"Ephemera Central"

 Nancy, Geoff and I had 77 visitors to our open studio this weekend. Most seemed to be artists looking for ideas for their own studios or students that were out interviewing artists for a school assignment.  I had a woman who had taken a class from me come by and another woman that had purchased a piece of art from me from one of the TVAA shows and wanted to see where I had created it.  A few friends came by which is always nice, and one bought a piece of my art for his new home.  A few people had seen my art at Green Chutes and were curious as to how I kept all my little pieces organized. One gentleman called my studio "Ephemera Central" and another said it was a room of Organized Clutter. 
There was some interest in possible commissions and in me teaching another class...so we will see.

The entrance is flanked by Nancy and Geoff's doors that were on display at the museum last week. 

Geoff Everts working on Bas Relief in clay.

Nancy Panganiban creating one of a kind paper mache sea creatures.

That's me working on some projects. I finished 3 and started 2 others.

T Assemblage- lot's of fun looking for this that start with the letter T: tiger, turtle, turkey, tree, trumpet,  Terriff's Toilet Soap. 

A friend from TX saw some of my bike art on FaceBook and wanted me to make her one. I finished this piece up and will mail it this week. She was thrilled.

The start of a new bike piece.

The start of a piece with a movie theme in a film real canister. 

My daughter and I  worked on several different versions of an ofrenda for the Dia De Los Muertos Exhibit  which will be held at the Idaho Historical Museum this November. This is not the final version. (another blog post for that one.) My daughter is involved in this project as she will be the installer of the piece at the museum.

All in all it was a very nice weekend, the weather cooperated beautifully. It was nice having friends over and it was nice having my daughter and her pug, Ray Charles spend the weekend with me. (and yes he is blind)

This week will be studio night at Marianne's and then it is off to Texas to teach my sip n paint class at the Texas Chocolate and Wine Festival. 

Open Studio Tours this weekend Oct. 13 & 14, 2012

ThThis is my third year to participate in BOSCO Boise Open Studio Collective Organization Studio tour weekend. I am looking forward to meeting new people interested in art and seeing familiar faces. Geoff Everts and Nancy Panganiban will be joining me with their art, so you get 3 for one! The first year Marianne Konvalina joined me, but now she has her own cool studio. This event always gives me a good excuse to do some straightening up. Well this year I took it to a whole new level and moved everything around. I just wasn't feeling so inspired in the space anymore, it felt way too cluttered. I didn't like facing the window/wall. So while my husband was out of town I turned the room upside down. I like it much better, what do you think? or better yet come by and see it. Maps are available in the Boise Weekly and at Art Source Gallery or email me for my address. 36 artists are participating this year! The only downside is I can't go! 

Boise Open Studios (BOSCO) 2011 weekend wrap-up

Pam, Geoff and Nancy working on their art.

 This past Saturday and Sunday was the big event. Now you might ask yourself why has my studio been relocated to the front yard. Well for  several reasons. One my studio is too small for three of us plus guests. Second, last year Marianne and I were set up in the back and we had a total of 15 visitors over 2 days, and since I live on a busy street...I thought this way we would get people that wouldn't normally stop (more visibility and not as wierd as going around into someone's back yard that you don't know) and 3rd reason was when I went to Open Studios out in Lake Tahoe this was how one house was set up and that was were I got the idea.

Well this set up worked very well for the first day. We had a lovely warm fall day! By afternoon you can see I was down to a sleeveless shirt. My theory was correct about better traffic up front. We had many people stop by that were not doing the tour but were just driving by and wanted to see what we were up to...plus lots of neighbors. I didn't count how many people came by on Saturday but at least 45, if not more and almost that many on Sunday. I sure wish I had thought to count.  We had a constant stream of people until 4pm when the Football game started. It got so eerily quiet that we thought maybe the rapture had taken place. No cars, nothing...just silence.

 And for people wanting to see my studio- they got a private tour, so all worked out well. I had many comments about how calm and tranquil and zen like my studio area was. That made me happy. That must mean I did a good job of cleaning up the usual jumble of stuff!

Nancy worked on staining old letters with coffee and burning their edges to add to her moth painting. Geoff is seen working on his cartoons.

Here I am gluing buttons and adding paint and glitter to a project.

Day 2: Sunday we awoke to pouring rain and dropping temperatures! The tent had pools of water on the awning! Time to re-adjust. Bill moved the truck out of the garage and we turned that into a working studio for 3! We did such a convincing job of that- ( in only 30 minutes!) that we had a quite a few people comment that it was nice that 3 of us could share this studio space (all the time). We laughed and said no we didn't usually work in the garage and then I would show them my studio. Which is just through the door in the garage, so this arrangement actually worked out really well. And I told them that Nancy and I actually would go work once a week in Marianne's studio which was also open and then we would send them over there to go see.

We also had comments from folks that were happy to actually get to see us working, they said that at some of the other studios they went to the artists were not actually working on something.

At first the rain was a dampener on traffic but as the day went on the people came out, at one point we had a bottle neck in the garage it was so full of people. I think the other factors in such a good response was the insert in the Boise Weekly, the cards promoting our website (a lot of the folks I talked to had just printed the map off the website and didn't even have the one from the paper) and the opening at the Boise Art Museum.