When we were on Martha’s Vineyard in July for the Granary Gallery show we took a day off to be filmed for a spot on Plum TV. Hannah Pillemer, the film maker, producer, editor and interviewer, along with David Rhoderick the intrepid cameraman, did a fine job of making us feel at ease…and our friend Barbara Gordon, aka Ansel Leibowitz, documented the interview for the studio blog.
Here are some photos from our morning in the spotlight, and a link to the video …
The cooler weather is perking up the not-so-little-anymore Finnegan…
At six months, her studio apprenticeship is focusing on getting the artiste to stick to a routine. Up at the crack of dawn, feed the pup, climb into the truck and head over to the park for a brisk half hour walk…then home to hose off …
Then it’s time to get to work…
Her new name this week is Runs With Brushes…
When I catch her and get this one back… I WILL get to work.
Calling all scholars and mystics…
I need some help interpreting two phenomenons that have puzzled me of late.
The first is straight forward… this cloud formation followed me all the way to the park a few days ago. It looked so much like calligraphy that I pulled over and sketched it in a notebook. Reproduced here via photoshop it is a fair representation …
The second phenom is something that I started recognizing months ago. Every time I would look at the clock it read 3:33 . Now, to clarify, I hardly ever look at a clock. And obviously there are only two times in any given day that that number can come up. But sure enough, my nightly bladder call was precisely at that hour…and I could have gotten up and looked at the clock at any stage in that journey to and from the throne but I always seemed to catch 3:33.
Same thing in the afternoon. I’d stop painting and just randomly glance at the clock by the easel and there it was again. Not 3:34…or 5 but 3. When I think back now I remember that the first time that number came up it was on election day. I was number 333 in line to vote. Hmmmmm.
So …leap forward to almost a year later. The anomaly has blossomed. Now almost every time I look at any clock the time has all the same digits repeated. 5:55 comes up a lot, 11:11 is a fun one, I seem to catch 4:44 almost every day and so on.
No, I do not hang around waiting for the numbers to roll around. And no, I don’t pay any more attention to the time than usual. And Pat is completely done with me exclaiming, ” I don’t believe it…look…again !” But I do feel, not unlike the sky writing, that there is some larger message from the beyond that I am supposed to be getting and am obviously not catching it on the whisper.
I have no clue if anyone out there actually reads these blog entries but I am curious to hear if anyone else finds these things… well…curious ?
It’s been stressful in the studio this week and I have been finding solace in my early morning walks with Finnegan.
It’s not safe to walk a pup on our street so I drive 10 minutes over to a local park and we walk for half an hour or so. The farms along the way are close to harvesting corn and sunflowers and the other morning, when we got a particularly early start…and just as we crested a small hill…the sun was a firey re/pink globe hovering over pockets of mist that hung in the valley of the fields below. I have driven that way every day since and the late August morning mist is there but not that spectacular sun.
Here’s a look at yesterday morning’s mist giving way to the sun…
I have a couple other paintings in the works which the Granary Gallery has requested but I am taking a small detour to work on the challenge of recording these peaceful early morning vistas while they are still fresh in my mind and before the snow flies.
As Polly would say…Shake yourself together ! and indeed I have.
Well it was a wild week up on the little island of Martha’s Vineyard… the show was a huge success, there were many new adventures, new vistas to investigate, a little bit of poison ivy, lots of early morning walks on the beach, many evenings of friendship and fine feasts, way too many kudos and not nearly enough sushi…and now that we’re home again I am rejuvinated by the enthusiastic response to the new paintings and ready to dig deeper and take the work to a whole new level.
