:convergence:

Poking my virtual nose in here mainly to promote an event that I'll be vending at, selling my artwork: Convergence 25 in Boston, the weekend of May 3 - 5, coincidentally my birthday weekend as well. So the best gift to me would be you buying some of my artwork!

As you might guess from the number, this is the 25th gathering known as Convergence, started so many years ago through the alt.gothic Usenet group. I've been around long enough to have been at the first time it was held in Boston, Convergence 2. I've attended several others over the years too; Toronto, Montreal, New Orleans, Chicago, and Austin, the latter being where I also attended as a DJ.

I've been told that you don't have to be a C25 attendee to go the the vendor's market, which will run from 11 - 5 each day. More information here. Pretty much all that I'll have on sale will be the same as what is on my Etsy page, which will be updated closer to the dates with the total inventory.

I'd like to go more into what I've been up since my last entry here in January 2018, but it has been resisted. I'd still like to have a proper website up and running before I return to writing regularly here.

:a slight return:

Peeking back in here for a brief update, as sometimes I can't resist some sort of year in review, or in this case, the later half of 2017, as I went on a blog hiatus mid-year. Why, if you've forgotten? To try to concentrate on the website redesign. Has it happened? Um, no but I'm closer than I was before. 

Taking stock of what I've done aside from that, it appears to me that I've been not as productive as I'd like to be, but never for longer than a week or two at the most. I still always have some sort of camera with me at all times. Instagram still gets a fair amount of those images, but I plan to return to more "real" cameras in the new year. I am hopeful to get a new smartphone as well, based on the camera that it has, of course.

Speaking of real cameras, I realized that my frustration with Polaroid film had to do with the model camera that I was using. Changing to another one produced somewhat better results. As another photographer pointed out to me, how much can you expect from a plastic lens?

I didn't do any more model shoots, alas. Sad to say I was somewhat affected by the lack of use of my  photos by the models, but I need to get over that. It's just one of the curses of social media when you can see the images that they do use instead, despite them saying that they liked mine. I want to get back to more surreal imagery in the new year. The indoor shoots were good practice and I certainly want to do more of those as well, but I need what I do to stand out more.

I still do more photography than illustration, but I did exercise the drawing muscles a few times. I made this to recognize the 30th(!) anniversary of the movie "The Lost Boys." Also saw it shown again in a movie theater, at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, of all places. I drew the lines in ink and colored it on the computer. I'm pleased with it but again I don't like how long it takes me to create just one illustration now.

Opposite of that was participating in Inktober, an ink drawing every day in October. Some hits and misses, of course. I chose not to sketch out beforehand, just straight ink, and I think my mistake ratio was quite low. You can see all of them on the sponge Instagram page. It was good practice, and I really should be sketching every day anyway.

Made more attempts to sell this artwork to people...twice I participated in the now-weekly markets at Mill No. 5 in Lowell, MA. I made enough to pay off the table fees, basically, but I still find that most people are more window-shoppers than art buyers. I tend to feel that way about gallery shows now too. I see that more as a way to get it out to more eyeballs at this point.

I also finally added a lot of artwork for sale to my Etsy page, timing it for "Cyber Monday" in November. But aside from a few initial sales, it's gone cold again. Etsy is not what it used to be. It seems to be anything goes, and not necessarily arts or crafts. Glue a gear onto something and it's somehow instantly Steampunk. I've joined an online community to hopefully get better insight into the selling part of this.

I can't promise that this is a return to the weekly blogging, but once that damn website is finished, I intend to!

:interlude:

Just poking my nose back in here to tell you about a few events coming up involving my artwork, and hopefully sales of the same.

Friday, October 13th from 4-7 PM at the Pearl Street Gallery in Chelsea, MA is the opening of the Bridge Show, dedicated to depictions of the Tobin Bridge. All profits from sales will go toward hurricane relief charities. I have two photographs in the show and am donating 100% of my sales. You can also go online to purchase.

And for the next two Saturdays, October 14th and 21st, I'll be participating at the now-weekly "A Little Bazaar" at Mill No. 5 in Lowell, MA from 12-4 PM. I'll have a selection of artwork to choose from in various sizes and media, and even a Homunculus doll or two.

Why did I stop writing this blog, if you don't recall? Well, I told myself I'd stop until I finally revamped my website. That hasn't happened yet. But once I'm done with the above events it will become the priority. Rest assured that I haven't been non-productive these few months.

:art life:

Yes, I am supposed to be on "hiatus" from writing on here like I said last week, but several paths of thought prompted me to return this week. And while the website is still a new priority, truthfully much of last week has been spent doing some overdue Spring cleaning. Much of my life remains in the boxes that I brought them in when I first moved into this current apartment. Part of it truly is for storage reasons, but part of it has been the dreaded "I'll do this some day" curse that applies to too many things in my life. Which is why my to-do list grows and many things get only partially done. So I try to adopt a philosophy of "Some Day is Today." Sometimes it works. But the large list often leads to paralysis too.

Two documentaries that I viewed in the past week inspired me to write. One was "David Lynch: The Art Life." No doubt it was released to coincide with the premiere of the new Twin Peaks series this upcoming weekend, of which I'll probably see the opening episode, but my lack of a TV or cable subscription means that I won't keep up with it until a DVD collection comes out or when it shows up on Netflix, and most likely will be spoiled for me before then by peoples' need to post it all online nearly immediately afterwards. I saw the first series when it was on TV the first time, and revisiting it recently, I realized that that was the only time I had truly seen it, other than a few episodes that I had taped. The story and images had stuck with me that deeply.

