Well, our first Virtual Gallery Talk from the West End Gallery has went by the wayside. Whew.
It was such a different experience from in person talks that I am still processing it. I will most likely address it in greater detail in coming days, including answering some of the questions that were asked in greater detail.
I am fairly happy with it thus far. And the feedback has been very good thus far. One unfortunate aspect was that I wasn’t able to see or hear the folks watching and we’re working to address that for future streaming events.
It was much more difficult than I had expected when the idea of doing this first came up. I know when it ended, the strain of it hit me almost immediately. Within minutes of it ending, I felt like I had been beat on with bag of pennies. I expected a sense of relief but wasn’t expecting that.
But it’s done. There’s something to build on now, to make future ones much better.
I want to extend a warm thank you to everyone who tuned in yesterday. There were well over a hundred viewers from 18 states and 4 different countries. I can’t begin to tell you how much I appreciate those of you out there who took the time to listen to me yammer on for a while. I hope it made some sense for you and you feel that it was time well spent.
I also want to thank Jesse, Linda and John at the West End Gallery for giving me the opportunity and for the massive effort they put out in making it happen.
Though I hopefully look forward to standing in front of an audience for a gallery talk, here’s to more and better streams in the future. If you tuned in yesterday and have comments or criticisms that you think will help us make our presentations better, please let me know so we can improve. Thanks!
For this Sunday Morning Music, here’s a song I referenced yesterday from John Prine, I Ain’t Hurtin’ Nobody.
“A good speech should be like a woman’s skirt; long enough to cover the subject and short enough to create interest.”
― Winston S. Churchill
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Still busy getting ready for tomorrow’s Virtual Gallery Talk from the West End Gallery. Still a lot of work to do, especially on my acrobatic entrance where I do a series of backward handsprings into the gallery culminating in two twists and a stuck landing.
I have so far broken three windows, four coffee cups, stepped on Hobie (my mighty studio cat) and put my foot through a painting while practicing.
I might have to cut that part of the presentation.
Oh, well. I guess that help in adhering to the words above from Winston Churchill. I do try to follow this bit of advice and keep my speech short even though there is always that temptation to keep blabbing.
Win This Painting!
Hope you can tune in tomorrow. I am a little nervous, doing this in this online format that is new for both myself and the West End. But I think it’s going to go off pretty well and will be, hopefully, interesting for you.
Plus, we’ll be giving away TWO paintings of mine at the end of the hour and maybe there will be anther surprise or two. So, there’s that.
And I heard there will be pie. But I guess that won’t help you since it’s a virtual talk. When they can teleport pie via the interweb, that will be a great thing.
But I doubt it’s going to happen by tomorrow.
Well, that won’t stop us.
Hope to see you tomorrow.
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See yesterday’s blog for more details and register below:
“There are no shortcuts to any place worth going.”
― Beverly Sills
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I guess Beverly Sills is right but this is a lot more work than I thought it would be.
I am talking about getting ready for the Virtual Gallery Talk I am giving on Saturday from the West End Gallery. There is, of course, always a certain amount of preparation for any talk. But this year’s talk without an audience has me scrambling. There’s a whole new layer of technology to adopt in a short time while trying to make it look cohesive and somewhat smooth.
I don’t want to look like a complete idiot, after all.
But beyond the technological hurdles, my presentation as to be changed to account for not being able to interact with a live audience. Normally, I try to have a few things ready to discuss and begin with a pretty short intro before moving quickly to questions from the audience. I try to get into questions and answers as soon as possible because I think that my reactions to questions are one of my strengths.
I could be wrong there. I am hesitant to say any quality of mine is a strength for fear of being that guy who over esteems his prowess at far too many things.
You know the type.
But if I had to say I had a strength it would be in my willingness to react to and honestly answer questions in these situations. At least, I am better at it than I am as delivering prepared remarks. But because of the remoteness of the talk, I really have to prepare to deliver a short address, of sorts, fully worded and thought out beforehand. Without the benefit of being able to react.
For a lazy slob like me, that is a tough task. Makes me truly admire those folks I know who deliver speeches and prepared remarks.
