KATHRYNARNOLD

8th Street Studio

My 8th Street Studio and its day to day, or maybe it will be week to week digression on my studio issues, art thoughts, and the duality experience between conceptual/rational and nonconceptual/intuitive. Grid and ground contained all within.

Studio Log

8_1_06

To see recent studies, acrylic on paper, click here:

7_29_06

It's true! I'm here. Have been here quite a bit on weekends but too busy to do studio blog. Moved on the 8th of July and that was entirely too exhausting. Took part in monotype exhibition at the ICA in SJ. Also the exhibition in Pacific Grove. And on Monday dropping pieces off at a last cafe show at SOMARTS. Also, volunteered for installation all afternoon on Monday.

Additional things I have done were to close on this property and complete a small suite of studies for the possible commission. I also sent images over the the SF MOMA artists' gallery in order to take some large 7' x 7's over there.

I am working on a set of 4 8' x 8' works on paper. Each is made up of 4 sheets. They are going well; they are about passages, time and sunrises and sunsets.

Preparing also for the Open Studios again this year. Have worked out some small pieces (4" x 6") that I will hang in these cool glass frames. They are acrylic and mixed media.

Later I will place new photos up. I did complete shooting my work for inventory and hope to refresh the website shortly too. So much to do; 4 weeks to do it.

Need 2 additional students in the painting class at WVC. I am looking forward to that class and it is all levels. Not sure how I had 10 beginning students last time, but same number this time plus a few in the higher levels. Those are the projects I need to develop.

At new place set up an outdoor palette and negotiating a small table in the living room. These will be workstations for drawings and small mixed media pieces. Excited to be just 30 minutes from the ocean at new place and may take a trip there in the morning tomorrow. Things are more delightful all of the time!!

5_26_06

I am done for the year; have done a lot. I am excited I will be able to be in the studio really working for 3 solid weeks. I have a number of works I want to complete and will begin doing that on Tuesday.

Today, organizing materials and off to the mountains tomorrow, but would prefer staying here. Have been making sure to get my work included in some various shows here in the city, SJ and in Pacific grove and will be refreshing the pieces at SF MOMA artists gallery. I want to do a massive mailing also. making some photos from the photos I took.

Even though wanting to stay here, am actually glad to be tripping off to the mountains. The sky is incredible there; perhaps can gain some of my sensitivity back or renw it.

5-19-06

Found a place 5 minutes from work; will try to get it. This will save me 3 hours a day, totally 12 - 15 hours a week.

I have been in the studio quite a bit, contemplating sharing it again but not knowing as it is very crowded. I have been taking inventory of all of my works that are there and only 5 pieces are still at home.

Idea is to rearrange and redo my web site. All of these images looks good and are large and great resolution, so should be able to make good photographs from them.

Sold a piece at the SF Moma Artists Gallery and still the possibility of the commission, however no way would a watercolor maquette give the sense of the large layered oil paintings, so not sure...should do these though on Monday. How often have i worked in watercolor?! Probably should do them in acrylics.

They have put me in charge of the gallery at the college. It will be good if I am only 5 minutes away, no matter where I live.

Ready to get to work on the maquettes; Sunday and Monday? Nothing else is new but I have been working. Works on paper have been drying and I have a set of 9 - 12 approximately 18" x 18" panels begun. Got inspired to put Gertrude Stein in white writing and small medallion like pinecone drawings...thinking of Roman villas. Would like to go see the new Getty.

This is a great place to live and work. Now just need to get moved and gain this commission.

3-6-06

I am here nostalgic for things past. A time when I had time. A time when I was not in the car for days on end. A time when life was simpler and not as expensive. But was it really that way or has time erased the reality.

My 4 pieces are hung at 1 Sansome Street and I hope to have the cards soon to mail out. The 100 piece piece I rearranged and attached it to a lattice. It seems to have worked; my grid theory proven true in this case. I will go to see them again on Friday.

The small piece I hung at the Berkeley Art Center did look good and I am the only one who is doing what I do - meaning there were no other pieces even similar.

I am driving 2700 more miles in 16 weeks as a full timer than I was when I was doing parttime work. I am at about 6,800 miles for 16 weeks righ now. This is a lot of my life. In the mornings I am too tired to learn from my Spanish CDs and in the evenings just want the monotonous pop. So I am wasting a lot of time. I am driving probably around 150 hours in 16 weeks, which is like 45 hours a month. It is actually 48 hours a month plus when I go in on Fridays, add another 2 hours. Hopefully this can change. it has eaten into my studio time tremendously.

I have begun to be inspired again by paintings and art. The beautiful seduction of shapes and colors and the connection of form and meaning and context.

In the studio, I began 3 smaller paintings, about 40" x 36". I will go back on Wednesday to reaquaint myself with these long lost friends. I also began some pieces on paper, oils, that I am looking forward to continuing. With paper I feel no need of making them complete in the same way as the works on canvas. Paper lends itself to this experience for me - and i can leave them unfinished in this way.

Sue and Nancy, 2 students visited the studio a week ago Friday. it was enjoyable to have them come by. Time disappears there and it seemed as if they had been there for hours, but really just around 1-2 hours.

Patreecia is planning on coming by the studio too with her family. She has been painting awhile from what she says but is also in the beginning painting class. She is from mexico and has a friend in the States who is a muralist. It sounds as if she teaches at Stanford and I will look her up to see her work.

In between these things it has bee raining here. I am considering if i wish to live in Boulder Creek where it is very quiet and secluded with sounds of wildlife. I may be thinking too hard about it. The main thing is the driving becasue although it is only 23 miles from my college, it is a 40 minute drive with no street lights. We'll see. Today I very much wanted to be there.

Have a lrge canvas, a 5 x 7 in my studio that has a grid now and is full of pastel colors. I want to add white writing but do not know yet what the writing will say. Have an entire series in the studio waiting for something.

Saw my friend george Thompson late last fall, before November 13th. He is from KC and was the administrator at the JC where I did some parttime teaching in Johnson County. We met at the SFMOMA. When he told me Lester Goldman had died, I almost needed to weep. Lester, one of my supoorters of my artwork in KC when i was just out of grad school, also taught at the Art Institute when i was there. He was never my teacher but someone who was very meaningful to me. He was 63 and died of cancer. George did not know what kind. It was like one of my emotional ties to kansas City had been broken and felt very sad. Lester had called out here when i was just beginning to move out here to offer me a class at the Art Institute. I wanted to take it but I could not as it was too far a commute!