All the photos below are currently works in progress. I typically wouldn't show these photos but wanted to see if it might push me to finish them. 

I like anything that makes me think of Boo Radley and the gifts he would leave in the tree for Scout and Jem

which means I like the idea of the Little Free Library

which makes me want a house even more so that I could do something similar.

I don't know if she still does this, but Cynthia Markert used to laminate prints of her paintings and leave them around Knoxville. I know because I have one on my refrigerator. I found it stapled to a piece of plywood on an abandoned building downtown a few years ago. I wasn't quite sure if I was supposed to take it, but the way it was presented made me conclude it was meant for its finder.

I know I don't have to own a home to imitate this secret giving and receiving. It's something I'm going to think more about

but not right now because I am up to my ears in unfinished work.

I had a studio visit with Kelly Hider (fellow artist and studio-mate) last week who told me that it might do me some good to finish up what I'm working on and then focus in on one specific project.

I've been thinking a lot about this, how I could take one thing that I'm thinking about and push it as far as it will go. I'm not sure if I'm that type of artist. I'm pretty scattered, except for the mason jar paintings, which is the most consistent series I've ever stuck with, but that's not really what I'm talking about anyway. There's nothing I'm trying to solve as I make the mason jars.

Kelly and I are extremes; she's been working on the same project for at least six months and will continue to work on it over the next year.

I can't imagine that I have that kind of focus in me.

Also, I've always had a weird feeling about Series. If I plan to make 6 similar paintings, by the time I'd get to Number 6, it would be so far removed from Number 1 that it wouldn't look like a series anymore. Is the point not to meander or is ok for thoughts and ideas to evolve? How could they not?

Right now, it doesn't matter. I'm making a bunch of work (partly due to to my FB hiatus) and feel like it's all funneling toward a focus that may come in the next year or so. It's enjoyable at the very least, and isn't that what it's all about?

The funny/annoying/great thing about being an artist is that you can never get away from it.

I always think about vacations, and how when I travel "away from work", I can't go anywhere without visiting an art museum or schools with an MFA program.

If I sit on a beach and read a book (wow, that hasn't happened in a long time), I can't turn my brain off to quit thinking of images that I could use later. If I stare at the ocean, I'm moved by the colors that make up the water, and how they look against the sky or the sand, and how that expanse relates to a tiny figure bobbing up and down. And then I think about how I could make something using all of those thoughts.

Going through a normal day, every idea, every material might have potential.

Actually, it's really not annoying at all.

Instructions:

Save this photo to your computer.
Find me in the photo.
Circle me in red.
Save new photo.
Send new photo to beth@bethmeadows.com

First place will receive a special gift.

Photo by D. Yasko

When I was little, I used to laugh when a small segment of my mom's hair would stand up straight and do a little dance when the sunroof was open.

Ha! Whose hair does that?

Yep, mine does.

I couldn't go long without them.

The first has inspired a drawing I have yet to make.
The second, I've made a painting about.
The third makes me think of images I'll most likely never be able to express.
It works for me.

Here are some photos from the opening last Friday.

The paintings look great at Bliss. They'll be there this month, so please stop in to see them. Each painting is $55. 

Bliss Home 

29 Market Square

Knoxville 37902

with Cassie

Cara and Erik

with Tracy

Adam

love

with Amanda

My friend texted me last night:

"If I was Martha Stewart, tomorrow I'd be boat tripping and picnic lunching on an island in Maine. Oh, and doing yoga."

When I read the text, it was 4:30 am* so my brain couldn't register what she meant. Then it hit me that she was referring to the calendar in Martha Stewart Living where Martha tells all the normal people who subscribe to her magazine all the outlandish things she'll be doing that month. It's really good entertainment.

It would be fun to start posting a calendar of my own here, so I can have a visual of how much my life is not like hers.

Yesterday's entry would have been:

July 31, 2012
Make myself sick off BBQ nachos at Smokies baseball game

***

I'm learning how important it is as an artist (and as a human being) to write down everything I think about doing. Everything. I think I may have hit a level of "planner/to-do list lunacy" however.

I have a planner to carry around with me, I have physical calendars of each month til Dec 2012 hanging in my studio, I have a calendar online, I have a dry erase board at home and in my studio, I have a sketch book, I have a bulletin board, and I've become a post-it fanatic at work and home.

The outcome of this is that I'm actually getting things done. Well, no. I'm getting a lot of things started, which is more than half the battle in most cases. It feels really good.

***

November 17, 2014
Assess whether my life is moving toward or away from resembling Martha Stewart's

***

I could use a little more glamor in my life, and because of that, I can't say I'm never jealous of Martha's Month. I would never want too much glamor, though. That way, I can enjoy reading what this cat and Car Talk say about these sorts of things and also keep pondering the ramifications of such a lifestyle.


* August 8, 2012
   Consider prescription for Ambien