But I am working at it and hopefully you won’t even see the rivers of flop sweat running down my face during the talk. I am thinking of doing the old trick of smearing vaseline on camera my lens so that it gives me a soft gauzy look. I think they used to do that for Doris Day at some point. If it works for Doris, then dammit, I am willing to give it a shot.
All kidding aside, it is hard work and we are really trying to send out a Gallery Talk that is rewarding for everyone who takes the time out of their busy lives to spend a little time with us on Saturday.
I am giving away two original paintings so I hope you can be there!
Here are the details:
Virtual Gallery Talk with GC Myers
Streaming from West End Gallery via Zoom
Saturday, August 22 Beginning at 1 PM EST
You do not need a Zoom account but you do need to register to participate
There will be a drawing at the end of the Talk (approx 2 PM EST) to award two GC Myers paintings
Participation n the Talk is limited to 500 viewers but the prize drawing is limited to the first 100 registrants for the Gallery Talk
Eligible registrants must be present online in order to claim their prize and the Gallery Talk will be locked to new participants at 1:30 PM
The winning paintings will be shipped free within the US and Canada to winners residing out of the area. However, if an international entry wins, the winner would be responsible for shipping costs.
The regular Gallery Talk ends after the drawing for the two paintings which will be approximately 2 PM EST
At that point, about 2 PM, the meeting will be unlocked and there will be a Gallery After Talk, an additional period of Q & A after the regular Gallery Talk for anyone who cares to talk a but longer. This period can run to 3 PM, if need be.
There will be a Waiting Room on Zoom 10-20 minutes prior to the beginning of the Talk. You can check in and chat with other participants at that time. While muted, you can still submit questions or comments via the Chat.
You do not need a Zoom account but you do need to register to participate
There will be a drawing at the end of the Talk (approx 2 PM EST) to award two GC Myers paintings
Participation n the Talk is limited to 500 viewers but the prize drawing is limited to the first 100 registrants for the Gallery Talk
Eligible registrants must be present online in order to claim their prize and the Gallery Talk will be locked to new participants at 1:30 PM
The winning paintings will be shipped free within the US and Canada to winners residing out of the area. However, if an international entry wins, the winner would be responsible for shipping costs.
The regular Gallery Talk ends after the drawing for the two paintings which will be approximately 2 PM EST
At that point, about 2 PM, the meeting will be unlocked and there will be a Gallery After Talk, an additional period of Q & A after the regular Gallery Talk for anyone who cares to talk a but longer. This period can run to 3 PM, if need be.
There will be a Waiting Room on Zoom 20-30 minutes prior to the beginning of the Talk. You can check in and chat with other participants at that time. While muted, you can still submit questions or comments via the Chat.
So, we’re on our way! It’s actually pretty simple but if you have questions or comments, just drop me a line. We’re trying to make this whole thing as smooth for you and for us as possible. Hope to see you Saturday!
“Magistrum”- You Could Win This Painting at Saturday’s Virtual Gallery Talk!
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“The best thing for being sad,” replied Merlin, beginning to puff and blow, “is to learn something. That’s the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds. There is only one thing for it then — to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting. Learning is the only thing for you. Look what a lot of things there are to learn.”
― T.H. White, The Once and Future King
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At a size of about 11″ by 15″ on paper and under glass, this painting is the second of the paintings that will be awarded as part of a free drawing at the end of my Virtual Gallery Talk this Saturday, August 22. It is titled Magistrum which is the Latin word for teacher or master.
It’s fitting that the snip I am using to start this post is from The Once and Future King from T.H. White. Reading was a big part of my childhood, a connection to the wider world and the key to unlocking the secrets of it. Books were the teacher, the master, I never had in any one person and I remember it well when I first came across this book. The story of the education of the young King Arthur by Merlin, it was delightful tale that really excited my imagination and, with its emphasis on learning and observing, reinforced my own quest to learn.
Merlin is correct, learning is the best thing for being sad. It changes the mind, building new structures upon it that make the whole thing so much stronger. In these days where, as Merlin points out, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, it is indeed a good thing to not wallow in sadness. Best to learn something new, expand that mind and see the world with wiser eyes.
That’s kind of what I see in this painting. The Red Tree here is the teacher urging its students to come out into the light, emerge from their state of blueness.
