Friday, October 16, 2015

Opening Up More Than My Studio.



I work alone in my studio and I'm fine with that.  Truth be told, working alone, writing alone and creating alone is really my comfort zone.  But this week, it's been a totally different.

Out and about.

I had an artist reception in a gallery across town.  It was a nice event filled with people I'd never met in a place I'd never been to before.  There were many people interested in my horsehair raku pieces and mask.  They asked lots of questions and appreciated all the work that went into the creation and production of the pieces.  

Along with two other artists, I did a demo of my clay work in sgraffito at local art event.  It was a rainy Saturday but for 3 hours, crowds of people stopped by to see what I was doing.  They asked questions, got answers and took catalogs for the open studio tour we were promoting.  

Today, I got up at 4 am and drove to another artist's studio.  Three artists from the open studio tour, Linda Gerrard, Peg Silloway and myself were going to be on live tv during morning drive demonstrating what we do alone in our studios all day.  I've never been on TV before.  And I've never been on TV LIVE before.  And, although I've done many demos of various techniques in a variety of media and taught classes, I've never taught a local TV reporter how to do sgraffito on live TV.  

It was scary.  Enriching.  And exciting.  All of it.

But wait, there's more.  Tomorrow and Sunday, I'll be opening my studio doors to the public to come on in.  They'll see where I work, what I work with and how I make art.  And I'm glad to be able to show them around.  

It's amazing to me how the universe works.  The cycles of up and down, in and out that move through my life.  I could never have dreamed all the things that have happened to me...good and bad.  But I know in my heart, even when I'm nervous or scared, that opening up my studio and myself to the world is a very good thing.

No comments: