What do artists want?

Artists, it turns out, tend to be almost universally frustrated by having to give time to pursuits other than art. Staying away from distractions, switching from the left to the right brain, organizing life so that they can sculpt, assemble, draw, or etch, that's the hardest challenge of all. I belong to a very active group on Facebook called "The Life of An Artist." The goal is to get artists from all over the world to communicate with each other, and they do. I was reading the message board, where there are several topics under discussion, and it's fascinating.

Right now, I can tell most of the artists on this group like being able to focus on their art, connecting with other artists, and getting recognition in the form of cold, hard cash. But even more revealing is the topic of what artists don't like. Lack of time to work is number one, followed by having to interact with other artists who take themselves too seriously. Wasting expensive materials, people who analyze paintings to death, and strangers who assume art is a wonderful hobby are next on this list.

On the topic of professional jealously, I found a few gems, great thoughts by fellow artists that should be framed:

Human beings always act from mixed motives. The presence of feelings of admiration does not necessarily negate the presence of feelings of jealousy.

Mark Peters

There will always be someone who is a better artist than me...I can't get hung up on that.

Anne Kullaf

Jealous of another artist would be like I lost something or threw in the towel and gave up.

Michael Corcoran

Finally, this group provides plenty of space in its message board to praise the work of others. What a wonderful idea, and so many have taken advantage of this thread to talk about favorite artists. If you are wondering where to start collecting, or simply admiring art, this is it.

Open Studios June 6-7 and 13-14

Sarah and I went to the Pro Arts Gala this afternoon. We were listening to the wonderful jazz ensemble when I got a call on my cell. I stepped outside to take it and discovered it was my friend Karen Sherr, telling me a reviewer for the East Bay Express had named me as one of the top ten picks for Open Studios. I was happy. I hope many people come to see it.

CRITIC'S CHOICE
East Bay Open Studios
More than four hundred Alameda and ContraCostaCounty artists are opening their studios to visitors on June 6/7 and 13/14; samples of their work, in all media and styles, are now on display at Pro Arts. If you're staycationing this summer, support your artist neighbors by perusing, schmoozing, and noshing(come for the cheese, stay for the broccoli). Check out the show, pick up a free directory, with photos, web sites, and maps, and plan your excursions. Some show standouts: Rebecca Garcia-Gonzalez, Martin Webb, Deborah Barrett,Alicja Coe, Deborah Harris, Hadley Williams, Elena Zolotnitsky, Liz Maxwell, Bart Trickel, the Pfeiffer Sisters, Lisa Beerntsen, Vicky Mei Chen, Terry Furry, Benjamin Chan, Afton Badger, and James Lovekin. Several art-worlders dared to formulate itineraries this year, so decide for yourself if our eyes or heads need examining. East Bay Open Studios runs through June 14 at Pro Arts Gallery (550 2nd St., Oakland). ProArts Gallery.org or 510-763-4361.

-- By DeWitt Cheng
Time & Date: May 27-June 14

The Business Part of It

Getting my work professionally photographed over the winter break wasn't hard because I didn't do it. The hard part was packing it again for storage! Canterbury Media did a great job of preparing the images for reproduction, something I could learn how to do eventually, but that is not cost-effective right now (and it would wreck my arm).

I have now uploaded the initial seventeen images to Imagekind. Most are landscapes done in watercolor, acrylic and oil, but soon enough I will be posting portraits and other pieces. I will be posting more as I get subsequent batched photographed and processed. If you like any of them, you'll be able to order glicee prints in a variety of sizes and papers directly from Imagekind. Isn't that great?

The Undocumented series will also be turned into giclee prints. However, Canterbury Media will print them locally and I will do the shipping. The percentage that a company like Imagekind would have received will go directly to Oakland's Centro Legal de la Raza.

What a Success!