The documentary covers Lynch's early life up until his first movie, with him narrating it in his own inimitable way. Mostly it's about his "art life," as he started out as a painter and we get to see him create several new works throughout the film. He seemed to get into film only because he had the idea of paintings with sound, which led to filming them as well. The film concludes with his recollection of the filming of "Eraserhead," and the good fortune of receiving a grant from the American Film Institute, much to his genuine surprise. He muses about what sort of life he would have led if hadn't had this stroke of luck.

This resonated with me because it's clearly that most of what he wanted to was create art. But modern society makes it difficult for those who want just that. The world runs on money, and you need jobs for that money, for who is going to pay you to "just" make art? A frustration I've known all my life.

The other documentary was "Dear Mr. Watterson," about the comic strip "Calvin & Hobbes" and the artist and creator, Bill Watterson. Through interviews of other comic artists and "regular" people we see what it came to mean to them, both at the time it was running and of newer audiences discovering it.

Much is made of his resistance to any kind of merchandising, and of ending the strip well before than he had to, and fighting any of the traps of fame. He wanted the strip to stand on its own, nothing more. One of the interviewees noted that a stuffed Hobbes doll would probably still be making millions today, but part of the point of the strip was that to Calvin, Hobbes was a real tiger. Creating him as an actual toy would take away that magic.

At the end of the documentary it's said that the strip came out at just the right time in history. In today's times of dying print and shrinking comic pages, plus the sheer volume of competition added by various media online as well, it's more and more difficult to stand out among the rest. Something else that I am all too aware of, and probably adds to my recent crisis of thinking "why bother." That's if you're creating with an audience in mind, of course.

But I don't turn off the creative mind if I can help it. Always have some sort of camera with me, of course. This past weekend was the annual Steampunk festival, held in the city where I currently live. However you feel about the genre or of cosplay in general, some people's work in that area can be quite impressive. Some photos from that were added to this group on my flickr page.

:priorities:

I'm proud of the fact that I've been able to write regularly in this blog (once per week for those who don't look at the dates). In truth that discipline has kept me creative so that I actually have something to write about from week to week.

I took a break from writing here last year, partially because I had the regular notion that I'm the sole reader anyway, but also with the intention of completing certain projects, namely the redesign of my website, which is pretty much essential to have as an artist these days. I didn't complete that plan. When I hand out my business card it's with some embarrassment that I have to explain that my site is not quite what it should be.

I took part in an online seminar this past Monday (during work hours so I was multi-tasking as usual) that was mainly about staying focused and getting past such obstacles and just Getting Things Done. One thing that stood out was the need to do one thing at a time. This year I have been doing many projects at once, alternating doing small parts of each one. I think it went well for some time, but to go from photowork to pencils to working on a doll, I think abruptly altered some of the focus for each project. So far the doll is still uncompleted. I guess I'm "lucky" that the gallery that showed some interest in them last JUNE still hasn't gotten back to me about them.

So there was that lesson and the fact I already know, that the website needs to take priority. Which is what I intend to do going forward. That process doesn't make for interesting reading, I don't think, plus this is partially a visual blog, so there's that too. Thus it appears that I'll be on "hiatus" again, unless something catches my (camera) eye that I must share.

Like last Friday, which was my birthday, when I spent a good part of it at Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (free admission on one's birthday, FYI). It was a cold and rainy day, but the central courtyard let in enough light to still make it a wonder to behold.

:inbetween:

On Tuesday of this past week I once again participated in a workplace crafts bazaar. It was less attended than the winter one, possibly because people would "shop" more due to Xmas, but also because the company is really encouraging people to work remotely more. Which is something I actually want no part of, but I'm not going to get into that.

I correctly deduced from the last time that people prefer the smaller framed photos, and also because several had mistakenly thought that they were drink coasters, found that selling actual coasters worked. Not a crowd to buy larger works, alas. But once again I kept the weirder (for them) works at home.

I finally got through all of the shots from the Asha & Hex photoshoot that was in March and sent off copies to them. Hopefully something of their liking amongst them, and maybe they will say so publicly.

 

Out of 185 shots I narrowed it down to 96 for them. There are some less than-perfect shots in there, but I think they may work as part of some editing with them in the future, but for now I'm putting them aside.

I tried to narrow down to my 10 favorites but settled on 12. A good balance I think. Sometimes you're only seeking for that one good shot, so I'm glad that I had a difficult time choosing.

 

:holding pattern:

I continue to try and figure out my creative path from here on in, after weeks of often thinking "why bother," which I'm sure makes for riveting reading on this blog. While I don't think a complete hiatus would help me, I think I may have to work on some "behind the scenes" projects for awhile, after I finish up the first edits from the Asha & Hex photoshoot and send them off to them. Any further work on those will be...further on.

The projects I'm thinking of are the long-overdue redesign of my website, putting more work up on Etsy, and trying for more gallery shows, using artwork that I've already made. I'm also going to be selling artwork at my workplace again this upcoming Tuesday, and so will pay attention to what sells. Again I'll be leaving the "freakier" pieces at home.

I'll still have some sort of camera on me at all times, to catch what moments that I can while out and about. The springtime green is slowly creeping back into our world, which sucks for allergies but good riddance to the grey, miserable winter. Looking forward to finding new places in nature within the coming months.