Year end/beginning for me is always a time for studio-housekeeping, accounting and general “being held accountable for the business of art” duties. Or as otherwise referred to as REALITY. Necessity says that there are going to be some major changes in the way I do the business of art this year. Half Moon Creek Gallery where I sell the majority of my work, and through their sales efforts make up the bulk of my income, will be closing at the end of January. The Gallery is leaving Anchorage for a larger building in their community of Palmer, Alaska. Good for Palmer, bad for Anchorage and me… The new Gallery probably won’t be open until April which would be OK, except for my house payment and other bills don’t want to take a 3 month hiatus! I will be able to work on a couple of commissions and by tightening the budget we’ll make it work. We will be taking a inventory in a couple of weeks and I’ll need to store any unsold pieces until they are through with the construction of the new building in Palmer.
The Grasshopper came home this week after being on loan to Octopus Ink Gallery through the end of the year. Sugar Puppy wouldn’t take care of her “business” in her usual spot because of the invasion of the Grasshopper on our shed! I’m finally down to my last bag of clay and am putting together an order from Clay Art Center for 500 pounds of clay to be shipped up from Tacoma –yaaaay! It will cost $141 for shipping up to 550 pounds so I ordered a few more bags than I wanted to be efficient with the shipping costs. Clay has been calling me once again and just in time. I've been invited to participate in a VERY COOL Show in North Carolina…more on that later. I will say that the creative clay pressure is ON!
Had lunch with my friend Katie Sevigny at her Studio Gallery yesterday. I brought in fresh, hot specials of the day from Burrito King (my favorite). Good thing we’re self-employed because this turned in to a 3 hour “lunch!” I looked at it as more of a business meeting or team building session if we were part of a large company being paid on someone else’s dime. We are organizing a big Soiree for our Art Coffee Group and Katie agreed to host the event in their new Upstairs Studio space. We also talked about the wholesale and retail climate and planning for some shows in 2010. It was good to have another artist’s ear and share our ideas, thoughts and business joys and woes with someone you can trust and who has had similar experiences.
