Red

This post isn't about RED tape, but about red roses.
I will be taking a workshop with Karol Kintz on still life painting. Karol (who I mentioned before in this blog) is an accomplished artist who is featured at the Knox galleries in Naples. She studied at the American Academy of Art where I studied as well. Karol also studied with the very famous David Leffel. Google his name! Wow, I would love to have one of my paintings sell for 25K or more someday...
I plan on posting a work from her workshop weekly. To begin, however, this is a small painting of roses I did as a begining point before the workshop. The format for this oil is 5x7 inches.
If you got to this page from my website, you can return by clicking here
http://www.trudybentleyrech.com/

Progress

Learned a lot this weekend about getting into being an artist as a business. Where I live in order to work professionally, one must have an occupational license and really set up with various State and Federal entities as a business. Lots of RED tape. I went to a workshop by a group of volunteers with SCORE. They are usually retired business people who have lots of experience. The Small Business Administration works through this organization.
I have a lot to learn and my target to be fully operational as a business is fall of 2006. I will first make a business plan. Nothing in art school or even college covers this type of thing. I am happy there is an organization like SCORE.

I will be taking a workshop this week. Posting a painting done to prep for it tomorrow. More about the workshop with the painting!

Website is updated

If you are reading my blog, take a moment and check out my new website....
http://www.trudybentleyrech.com

I have learned a lot. Most artists post their bio in the third person. This is the web. I want to be more informal. My Bio and formal resume will go with a package to folks who want this kind of documentation or if I am in an gallery exhibition or museum type show, but for online...I am staying casual...at least for now. What do you think of this painting? I am donating it to a charity event for Step by Step Early Childhood Development Center. They help children with developmental delays catch up. It is a great center. They use art to reach out to the young children. It is one of my favorite pieces, but theirs is a great cause. Hope it brings them much needed funding.

One more thing

New artist statement part one...more candid
Why do I make variety of art I make?
I am an intensely visual person with a huge curiosity about life science and the arts.
My artwork is about connecting both.
For example, when my subject is a person, I like to look beyond the physical shell to connect with the personality of my subject.
Capturing the physical image of the subject is fun. I see mass and form, flesh and structure with a spark of the person inside.
Painting becomes my dance inspired by vision, being actualized by my own muscles and bones.

Working on new site

Put up the site and now am revising it in a major way. Took down all the pictures. Building the site with only Contribute 3 and limited templates is frustrating, but I have learned to go around a lot of obstacles. Helps to play with software. I could envision getting Dreamweaver someday, but have some other items on my wish list, like an Epson 4800 printer. Great way to make digital prints AKA giclees with such archival qualities as to probably outlast most actual paintings.

My official website

I just published it tonight after finding a host and registering the domain name. I will have it looking better by tomorrow. Will be adding a counter to gauge traffic.

The Visit

This painting got me started back painting my favorite subject: People.

It is an acrylic painting done Alla Prima style on a 24 x 36 inch canvas. I don't ever really intend on selling this piece. "She" is what brought me back to painting representationally again.

Some artists and collectors only feel oil paintings are the most desireable. I like to use a lot of different mediums to express myself. I do love working in oil, but acrylic paint has wonderful qualities as well.

Growth

The sketch group was better than ever last night. One of the artists who was there is another American Academy of Art graduate. Her name is Karol Kintz. She will be teaching a limited sized class on painting flowers "Alla Prima". The style Richard Schmid http://www.richardschmid.com/book.html uses. I started at this school a few years after Richard Schmid went there. He was already quite well known. Mr. Mosby was his teacher and mentor. Although Mosby was still there when I went to classes there during the summers while still in high school, I was enrolled in life and fundamentals classes and didn't have the honor of studying with this wonderful painter. Fortunately Mosby's influence prevailed when I attended full time. Mosby's friend and fellow artist Joseph Vanden Broucke was my teacher. Mr. Van was a wonderful teacher. I hold the distinction of winning the Mosby scholarship. The year I won, my friend David Hettinger also won. They split the scholarship between us. My growth was stunted in some ways because of life choices, circumstances and perhaps even fear of failure/fear of success. Now, I am focused and enjoying growth. What will be will be. I have to paint. I have to draw. I am eating, dreaming and living my work again. The fellowship of fellow artists really helps. It is all about growth.