So, if you feel blue these days, open your mind and try to learn something unknown to you. Read something new. Look at things closer. Imagine the world through the eyes of others.
It’ll do you a world of good. That I can say with certainty.
Now the Virtual Gallery Talk from the West End Gallery takes place this Saturday, August 22, from 1-2 PM EST. Tomorrow, we will be posting the information on how to preregister for the Talk with Zoom. You do not have to have a Zoom account but you will need to register to participate and view. Though the Talk will be open to all, the drawing for the two paintings will be limited to the first 100 registrants. The chosen winners will have to be present (online!) at the Gallery Talk to claim their prize.
So make sure you get your name in when we roll out the info tomorrow. Good luck!
“Heart of Light”- To Be Awarded At This Saturday’s Virtual Gallery Talk
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“A fight is going on inside me,” said an old man to his son. “It is a terrible fight between two wolves. One wolf is evil. He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other wolf is good. He is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith. The same fight is going on inside you.”
The son thought about it for a minute and then asked, “Which wolf will win?”
The old man replied simply, “The one you feed.”
— Wendy Mass, Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life
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This is a battle that I know well. I don’t know about you but I suspect many of you have witnessed this same conflict within yourselves.
Experience has taught me that, indeed, feeding and nurturing one wolf makes it stronger so that the other one that is not fed slinks into the background. That other evil wolf remains always just far enough away in the shadows, however, waiting for a sliver to fall its way that will strengthen it, allowing it to once more fight for dominance.
Which wolf are you feeding today?
This is a roundabout way of getting to the painting shown at the top, It’s a 12″ by 12″ piece on canvas called Heart of Light. and is one of the 2 paintings to begiven away at the end of my Virtual Gallery Talk that will be streaming online from the West End Gallery this coming Saturday. The Talk begins at 1 PM EST and runs until 2 PM. Details on registering for the drawing will be forthcoming tomorrow or Wednesday.
I would like to think I am feeding my good wolf with this but it seems pretty arrogant to call this annual giving away of a painting an act of generosity.
And that is feeding that evil wolf.
Maybe I believe I am feeding my good wolf because it brings me joy to express in this small way the gratitude I feel for those folks out there that have allowed me to have this life an artist, one that allows for my many shortcomings.
Who knows?
Good wolf or bad, I know that this painting will be given away on Saturday. Hope you will be there.
In the meantime, feed your good wolf well. I will try to do the same.
From his own words and actions, we now know with a pretty high degree of certainty why the current thing that is leaving a stain on the walls and carpets of our white house wants to sabotage and destroy our United StatesPostal Service. It has little to do with the smokescreen of the profitability of the USPS and almost everything to do with the suppression of voting via the mail, which has taken on greater importance during the current pandemic. He has demonstrated that he will do anything and everything to protect himself at this point including the destruction of a vital part of our national infrastructure that has been around since 1775 when Benjamin Franklin was our first Postmaster General.
And it’s all simply because he knows that if more people vote, his odds of staying in (and staining) the office go dramatically down. In fact, the only chance he and his cronies have to remain in power is if they can force people to have to vote in person then reduce the number of of voting locations, shorten the hours of voting and purge voter rolls to keep the numbers as low as possible.
Create roadblocks to voting, in other words.
Despite his warnings of vast voter fraud, I have yet to hear a cogent argument why mail in voting should not be expanded especially in a time of pandemic. I have not seen an iota of evidence that voter fraud via the mail is a real problem. In fact, most arguments point to it being more reliable and less prone to manipulation when administered with proper precautions.
And if you think about it, voter fraud via the mail or even in person voting is so much less efficient that voting machine fraud, where a simple software tweak can alter the vote totals of each machine, that it would be a ridiculous risk for the return.
The USPS is often maligned but they are still a wonder of efficiency in my eyes. Throw a letter in an envelope, jot down an address and add a stamp and stick it in the box at the end of the driveway. A person picks it up and a day or two later it is delivered anywhere in this country for 55 cents. The people who complain about this are the same people who bitch that gas doesn’t cost thirty cents a gallon anymore. To me, accessing the infrastructure that can do such a thing for less than buck is perhaps the best bargain around.
