Page Three of I Painted Myself into a Corner

 
I signed my name and put down my paintbrushes at 9:30 pm the night before the event. I still had work to do and corrections to make, but I had to concede that no one else would probably notice. I’d just have to finish it up after the show. The festival was open to the public from 10:00 am until 10:00 pm. Twelve hours sounded like a long time, but it wasn’t until a couple days before the event that I came out of my daze long enough to realize that I needed to have my display set up before 10:00 am. I also still had that nagging transportation issue.

Mike and I recruited a friend who owned a van. Measurements were taken and Will reported back the painting would fit with 5" to spare! He and his wife, Tracy, arrived at 7:00 am to begin loading the canvas and a collage Cris wanted at the show. Oh, and a blank canvas. I had agreed to do a demonstration throughout the day (don’t remember when or how that weak moment was taken advantage of). Plus all the painting supplies I could possibly use in twelve hours, a folding chair, and some foam mats to stand on while I painted.

I surveyed the mountain of stuff and mentioned to Mike, "I didn’t pack that much stuff for a 6-day trip to Nevada!" (He didn’t comment, by the way.)

The big one is 6’x5’ in case you’re curious. The framed collage is an easy to manage 2’x2’. A painting measuring 6’x4’of a lighthouse I’d donated to a hospital was being transported separately and, thankfully, I didn’t need to concern myself with that item. My demonstration canvas was medium-size, by Cris’ standards, at a mere 3’x5’.

I planned to paint a dancer in simple muted colors; nothing even remotely like the peculiar shades of pond-scum gray and moldy rusty-black I’d been staring at for so long. I was aiming for something in the style of Monet (my sincerest apologies to Claude, by the way) and was determined to stick to large paintbrushes. Realizing that people would be looking over my shoulder, I didn’t want to attempt anything that might induce more tension and nervousness than I was already experiencing. I would be painting acrylics in triple-digit temperatures and fighting to keep the paint from drying on the brush before I could actually apply it to the canvas. It’s a wonder that by the end of a very long day with regular breaks to seek food, rest and cool off, I got the painting over halfway finished.

People came by and asked about prices for my work, easing my apprehensions while feeding that ravenous ego of mine. I explained that the lighthouse was not mine to sell and the collage was something personal I was not prepared to part with at the present. The locomotive was for my husband; I had even painted my favorite engineer sitting in the cab. When Mike joined me that evening, I was delighted when people recognized his likeness in the painting!

We began disassembling the display at precisely 10:01 pm and loaded the van back up. Traffic was crazy with vehicles parked every direction in the middle of the streets as artists and vendors scrambled to leave. It was 11:45 pm by the time we got home and waved goodbye to Will as he disappeared into the night driving his now empty van.

I shuffled my way to bed as Mike wisely suggested that I shouldn’t even think about picking up a paint brush for at least a week. Great idea! Actually, it’s been more like three weeks!

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