The exhibit held at CompassPoint, Undocumented: Latino Immigrant Portraits by Rebeca Garcia-Gonzalez, was a fantastic event. The VIP reception was earlier, to give the press a chance to see it before the rest of the public. Given the tremendous number of people who came (more than a hundred), this was a wise decision. Luckily for us, some came earlier and others late. Martina Ayala and her husband Alex Balmaceda, my friends from graduate school who did all of the public relations, are responsible for such wonderful numbers.

It feels wonderful to have received such support from friends, colleagues, family and total strangers interested in art. They asked very interesting questions. My only regret was to not have had enough time to go beyond, "Hi, thank you so much for coming!" due to the opening's popularity.

The Mission Vocational School's Culinary Department did the catering. I didn't eat, but I heard the food was excellent. They were very professional. We served wine, water and get this: vitamin water. This was another good decision, as the temperature went up with the number of attendees.

Curator Linette Morales spoke first. She talked about the impression the paintings had made on her personally. I thanked the incredible team that made it possible: my partner Sarah Calderon, in charge of the logistics for that day, the framing of all 16 paintings, and of helping me pack and deliver them across the bridge; Carmen Melendez, who did almost all of the graphic design out of her business Pitipua Graphix; Linette Morales, who volunteered her curatorial skills; and Vicky Lee, who supported us on CompassPoint's behalf. Bianca Serra, from The Centro Legal de la Raza, explained what they do to help undocumented Latino inmigrants, since this is the organization that will receive 30-40% of any sales.

I placed a "vote for your favorite" board on a column, and will use this feedback to decide which paintings should I reproduce as gliclee prints. We also asked those those are interested to give us their e-mail so that we can notify them as they become available. There was, however, considerable interest in the paintings themselves. We are working on a way to sell with an agreement to allow other exhibits even as new owners take possesion. We'd like this exhibit to travel to Los Angeles next, but I'd have to find a way to finance the shipping as it is a costly proposition, even if I deliver them myself.

Undocumented Progress

It's a team effort! My childhood friend Carmen Melendez is designing the bilingual postcard that will announce my August solo show at Compass Point, a non-profit organization on the second floor of a building (731 Market St) in downtown San Francisco. The opening will be on August 22, at 6 PM. The show is titled Undocumented: Latino Immigrant Portraits by Rebeca Garcia-Gonzalez.

Meanwhile, my partner Sarah is framing all fifteen paintings in my studio, no small feat if you consider we do not own professional framing equipment. Doing this is preferable to sending them to a shop, as a framing shop, even a discount one, charges four to five times as much. So we bit the bullet and got an early start.

Linette Morales will be the curator for this show. She will come to my studio mid-July to help me select the paintings that will make Compass Point's small space. My graduate school friend Martina Ayala, a producer and community activist, will promote the show in San Francisco and Los Angeles.

I have been working on both the series statement, and on a reflective essay based on the series's effect. The series statement will be available at the opening, but I am not yet sure of where I would post the essay other than my web site. I did read it to an audience gathered at the writing retreat I was recently coordinating and got some suggestions. However, I do need to start writing the press release.

Santa Fe Week

I've returned from Santa Fe, where I was coordinating a professional writing retreat for the National Writing Project. My colleague Lisa and I decided to take a stroll through Canyon Road before dinner at Geronimo, and got a glimpse of the art business as it is conducted at this point in the town's timeline. I must say we began our walk at 4:00 PM, toward the end of the business day for most galleries there, and as a consequence did not elicit much interest from most of the owners/attendants. There were three exceptions, all on the south side of the famed street. Its gallery attendants left what they were doing to greet us. Soon we saw they were not there to sell pieces, but to talk about art: Martha Keats, Selby Fleetwood and most notably, Darnell Fine Art. All were women, and all were very friendly, despite the fact that we were clearly tourists without loads of money. This was something I did not at all expect after visiting galleries in New York this last November. Their behavior was highly consistent with what the Art Dealers Association of America, in their collector's guide, says should be their primary mission: to educate the public.

