by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life, Studio
Exhale mode, sweetums. Great. Big. Exhale.
Ahhhhhhhh…
Open Studios Tour is coming up! Oh, indeed it is, first two weekends of October. This is where I plug the event and tell you if you live anywhere in the western hemisphere northern California, and do not come, I will personally TP your house!
Trust me, I learned from the best, having raised my very own delinquent. Had FirstBorn paid as much attention to his grades as he did the price of toilet paper, he’d be a BRAIN SURGEON by now.
But back to the Studio Tour…. Got a little more than three weeks to get things in order. I’m not worried about the art, got paintings coming out my ears right now. Seriously. Lots of art. But of course I’ll probably get in a frenzy the week before and crank out paint my bum off.
It’s the housekeeping that has me a wee bit, umm… well, see for yourself.
The exterior of the new! improved! Studio Grande is still a construction zone. Tar paper and stucco screen are waiting for the stones to go up. And they will, at least on the front, in the next couple of weeks. Mr. Spouse does stonework but for this, for rock and brick that gets walked under, for this we’re hiring a real mason. YAY!!! I’ll be posting photos of the process, and a conversation or two about all the amazing arty things you can do with cement. Meanwhile you can see some of Grant Weiss’ work here.
I spent the afternoon dealing with construction debris. Bagging up what I could. And then I decided to get a start on the patio I plan on putting in just a little uphill from the wall of windows.
See this? One dead oak and a bunch of construction stuff. Well, by the first weekend in October it will ALL be gone. And if the gods of patio construction are with me, there may even be a patio! At least a clear, level place to put a couple of chairs.
And look! It wasn’t all about garbage bags and recycling cardboard. I got a couple bins of stomped-on-squished-down-tight kindling for winter.
OMG!!! I just remembered I bought some chocolate chocolate chip ice cream to reward my sweaty labor.
OMG! OMG! OMG! I’m outta here. It’s been real but I believe I hear someone calling my name. From the freezer. But I’ll be back in a couple of days. And I’m sure there’ll be some more photos.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Studio |
I’m in! I’m in! The new! improved! Studio Grande II is an actual working studio now. YAY!
Okay everyone, time for the dance break! And when you come back, pull up a chair, sit down and take a look at the last six months.
January.
Sometime after that.
Sheetrock.
Moving in!
First art!!!
Thank you Mr. Spouse, best beloved handy husband ev-ah!
by Susan Lobb Porter | Studio |
Arty Life is moving at warp speed these days. Got a new studio to finish. Estimated move in date, three weeks.
Mr. Spouse, AKA Weekend Construction Warrior, assures me I will be in by July 8th. He has yet to tell me the hour or the minute but I have no doubt about his intentions. If he says by the 8th, he means by the 8th.
He is often mistaken for an engineer.
So here’s where we stand as of this weekend. Got electric. YAY! Cabinets are in, forms are made for the concrete countertops. They’ll be poured next Saturday. I will be mixing the color. Black. Mr. Spouse trusts me to do this. He says they won’t be black, more charcoal. It doesn’t matter what color they are once the paint comes out.
The lower section in the photo is my office area. Computer, printer, scanner. You have to pretend you see them, just like you see the countertops.
I’ve been working behind the scenes. Building cabinet drawers. There’s a few of them posing with the box from the exhaust fan. Buddying up because soon they’ll be at opposite ends of the studio. Drawers in the office, holding pens and files. Tape. Clips. Rubber bands. Chocolate.
Mr. Exhaust fan will reside against the real wall, heroically sucking up toxic art fumes. I do so adore him.
Then there’s the easel, seen up above with cabinet parts. The reviews all said it’s a great easel but a bi-atch to put together. Sounds like migraine level on the fun-o-meter to me. So I’ve been putting it off until I get a better attitude or the night before the move. Whichever comes first.
More behind the scenes, this time warp speed snail version. I’m restructuring my official art site, the one I never direct anyone to because it was thrown together last fall right before my show. The work doesn’t represent any of the new things I’ve been doing since then. I hadn’t realized how much I’ve done until I began organizing the photos for the galleries.
Not just any galleries. I’m taking it to the next level with an on-line store. Right now it’s limited to originals but prints will follow after I get set up in the new studio. This is where we get into the speed of slow. I’ve been pulling out my hair all day figuring out the ‘intuitive’ e-commerce plugin.
Intuitive for a code junkie, maybe.
But I tend to operate on the right side of my brain.
Ah, I’ll figure it out. I. WILL.
Because I’m too stubborn not to.
Okay, my sweetums…time for me to end this fascinating (WAKE UP!) one sided discussion and go back to e-commerce land. Wishing you all sweet dreams and productive days. One of us got to have ’em.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Studio |
My latest canvas…
The new! improved! Studio Grande!!!
Sheetrock’s up. Taped and textured. Next step is priming. And then painting. First I have to pick the paint. White. But which one? There may be fifty shades of gray but there are approximately fifty thousand hundred million Shades Of. WHITE!!!
AAACK!
But the door will be painted red. Red I can do.
This view is from the door. Cabinets will run the length of both walls under the windows. We’re picking them up at Ikea this Saturday.By Monday they’ll be built and in place, waiting for the concrete counters that Mr. Spouse will pour the following week.
Cross your fingers, girls and boys…the counters WILL be poured next week! Yes. They. Will.
Going to put a vent fan on the back wall between the two windows. That will be where I do encaustics and spray stinky stuff.
Another view of the wall o’windows. I just love this wall.
And a view from the encaustic area towards the front.
Still have to take the tarps off the skylights.
Still have to do a lot of things. But we’re getting closer. And I’m thinking knowing my art is going to blossom in here!
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life, Studio |
It rained hard enough last night for the power to go out. Poured throughout the day today. Snow. Hail. Going to keep on going like that for another 24 hours.
Welcome to April.
When I came home from work tonight the first thing I did was check the studio. The new studio, Studio-Grande-under-construction. Even though the sky was opening up like some fanatical end-of-the-world-scenario, it was dry inside. DRY!!! Not a puddle in sight. No drips. No buckets. No horse shavings strewn around the floor to sop up the puddles.
It. Was. DRY.
Oh, what a difference a roof makes.
I went inside and savored it. Walked around feeling the space that for the first time did NOT include some reminder of the outdoors. A space that completely sheltered me from the elements. The air was cold but it wasn’t moving, wasn’t blowing in through cracks. The rain was on the other side of the windows. It smelled like lumber in there. And cold concrete, if there is such a smell.
Each phase of the construction has filled me with a sense of gratitude. Because this place is being created to honor my creativity. It’s my space to paint and spill and celebrate whatever it is inside me that HAS to make things.
And I’m so grateful for the love that’s gone into this place. For Mama, who left me the money to finance the construction. For Mr. Spouse, who also has the need to create and has taken this project beyond what I first envisioned.
This weekend we’ll put up the insulation. Weekend after that, the sheetrock. There’ll be cabinets to assemble, concrete countertops to pour. If all goes as planned, I’ll be in there in early June.
And I can’t wait! Got a business to get up and running. Painting. Teaching. Marketing. Letting my light shine.
It’s about time.
Speaking about business, be sure to check out my Facebook page, SLPorter, Mixed Media. I’ll be posting a little something there every day. Brief little bits of studio news, new art or something from my classes. Arty Life Lite. And if you like what you see, please do me a great big favor and click the ‘like’ button on the top of the page. I want to get more ‘likes’ than Coca-Cola. I only have 41.something million to go.