Here is a gallery with some of the highlights of the trip…
check out our little apprentice as she visits the island for the first time…from the big boat to the bigger ocean she was a trooper… she left the last of her puppy teeth there and is now settling in to her cushy day job here in the studio…
another new adventure was being interviewed for Plum TV which has stations in lots of fancy vacation spots…they followed me around for a day with cameras and two delightful cinematographers…and our friend Barb followed them…very much looking the Annie Lebowitz part…
we had our usual techno breakdown on the night of the opening so there are only a couple photos… but I went in the next day and got some shots of the gallery to give you a feel for the place …just imagine a few hundred people milling about with mixed beverages and kind things to say and you’ve got the rest of the picture…
and then there are a few shots of good times with good friends and some views of the pond house where we whiled away the week that was… and of our visit with Ted to Menemsha and a stop over to Jane Slater’s, my teacup muse, and a chance for Ted and Herbert to catch up on some laughs…then, finally, a tight squeeze on the new ferry back over to America…
I’ll let you check this out while Finnegan and I get back to work…
be well, Heather
Headed this week to Martha’s Vineyard
for the annual summer show at
For more information about the show
and to read the painter’s notes please visit my website at
It’s almost 4pm and I’m taking a break from the second go round of framing.
This is a profession I know well. I have been a picture framer off and on for thirty years and for most of that time I made a living doing it. Now it’s only once or twice a year that the studio is transformed into a frame shop. The workspace will never never be as small and confined as the closet in which we worked at the Harvard Coop but it is crowded this week in here and Finnegan and I are stumbling all over each other…
She has a very delicate way of maneuvering past tools and frames and original oil paintings and tiptoeing her way to find her favorite squeeky toy. She is quite the musician and I’m pretty sure she chooses among the three we have here according to their scales. We’re currently reviewing our Frank and Julie party mix and she is partial to the Frankie Capp Orchestra swing section. (You think I’m kidding …)
Meanwhile, here’s a look at the still life table cum framing table…
Is that art imitating life … or …me imitating art ?
Anyway…16 days and counting…back to work.
Already knee deep in July…or is that the corn being knee high by the 4th of July ?
Either way the framing has begun for the Granary Show and here’s a look at our morning excursion to fetch the frames and paintings. We arranged to have the largest paintings done at the same time which meant only one trip up with the trailer. Both the frameshop and the photographer’s studio are within 5 miles of one another and about 20 minutes drive from the studio.
My apprentice was concerned when we hooked up the trailer that she might not be needed for this trip…thus the batting of the big brown eyelashes…
How could I resist one so ready to work…
And off we go… this is the shop I worked at while saving and preparing to give painting my full time attentions.
They are the friendliest and most helpful folks around and make it a true pleasure to work with them…
With the frames loaded it was on to see John…
John Corcoran, the king of the camera, is the man behind the magic that allows me to bring my work to the big and small screen. Every painting goes to him to be shot in multiple formats so that I have a permanent and accurate record of the image. Nothing gets by this detail guy and I am forever grateful for his stunning work, jovial good nature…and steamed dumplings ! You can check out some of his own creations at Sterling Commercial Photography.
He and Pat always have way too much fun…
But time’s a-wasting and we’ve gotta get this show back on the road and home to the studio which is beginning it’s annual pre-show craziness…
My apprentice and my Lackey have just come in to tell me to get off of this machine and get a move on…
stay tuned…
MV show opening 23 days and counting !
Sour Cherries !
In Mima’s honor, Finnegan and I sat on the quiet sunny summer morning porch and carefully pitted three boxes of sour cherries into Saren’s beautiful bowl… enough for two pies…one for us and one with a Z for Zola and Zack…and Zue.
A few years ago this week I was on pins and needles waiting for the orchard to say it was ok to pick the sour cherries as I was scrambling to include a painting of Mima’s Sour Cherry Pie for the recipe series in the Granary show that July.
The pressure is off this year…all the paintings that can be done are done…and it was almost a zen like meditation to have a whole hour to do nothing this morning but sit and pit.
Now on to the painter’s notes…
and maybe just a tiny pieced of pie.
Many thanks to John O’Hern and the editors of the American Art Collector Magazine for showcasing the painting Temple of My Familiar in their latest issue. You can access the magazine on line if you are a subscriber or find it at most book stores to read the entire article. Above is a link to the AAC website and below is an excerpt from the article. The painting is on exhibition at the Granary Gallery on Martha’s Vineyard.