We were very pleased with those interactions, but it was very hot and past 5:00 pm. After this time, all the galleries were closed, and so we looked across the street and saw Ed Larson's sign: "Jesus said buy folk art," so of course we found ourselves at The Stables, which turned out to be a collection of seventeen working artist studios. Ed's studio was closed and so were most of the others, but then we glimpsed an open door amid a few heavily impastoed canvasses hung on the outside walls. One of them was a giant rose. The paintings intrigued me, because they weren't folk art, they were not art school art, or self-taught art. They were a hybrid of all of the above. Nobody responded when we called, so I peeked in and saw... a grand piano, in a room just like I had seen in a book I have about Santa Fe artist studios.

David Vigil stepped out of the adjoining bathroom just before we were getting ready to walk into his studio. He had a Kool-aid orange mane, brown skin and abundant chest hair: The Lion King. Fortunately we did not hear a roar but a laugh (I can be charming when I need to), as we hurriedly explained we were curious. After a brief interview in which our provenance was examined, he engaged us in a conversation on the nature of his recent work as artist, writer and composer. I found him quite endearing, not jaded or cynical, in the way he addressed these two women tourists after so many years of selling art out of a studio. We talked quite a bit about creativity. After his young musician collaborator Victor arrived, he mentioned some video clips of his music on You Tube and said he was a happy person. Warning: do not click if you don't like jazz.

We crossed the street again and sat down at the bar inside Geronimo to ponder our encounters. Fiercely air conditioned, this restaurant had a very nice wine list, but that would be another blog entry.

GYST Software

In my never-ending quest for professional improvement, I've decided to give this "artist-run company for artists" a chance. I've bought their software for $149., a filemaker database customized to the needs of professional artists. There weren't reviews on the web to help me pick this one from among four or five other contenders, so I had to choose based on minimal descriptions of the features on each website. Some companies had great screen shots to give you a sense of the interface, others, none. GYST had the most comprehensive and informative display on its web site, and what they offer seems to be geared at my needs for the moment, which are to set up and organize my art business. So stay tuned for an account of my trials and tribulations transferring my art inventory and mailing list to the program, as these are the first two tasks I will attempt.

For Art's Sake

It was during my middle school years when I realized the art world was not the homogeneous, equal opportunity institution I took it to be. Back in the early seventies, I bought my art supplies at a mom and pop framing and art store in Hato Rey, Puerto Rico. The display shelves in the beyond-cluttered one-room storefront were taller than me. More art materials than I had ever imagined advertised their mysterious uses in a secret language I could not yet understand. I needed time to figure it all out. I wanted to examine all of the point-of-sale displays, I wanted to read all the labels, and I wanted to ask how artists used each and every object in front of me.

Upon arrival, I was always greeted by a stentoreous "Are you looking for something?" After my first time, by the tone of their voices I quickly learned I was not supposed to "loiter," that I had to bring a list of supplies for the ancient man and woman behind the counter to fill. That was the purpose of an art store, I concluded. Being that my needs and budget at the time were modest, I used to spread them out over the school semester so I could earn more opportunities to visit. I would go there just to buy one tube of Grumbacher Academy watercolor, or an eraser.

It was during one of those flash visits that the door opened and in walked a teenager not much older than me. Instead of waiting for the standard question, he greeted the ancient woman by name and spent a few minutes on chit chat. She asked him how school was going and I learned he attended an art school in San Juan for those who already had selected it as a career. Before I could process this, he left the counter and selected a few supplies for what seemed like an eternity, nothing expensive. He was never interrupted. Then he went back to the counter and asked for Damar glaze, paid for it all and left.

As soon as he was gone, I was asked again what I needed. I did not have loitering privileges because I was not going to the best art school in the island. Attending a school of the arts didn't count because its graduates didn't go on to earn BFAs. In fact, ancient mom and pop had never asked me where I went to school, the assumption being that art would not become a career for a girl in middle school. All of this didn't sink in until I reflected in the discomfort of those years a bit later and decided that, just like the rest of society, the art world is stratified. Whether we like it or not, public perception will place us in one category or another. The art store was one of my first lessons.