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If you haven’t been to the current ThinkSmall exhibition at ArtSpace in Richmond, then you can’t have seen my work! I have participated in almost every one of these biennial fundraisers since the first one in … was is ‘01? or ’02? I’m not sure. For those of you who live too far from Richmond to make it, here are some digital versions, not nearly as good as seeing them in person, but sometimes we have to just make do, don’t we?
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Hi everyone! It’s been a while, hasn’t it! It was a very busy year, tying up the last of my father’s estate and the usual “trying to make ends meet” scramble. I even took a couple of vacations! (Though one of them turned out to be more of an adventure- not really relaxing!) I was in the studio a fair amount, even with all the interruptions and intrusions of the realities of life, but had little success in getting into juried shows (I think the score is 0 for 6) or scheduling new shows. I did win an honorable mention at Bath County, (congrats to all my friends who did much better!) and sold enough work to barely make the federal poverty limit level. (Hooray! Now I can keep my ACA health plan!) I am updating the website now with recent work, but here are a couple of images of some of my favorites.
Well, nothing like a little love note from the polar regions to keep me at the computer a little longer this morning. It’s 19 degrees at a quarter to noon and it’s been 19 since I got up. The wind is gusting up to 35 or 40 mph, and I have found dozens of reasons why I had to stay inside this morning. I even cleaned house! My excellent webmistress has been working her fingers to the bone updating the website, and I hope you like the improvements. We made a changing banner on the home page, added a category for the new work, and added a link on each of the gallery pages to the statements about the various series. In case you need something to help you sleep while the winds are roaring and banging around out there. Now to try and get through the holiday season. I will check in again in January, hopefully with news about my winter projects. Stay warm! Hey! It’s kind of xmas-y! <sigh> Most of my paintings turn out to be some variety of red and green.  Homage to Haeckle: Tachyomedeusa (oil on panel, 17.5 x 17)  I know! It’s been a very long while since I posted anything to this blog. Reprehensible. But it’s not because I’ve been slacking off. Things have just been a little… chaotic. Last summer I was consumed with trying to pay the bills (and mostly failing!), the fall was spent trying to pay the bills (still failing) and getting ready for winter (moving exposed pipes inside and tightening up the drafty house) and then the winter came along! What an awful winter. So many days below 10 degrees. So much 40+ mph wind.
The pipes froze several times despite my insulating the heck out of them. I spent all my time getting up firewood and throwing it at the wood stoves and shoveling snow and unthawing pipes. Ughh. And still failing to pay the bills. THEN my dad had an accident, which led to his death 16 days later. Kind of traumatic. I am the administrator of his estate, and that has been rather time-consuming. I am far from done with that. Anyway, despite all of this, I did actually get some painting done, due to the magic of [drumroll, please] … a deadline! Yes! My friend Kathryn Henry-Choisser, a fantastic artist, asked whether I’d share a show with her at the Hill Gallery in September. So I’ve had new work to show for months, I just didn’t think sitting here in front of the computer was a good use of my time. And don’t bother to tell me that I’m dreadful at PR and promoting my work, I can see that. So here are the details: Hill Gallery, 708 N Robinson St, Richmond. September 24 - Nov 8. Opening reception Sept 25 (which is my birthday, coincidentally!) from 5 to 8 pm. I’m really looking forward to reconnecting with some of my Richmond friends (if anyone down there still remembers who I am!) so I’m hoping you can stop by and help relieve the stage fright/show anxiety I experience when I have to be in public. Yesterday I took the landscape paintings I’ve been working on all winter down to Roanoke, to Scott Kitt’s Hair Salon. He’s gotten them hung already, and is busy drumming up interest, for which he is getting exactly 0% commission. What a selfless guy! It’s a lot of work, which apparently he does because he loves art, and he’s just a nice human being. Many thanks to Scott. So if you’re somewhere near Roanoke, drop in a take a look at the work, and thank Scott for me. One of the recently completed paintings that are now on view at Scott Kitt’s Salon on Brandon Ave. in Roanoke.  