The infrastructure to do this is incredible, a force of 600,000 employees ( this includes a huge number of veterans) who have been the lifeline for many for most of the time we have been a nation. Some say that most of our messaging can be done via the web now or through private carriers such as UPS or FedEx. Of course, there is a profit necessary in order to accomplish it with private companies. FedEx would certainly never be able to deliver a letter for 55 cents and deliver to every household across the nation on a daily basis. If any private company could do what the USPS does and turn a profit they would have attempted to do so by now.
For them to compete with the USPS, the prices would have to go up drastically. Any increase in the price of doing such would be a de facto tax on you, the US citizen.
Some of this is from a post written earlier this year when the white house stain first began to attack the USPS in earnest. I am pretty passionate about the post office and am one of those people who have always loved the idea of mail. In fact, it has played a part in several of my paintings, including the piece at the top, No Mail, which hangs in my studio.
The mail has always been an important part of my life, a first life line to the outside world when I was child living in the relative isolation of our rural home. I have friends that I still write to overseas that I befriended through the mail. While we now email more, the hand written letters and notes that I still receive mean so much more to me than an electronic message read on a screen. The fact that the sender wrote it, put it in the envelope and addressed it then a different person picked it up and inserted it into this incredible system to get to me makes it a small miracle. Well, at least, a wonder.
The USPS can easily be saved. Of course, the forces that be and their wealthy friends see it as a cash cow to be exploited or a vehicle for suppressing the vote. Whether we let that happen is up to us. Call– or better yet, write– your representatives in congress and tell them to keep their hands off the post office.
So, for this Sunday Morning Music I thought we should have some mail related song. There are a lot of great choices. There’s Fats Waller‘s classic I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter which has been covered by almost every major vocalist or PleaseMr. Postman from either the Marvelettes or the Beatles. Or Johny Cash’s Tear Stained Letter. Take a Letter Maria from RB Greaves. Elvis and Return to Sender.
But today I am going with the Box Tops and their song The Letter from 1967. It features the late great Alex Chilton on vocals and is always a great tune to get your blood moving. This song would have sucked if it said she wrote me an email…
Well, we are this much closer to having a Gallery Talk this year at the West End Gallery.
Here’s what we have so far:
The Talk will be streamed live online via Zoom
It will be streamed from the West End Gallery
The Gallery Talk will take place next Saturday, August 22, beginning at 1 PM EST
The traditional Free Drawing for an original painting of mine will take place at approximately 2 PM EST
The Talk will end at 2 PM but there will be a short Gallery AfterTalk for any additional Q&A for those who wish to stick around
There will be a pre-registration for the drawing
The Drawing will be limited to the first 100 registrants
We decided on streaming from the West End Gallery simply because it would be easier to handle the technical aspects of the streaming, especially since this is a new experience for both the gallery and myself. Plus, just having a few folks on hand will take away that feeling of talking to myself that I sometimes get when talking to a camera.
I had mentioned doing a Studio Tour and if this works out satisfactorily that is definitely something I will consider for the future. It opens up lots of avenues to explore going forward.
Full details will be coming in the next couple of days so keep yours eye open.
He was a king or a shah, an ahkoond or rajah, the head man of the country, and he commanded the learned men of the books they must put all their books in one, which they did, and this one book into a single page, which they did. “Suppose next,” said the head man, who was either a king or shah, an ahkoond or rajah, “Suppose now you give my people the history of the world and its peoples in three words— come, go to work!” And the learned men sat long into the night and confabulated over their ponderings and brought back three words: “Born, troubled, died. “
This was their history of Everyman.
”Give me next for my people,’ spoke the head man, “in one word the inside kernel of all you know, the knowledge of your ten thousand books with a forecast of what will happen next— this for my people in one word.” And again they sat into the peep of dawn and the arguments raged and the glass prisms of the chandeliers shook and at last they came to a unanimous verdict and brought the head man one word: “Maybe “
–A fragment of #49 from The People, Yes from poet Carl Sandburg
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Born-Troubled-Died.
It may not have the breathtaking poetic sweep of Person-Woman-Man-Camera-TV but the addition of that one word condensed from all the gathered knowledge of man, that simple Maybe, is a sign of hope. A sign that despite the worst efforts of kings and would-be kings, the people will overcome.
Redtree Times