SHOW TO SHOW

Dotty Hawthorne Studio

It seems longer than a week ago when we were in San Luis Obispo County sitting by the seashore and breathing in clean ocean air.  But a week ago last Saturday we were traveling through out the SLO county visiting artist's studios for their yearly studio tour.  Whenever we go on some kind of tour like this, we always manage to visit areas that we would never go to ordinarily and it is a special bonus to be able to see another artist's work space, especially when they are pastel artists.   Our favorite painting studio that we visited was the home of pastel artist Dotty Hawthorne, who also had a couple of paintings in the West Coast Pastel Society Show in Morro Bay.  She was superb at capturing the quintessential California landscape with many of her paintings showing golden hills and California Oaks.  www.dottyhawthorne.com   

The Palms

We also stopped by the Morro Bay Art Center and Gallery a couple of times to study the other entries in the show and made some notes on different artists styles and techniques which we followed up back home at the computer by going to each of their websites.  It was a definite thrill to be a part of a national show.  And, as it turned out, we were not able to attend the reception.  Saturday night we went out to eat at what seemed to be a very expensive fish restaurant and I had a prawn cocktail which came back to haunt me in the night and all the next day, which was the day of the reception.

Doug Dawson speaking to the APAA Reception

 On Monday morning we headed off in the rv, arriving in Tehachapi for the evening, then on Tuesday we made it as far as Needles, arriving home on Wednesday afternoon.  We spent the rest of that day and some of Thursday unpacking the rv and returning it to storage.  Then I framed five paintings for Drop Off  at the Scottsdale Artists School to be in our Arizona Pastel Artists Assn Fall Show on Friday.  We also stayed on Friday to help hang the show and then went shopping for wine and water for the reception.  Saturday was the reception which was fabulous.

Lembert Dome Honorable Mention

 What a turnout and Doug Dawson spoke at length about what makes a good painting, how paintings are juried, and then he elaborated on each painting that won an award.  I was completely surprised to find out that one of my paintings had won an Honorable Mention as there were so many really outstanding paintings in the show.  Dawson said that what he really liked about my painting was my handling of the edges, especially around the clouds, the pine tree needles on the left of the painting, and the grasses in the foreground.    But as Carsten so eloquently said "just keep painting".  So back to work, except it can't be work when it is so enjoyable.