The Behemoth Awakens (oil on panel, 23" x 18") My time as a guest artist is up at WareHouse Gallery; thanks to Jean and T.J. for hosting my work these last couple of months! I will be taking the work down to Roanoke next, to Scott Kitt’s Salon, for display during June. Scott has a beautiful space at 1102 Brandon Avenue, where you can have your hair styled while taking in an ever-changing display of great local artworks. He won’t mind if you just come in to gawk at the art, though. The painting above, something just finished, will be there. And next week I’ll try to post another fresh work, to whet your appetite. If you just got your refund check from the IRS and it’s burning a hole in your pocket, it might please you to know that Scott doesn’t take a commission on any art sold in his salon, so the prices will never be lower. And, I have to pay my Rockbridge County real estate taxes, so it would be excellent timing for me, too.  Spring Storm Clouds (oil on canvas, 16" x 25") The last couple of days it’s been terribly hard to stay inside. I have a serious Vitamin D deficiency, I think… I just couldn’t make myself go inside and paint until the late afternoon, and then I didn’t get much done. Ahh well, spring fever, I guess. Just like in elementary school. So the “exorcism” painting I had hoped would be done by this week is not. So, I’ll post this landscape, of a fall scene, ironically, that I finished a few weeks ago. This painting is down at WareHouse Gallery, along with the winter scene posted a few weeks ago and a couple of paintings of the creek. If you haven’t had a chance to go by the gallery yet, you really should. Also, the Lexington Rockbridge Studio tour is coming up the weekend of April 20-21, and WareHouse Gallery; Earth, Fire and Spirit Pottery and Jean Tremmel’s studio are on the route. Let’s hope we don’t have a recurrence of the snow from last week.  Fall View 2 (oil on canvas, 13" x 20") As they (who’s “they,” anyway?) say, if you don’t like the weather here, wait 10 minutes. That’s particularly true in March and April, isn’t it? Last week we had 8 inches of snow, yesterday it was 60 degrees and sunny, today it’s blustery and rainy for 10 minutes, then sunny and mild for the next 10. If it doesn’t get warm soon, I’ll need some extra-strength Prozac. But speaking of changing up, I realized last week that the deadlines for a couple of juried shows are coming up soon (well, one deadline is today…I may have missed that one) and the work I want to enter is not landscape-related. So I spent the week being ill and procrastinating. Then I got up off the couch and finished up this painting, which is as-yet unnamed. I’ll entertain any interesting suggestions for a title. This painting falls into the previously referenced category of “exorcism.” Sorry all you landscape fans. I’ll post another landscape sometime soon.  As yet unnamed painting (Oil on canvas, 48" x 32") I confess! The snowstorm is all my fault! Last Tuesday, just before that wretched snowstorm that dumped a foot of wet, heavy, something-akin-to-concrete snow, I was in the studio working on this painting of snow! I’m really sorry, I had no idea that I had the power to control the weather; all my previous attempts to make it rain, or make it stop raining, or especially to make the wind stop blowing had all come to naught, and I figured I was powerless to affect the weather! I guess I know better now, and I’ll be more careful! Specifically, I am going up to the studio right now and get to work on some sunny, springlike paintings, with flowers and warm breezes depicted, perhaps also some butterflies and bunny rabbits! [ok, that’s going too far - perhaps the rabbits will be menacing.] I was without power for 4 days, and while I am better off than most (I have gravity-fed water, a woodstove and plenty of oil lamps and candles) I really missed the company of the radio and the music on the stereo. After just a few hours of talking to myself, I found out I’m boring. Also, no lights in the studio meant only working in the daylight. And trying to read by oil lamp sucks. New appreciation for ol’ Abe Lincoln reading by lamplight in his cabin. Because I missed posting last week, this week there are extra bonus images!
And for those of you who want to see how the “exorcism” paintings are coming along (all 3 of you!) here’s an update. More to come soon, as I am getting fed up with landscapes.  The Burr in my Mind
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AuthorJennifer Cox is an artist working in Rockbridge County, VA. She shows her work regionally, sometimes nationally, but not that often. She works in virtual isolation, so if you want to leave a comment, please do! Just try to be kind. Archives
May 2019
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