"So Why Exactly Are You Doing This?" Hot 100: Completion!!

Every have this thought?...

"Why am I doing this?"

How does it usually turn out?  

For me, it is usually a pre cursor to some sort of regret.  (A residual of catholic education perhaps? Probably not but who really knows?  Maybe another non-art blog topic but not here, not now)  Suffice it to say, I think we all ask that when the success (and/or legality, morality, etc) of what we are doing is in doubt.

But NOT today. This is a celebration of success!

So, what is it I actually did that I am so happy about accomplishing and more importantly why should you care?
I just completed my HOT 100, or actually 103 to be exact.  Woo-hoo! If someone told me that I would make 100 paintings in a summer even just last May I would have bet against it, especially since I was becoming a stranger to my own studio.

Better yet, I think I also figured out some ways to generalize my strategies to do it again and in a way that others can use them too.  I want to remember not just the why but also the how so I can do it again!

Today's Stretch Goal to Tomorrow's Reachable Goal
(Stretch=intense attempt   Reachable=challenging   Comfort=some effort)

C'mon man,  almost there...

Well in this case, I am delighted to have a positive outcome and learned some cool stuff about producing and promoting my paintings along the way.  I just completed a stretch goal that frankly I was not certain I would meet (of course that is what makes it a s-t-r-e-t-c-h in the first place.  If I didn't want stretch, I would have called my series the "Hot 15" or something else as lame and uninspiring as that.)

Even better and more lasting, I learned some things along the way that will inform my art production to do it again as a reachable goal thereby making room for my next stretch goal. 

Sorry if I am sounding like a teacher, it's because I am one.

Thankfully, being the dorky teacher that I am, while working in my tiny, tiny studio I took notes that are great to refer to now.  I will use them and my new body of work to come up with some written explanations and ideas about Hot 100 to take this to my next level of stretch goals.

Meanwhile I will be posting these insights here to fine tune, firm up and clarify my ideas with the hope that some of it may inform your creative process whether it is in the garden, kitchen, wood shop, office or sewing room.

Best, Kathy

HOT 100!!

sizzle. sizzle. sizzle.

What better way to spice up the summer than to set a big goal for oneself?  

Well, maybe not a real-survival-necessary kind of goal (that is for the rest of the year) but a let's-see-if-I-can-pull-this-off kind of goal.  

Hence the birth of the Hot 100.

Maybe for those of us in on the East Coast it should be the Soggy 100.  Given the 6 week deluge we have had this summer, it might be more appropriate...too bad this cannot all be sent to the parched West!

 

Actually this Hot 100 goal, like so many others that I take on is really a combination of events going on in my life that I had no idea would provide any sort of intersection.  Does that happen to any of you out there too?  I really did not think a bathroom renovation, my son's 10 year old school project, camp in the middle of nowhere, and a wonderful Texan artist who I never got to meet would produce this kind of synergy...

But yes it did and here I go...

After this shot-in-the-arm inspirational artist colony last month, Nimrod Hall,  I realized that I really really need to produce lots of art (good, bad, or whatever) on a regular basis.  Why?  Well because, if you are an artist or gardener or craftsman or chef you just might know this feeling, drive to produce to be, I guess content is the best word.  

Also, creating an inventory is always good for an artist, but really that is just a beneficial side effect. 

My Entire Tiny Home Studio.

  Yup, that is it and it is working amazingly well! My car is about 18" to the right...

Anyway with this while bathroom renovation-moving-packing-my-house thing I needed to figure out how to do that with a tiny tiny space.  Next,  finding my oldest child's Day 100 Project from kindergarten in the attic purge.  Then viola courtesy of the inspiration of the Cindy Neuschwander tiny encaustic series via Diego Sanchez, my Hot 100 goal came about. 

Day 100 Kindergarten Project

100 Band Aids Creating 10 Buildings

2003

So there is my space above, here are some of my works on display below.  I have no idea if they are finished or not.  But I am at 64 and the daily goal is 4 day.  

Some of the Hot 100 on display

VisArts Center RVA

Daily progress of this series is being posted on my FB page.  Which will  continue throughout the summer...barring any flooding, monsoons, etc.

Teacher’s Student May Now Be the Teacher’s Teacher!

Kinda of like that old song, “I’m My Own GrandPa”

I recently have had the great privilege and luck to run into not one but two former students who are now colleagues,  art teachers too!

One wonderful young lady, Ashley, even came by for a studio visit with the same graduate painting class that I took for my degree.  My mentor was her professor  (so a double treat) and the wild thing is, I took that class a few years back with a former art teacher of mine.  (Wow, is this a circle of life thing or what?)  I am incredibly flattered that Ashley says I was one of her inspirations; as Mary (my aforementioned teacher) was one of mine.

Kathy and Ashley in Kathy's studio at VisArts

A totally different experience with my other former student.  Tesni and I accidentally ran into each other at the Visual Arts Center is Richmond.  Me, as a studio tenant, she, an instructor.  We talked for about 10 minutes before we realized our connection.

Funny how things like puberty, aging and about 20 years can change our perceptions...

So, I don’t think I should try to comp any inspiration credit here but it still great fun to reconnect as colleagues.  Anyhow on the DL between us, Tesni doesn’t know it yet, but I am even thinking about signing up for one of her classes.  Wonder if that will rock her world?

Tesni’s work on display in the exhibit, “Work” currently showcasing Visual Arts Center Instructors

I also think it is really really cool that she just received the “Master Teacher of the Year” Award from VisArts too!  Congratulations Tesni!

The most amazing thing about visual arts, I think, is the relationships that it just keeps creating and recreating on so many different levels-the elements to each other within a work, the dialogue between viewer and artist, artist to artist and just when I think I have experienced them all-student to teacher to student again!

So I am my own art teacher?  Nah, probably not and it is not even a good song title. But, still having former students become your colleagues is a pretty awesomesauce experience.