It’s a new year, a new decade and I’m excited about the prospects! I’m planning a studio “rethink” (ie. Remodel) to start the year off… and I’m working with Sidestreet on some workshops/demos. It’s going to be a great year!
Happy 2020!
Jolly Time & Holiday-ing
It’s certainly the most wonderful time of the year… The trick is, you just have to avoid the overly busy shopping places and the cranky hubbub. That’s right… You don’t have to stand in line at big corporate stores to buy mass produced gifts. No, you can be selective and creative in your shopping. This is how I do my gifting (which keeps me cheery). I buy from fellow local artists if I don’t make it myself. I like to be merry and full of the creative holiday spirit, don’t ya know.
This was my table at my friend Nicole’s Mt. Tabor Holiday Open Studio. It was a fantastic weekend… my big seller, as always, was my hand drawn, unique Copic Marker pinback buttons. But there were lots of other things that sold… like magnets, zines, cards and matted art.
If you visit Sidestreet Arts on 28th & Ash in Portland (OR), you’ll see new matted art, new magnets, Christmas cards, buttons and more. And you could always contact me with questions or visit my online shoppe. Meanwhile… happy holiday-ing! Don’t forget to be jolly.
December Open Studios
It’s less than a week away…
Holiday Pop-up in December
I will be bringing my traveling art show for you to Christmas shop through. It includes matted and framed original art, prints, Art-o-Rama zines, Squid Row comic books (comics about artists) and lots of other artsy stuffs! So mark your calendar!
December 7 – 8, 10-6pm
3410 SE 56th Avenue, Portland, Oregon
New Online Store experience
My online store is hosted by Square… and Square bought Weebly… and Weebly is now running the online store. It’s a nice little circle of ecommerce.
So I’ve been mucking around in the new store… it’s not a HUGE change visually thus far, but I think it’s more shop-able… not so clunky. And as I become more fluent, it will change more often as it’s more easily manipulate-able on my end. So I invite you to look around and see what’s going on at Bridgett-Spicer.square.site
Talky-Talk
I will be giving an Artist Talk at Sidestreet Arts (Portland, OR) on 8-11-19. I’ll talk about the inspiration for “Closer to Home,” as well as the muses and symbolism in the artwork. There will be delicious brunchy foods and drinks. Talk starts at 1pm, but if you are one of a dozen visitors to come at noon, you’ll get one of my zines!
Here’s the SE Examiner’s blurb on the matter… courtesy of Brian… Thank you, Brian! You all are awesome over there!
Closer to Home… soon
Sidestreet Arts: July 31-Sept 1, 2019
I’m “Closer to Home” … on July 31st, with an opening reception on August’s First Friday, I will have all new mixed media and acrylic paintings in the main featured gallery. There are twenty brand new pieces along with some fantastic new work by Portland ceramicist, Nicole M. Curcio.
This show deals with my changing relationship to Portland; from a tourist destination, to home, to muse, I examine the things that make Portland Portland, and also … my new home.
Opening Reception: Friday Aug 2, 2019 from 6-9 pm.
Artist Talk & Reception: “Bridges & In-roads”
Sunday, August 11, 12-2 pm with talk @ 1pm.
Bastille Day Fete!
Sunday, July 14th is Bastille Day… and Sidestreet Arts is going to celebrate! Okay, it was my idea. Anybody that knows me knows that I’m a Francophile … and since the Portland Art Museum is currently showing Paris 1900, I thought it would be an excellent idea to celebrate “all things French.”
And why not? The French have a Joie de Vivre and an appreciation of the arts… I’m an artist… Sidestreet Arts is a gallery… it makes perfect sense to me. Parfait.
So…. an art gallery celebrating Bastille Day should have some French art. I awhile back, I created some artwork inspired by my love of Paris. Using my Posca paint markers and colored pencils, I drew some French buildings and even some Cubist-leaning abstraction-ated drawings using that amazing blue ultramarine. I put up four of these framed mixed media pieces… and immediately sold “Paris Rooftop Chimneys” … prompting me to now make some more.
Meanwhile… if you’re in the Portland area on July 14th, Sidestreet Arts will have a glass of Kir and some Brie waiting for you at noon!
gallery Doings
There is so much going on!
The gallery is getting an exciting new mural on the outside of the building… and as the gallery member handling this event, it’s been a series of processes to get to here… which, as of Saturday, will be the actual time to paint! The outstanding Portland artist, Gary Hirsch, will be painting our 28th Avenue Sidestreet Arts wall, along with help from gallery members. Gary’s wonderful BotJoys enhance and bring joy to many other murals around our fair city, and we are ever so pleased to have him do ours!
Work continues on my “Closer to Home” show coming to Sidestreet in August. I’m down to the last two paintings to finish. One is a stubborn self portrait that I’ve painted, repainted and re-imagined what seems like a million times. The other unfinished piece is a ratty old recliner that I encountered not long after moving to Stumptown. It will live on in infamy once the mixed media on paper is finished up. Another piece in that series is “Judy” (above)… captured when we visited a lively Irish Pub in the Alberta Arts District in the Alberta neighborhood. I like this piece as it captures a moment… and one wonders what is happening just off scene …. off the paper in this case. “Closer to Home” will be at Sidestreet Arts in August.
AND Bastille Day is coming on July 14th. Sidestreet will be celebrating the fete with Frenchiness. More on that coming. But there will be French food, music and art! What’s not to like!??
Back to Painting
I have been lugging around canvases… some, still fresh in their packaging… and some have long been painted but needed to be, well, “recycled.” So I pulled these canvases out of their resting places and armed with sand paper & a tube of gesso … I primed them for their new lives as something else.
In August, I will have the featured artist spot at Sidestreet Arts (along with my art pal, Nicole Curcio) and I have LOTS of wall space to fill. Most of my recent work is either collage or mixed media on paper, and mostly 8×10 or near-abouts. So I needed to work larger and quicker. Enter those “refreshed” canvases.
The painting above is the first one completed in the new painting series for “Closer to Home.” It’s 18×24 inches and represents some of the more abstract techniques I’ve been working in. It still has that cartoonish hand… and the colors are fairly bright. That’s Mt. Hood in the center, in a cloak of white and pink. When driving our little packed car into Portland and over the Marquam Bridge (the zigzag bridge on the right), it was sunset, and the sky was pink and Mt. Hood was pink … and everything was pink. It was a sign. It’s become a symbol for me, of our moving here to Portland.