The main reason the Post went into such a lengthy hiatus is that I got all involved in painting. I’ve always dabbled, but a few years ago, with the new free time that retirement allows, I amped things up a bit. I have no training, just a pretty good feel for color, texture and rudimentary geometry. I bought raw canvas and did all my own canvas preparation; building stretchers, stapling the canvas on them, sizing with gesso. Very labor intensive, but worth it. I did some figurative stuff, but have always been partial to abstracts, in oils, so that’s where I went, knocking out quite a few fairly large pieces, 3×3 and 4×4 feet. When the house got full, we decided to try art fairs, something I’ve long wanted to do. Our first was the DeLand Art Show, about 30 miles away. Didn’t sell a thing, and actually had a small painting stolen from our tent during the overnight. Great security.
Our second show was a few months later in St. Augustine, where we won Best in Painting! Didn’t sell anything until late on the second day when they brought the ribbons around, and then we got mobbed. Lots of fun.
We went all over Florida; Fernandina Shrimp Festival, Port Orange, Hyde Park in Tampa, Ormond Beach, and one of our favorites, the Corey Avenue Art Fair in St. Pete Beach, where we had our best day.
It was great sitting there in the tent and watching all the folks go by, talking to those who came in to browse, but after a couple years all the setting up and breaking down got to be too tedious, along with the escalating costs of application. We called it a day and filled two houses with what we hadn’t sold. Last fall I set up the tent in the driveway here at The Little Hacienda, made a sign and stuck it out front, and sold six paintings to people happening by. That helped.
Now, I hadn’t stopped writing altogether during this time. In fact I completed two novels I’d had in process for quite a while. Stay tuned for announcements on those. I did have the occasion to look at both processes, painting and writing, objectively.
Bottom line, painting is fun for me, writing isn’t, though I do have great appreciation for the process. It’s pretty simple, really. Painting is tactile, immediate gratification. Writing is a long intellectual exercise, where satisfaction, because the end result is so long in coming, has to be found in making very small choices every day. I’ve said before, writing is for me a lot like carpentry, and it turns out I’ve pretty much just been a carpenter all my life.
The Skinny Island Post 
The piece pictured is stunning. Kudos.
The fact that you had a piece stolen is the absolute highest compliment you can get from the general public. A purchase determines its worth, right then and there. But a theft… now, THAT compromises the taker, completely, and yet he (or she) deemed it to be worth the soul sell involved.
I once had a print of one of my drawings stolen from a friend of mine. Joe Fioretti, of the Orrmond Beach Pennysaver, had a massive PMT machine upstairs there, and he did all of my drawing prints for me. He loved my Mount Rushmore tribute piece (done in women) and had himself a nice PMT of this work; the piece which had gotten stolen. He had only one request; that I bring the original drawing with me whenever I came for other prints, so he could enjoy it in the full range of its values. He would stand there, and gaze at it, for the longest time. He really loved that piece.
When I moved back to Virginia in 1998, I stopped by there, and made him a gift of it.
He was really moved by that.
I never did learn to paint, so the process is foreign to me. I do like your use of colors, and the piece you show there is reminiscent of a multiform that I saw in your house next door years earlier, if memory serves. A painter named Mark Rothko.
What is the title of the piece, if it has one? I always think paintings, like books, should have titles.
Dude, your comments are longer than my posts!
Yes, Bill Hunter always used to complain of a certain umbrage, on my part,
as well!
Your description of painting as opposed to writing is spot on. Your creations, both on page and on canvas are spectacular. Keep on creating. Artists such as yourself make the world a more tolerable place.
Thank you, Shirley. I can’t help but do this, so I guess ill keep on. Hope you are well, and making it through. Albert, Sam.