art print

I think forgot to mention that I have three prints of “Evangeline” available through my Etsy Shop. She is 8×10″ (same as the original painting) and at $15 an easy addition to your walls to class your joint up.

Framed in something ornate she is fabulous.

Milkshake Monday, 1st of 2010!

Basically, the purple tutu has not lost any luster and Milkshake still finds it interesting. Amazing. As you can see, he has discovered it can act as a cloaking device…

you can’t see him, he’s invisible.