Since my last entry was almost a year ago, a lot has happened for all of us. Yes, the studio is opened and working as planned. I now have a studio cat, Mooshie. We inherited her from our neighbors. As my attention span isn’t that great she keeps me entertained. I work on projects, moving from one to another, and play with the cat; she helps me to focus. Pat and I attended quite a few shows this past year. We saw Martin Puryear and Kara Walker Exhibits at the Fort Worth Modern. As you know, the University here in Austin opened a new Museum Building, the Blanton, also this past year, which is a huge improvement over their old facilities. The exhibits mounted by both the Blanton and the Austin Museum of Art (AMoA) have improved considerably, from my point of view. So Austin is a good place to be an artist and hopefully, despite the economy, sales will come.

I sold my first work, Pop Can Art, and it’s going to Paris of all places. It belongs to Helené Keller-Lindt, and is posted on my web site.

This past summer I devoted time to learning to draw, and I think I can say progress has been made. While my focus has been working with pencils, this fall I want to expand to charcoals, pen & ink and conte’. I am preparing myself for the East Art Fair by building inventory in anticipation of sales. However, my main piece will again be political this year. It looks like this is becoming a yearly statement for the East Fair.

The past year also gave birth to ‘Shop dropping’. You can google it to get the full story. It started with clothing designers in the early ’90s and is the reverse of shoplifting. I started by putting my business card in art books that interested me in bookstores. Then I expanded it to include sending pieces of my art to collectors who lend to exhibits I attend and enjoy. I have heard from the collectors I’ve sent work to, but no purchases as yet. While I’m currently developing a new shop dropping program, I can’t divulge yet. In the mean time, I’ll continue working on the first two as I consider them to be a success for me.

I won’t be so long between entries in the future. Please contact me if you want to start a dialogue . . . also, expect new photos.

Luke

Please check out my first completed piece this week-end at the East Austin art tour. It will be at the New East Arts Gallery at 1601 E. Fifth St, Suite 106. The title is: Throw the Baby Overboard . . . no child left behind. All of you, get out and support Austin artists! Have a look at my new digs below.

Get set. My pieces can now be realized. There are many projects set to be transformed into reality. Plumbing and electricity are scheduled to be completed this week –some projects are already under production. This is a dream come true.

Stacy and Jeff are hard at work and the studio construction advances. I’m anxious to begin painting as so many projects are in preliminary stages and waiting to come to fruition. Check it out!

We recently discovered terrific shows in Dallas, Fort Worth and Houston. Do not miss the exhibit by the sculptor Ron Mueck at the Modern in Fort Worth, Portraiture in the age of Picasso at the Kimball, the Nasher Sculpture Garden as always, everything at the Menil, and finally a kick-ass exhibit of contemporary Asian (pop) art, “Red Hot”, at the Fine Arts Museum in Houston! Go get inspired!

Meanwhile, the rains have decreased slightly and work continues on the studio –framing is going well!

Slowly the work continues –rain, rain. Framing is the next step and it looks like that will begin this week.

Today work was done on framing the foundation of the new studio.

This is exciting to have you here as it’s not that easy to find me. The World Wide Web is a HUGE space and I’m a pretty small dot on it. I’m an Artist who works with mixed media –in other words, I’m confused.

A little humor always helps.

I’m currently working on building my studio. Ive posted photos of that work. The foundation framing is being done now, so that’s what you’re seeing. I will keep you as current with this project as possible –like it’s so interesting to your life!!

This Journal really is a Vanity Project, but that’s OK. We all need a mirror in which to groom ourselves. Move over PARIS. She takes up way to much mirror time.

That’s sort of it for today, I’ll post soon.

LUKE