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Fall Begins

It’s been a busy summer and now looking forward to fall. Farmers markets are ending and now I prepare for some bigger events.

I will be at the Saranac Lake market Saturday Sept 21st, this is my last Saranac Lake farmers market this year. I am doing the Keene Market Sunday Sept 22nd.

I am then limited on markets for the next couple of weeks after that since my truck is going to the body shop after a deer incident earlier this summer. I am hoping to do the Keene market on 9/29 and 10/6.

I will have my truck back and heading down to Gore Mountain Master Crafters event for the Columbus Day weekend 10/12 and 10/13. It’s still up in the air if an event will happen in Saranac lake on 10/19, waiting on details. The final Peru Town market is 10/20 in Hayworth Park in Peru. The final Strand Artisans Market is 10/26.

I am at the SUNY Plattsburgh Arts and Craft fair on 11/16 and 11/17. This is always a busy event. The final event on my schedule is Sparkle Village on 12/6 and 12/7 in Saranac Lake NY.

I am undecided on doing a few markets in the Saranac Hotel before Christmas. Depends whether or not friend are doing it and the weather.

The other big news is, I now have a finished garage, with a nice workspace. It still requires a lot of interior work but I can finally do some of the other projects I have been eagerly planning, including metal and stone sculptures. All the materials I have been collecting will finally get used.

September

  • 21 Saranac Lake 9:00 – 1:00
  • 22 Keene 9:30 – 2:00
  • 29 Keene 9:30 – 2:00

October

  • 6 Keene 9:30 – 2:00
  • 12 & 13 Gore Mountain Foliage Festival 10:00 – 4:00
  • 19 Saranac Lake ???
  • 20 Peru Town Market 10:00 – 2:00
  • 26 Plattsburgh Strand Artisan Market 10:00 – 3:00

November

  • 16 & 17 SUNY Plattsburgh Arts 10:00 – 4:00

December

  • 6 Sparkle Village, Saranac Lake 4:00 – 8:00
  • 7 Sparkle Village, Saranac Lake 10:00 – 3:00
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Summer Markets

Summer has started and it’s been a good season so far. Missed a couple of markets due to storms. Heavy rain and paper doesn’t mix well.

I plan to be at several different markets over July and August.

Elizabethtown Market on Fridays July 12, 19 and 26th. August 2, 9, 16, 23 and 30th.

Keene Valley Market on Sundays July 14 and 21st. August 4, 11 and 18th.

Saranac’s Lake Market Saturdays July 13th. August 17,24 and 31st.

Strand Artisan Market Saturdays July 20th and August 10th.

Schroon Lake summer Market Saturday July 27th.

Essex days Market in Essex Ny on Saturday August 3rd.

Peru Town Market Sundays July 28th and August 25th.

I have been busy painting daily to have a variety of new paintings for each market.

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Ready for Market Season

It’s mid May and local Artist and Farmers markets are getting started. I have done a few early markets at the Strand Center for the Arts in Plattsburgh, and I’m happy to say that sales were very good. I thought I had a good supply of small study paintings, but now I have to continue to paint every day to keep up. That’s not a complaint, it’s a joy.

I have decided to do the most of the same markets as last year, but will sprinkle in several different markets, skipping my regular events those days.

Fridays; I will continue to do the farmers market in Elizabeth Town and try a couple of Friday evening markets in Port Henry.

Saturdays will be the biggest change, I will only do one Saranac Lake farmers market a month, that allows me to do the monthly Artisan markets at the Strand, regional specialty markets at Schroon Lake in July and Essex in August. I will be adding the Plattsburgh farmers market once a month.

Keene Valley Markets are Sundays from 9:30 to 2

Plattsburgh Farmers Markets are Saturdays from 9-1

Elizabethtown Markets are Fridays from 9-1

Strand Artisan Markets are once a month on Saturdays from 10-3

Peru Town Markets are once a month on Sundays from 10-2

Saranac Lake Farmers Market are Saturdays from 9-1

Port Henry Markets are Fridays from 5-8 pm (not sure about this one)

Here is my schedule for the next 6 weeks

May 25 Plattsburgh

May 26 Keene 

June 1 Plattsburgh

June 2 Keene

June 14 E-Town

June 15 Strand Plattsburgh

June 16 Keene

June 21 E-Town

June 21 Port Henry

June 22 Plattsburgh

June 23 Keene

June 28 E-Town

June 29 Plattsburgh 

June 30 Peru Markets

July 5 E-Town

July 5 Port Henry

July 6 Saranac Lake

July 7 Keene

Hope to see you at one of them. Please let me know if you have specific requests.

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Busy painting – forgot to post.

The past few week i have been in the zone, painting several paintings a day. I have a huge backlog based on drawings that I have done over the past few months. I have been using ProCreate on my iPad and its changed how I set up my paintings. I can sketch on the iPad with the apple pencil. then print sketch or use Davinci to see drawing on my paper. I do color some of these drawings but don’t spend a lot of time on that part of the process. To me the key is to get the head of the subject right (Eyes and Nose/Beak). I often draw and erase multiple times in order to get the proportions just how i like it.

I have also had the chance to do some wood working. Many frames as well as a few of my special driftwood accented frames as well as a unique portal frame. Another fun project was my wood box, bark on the spine, solid ash panels and magnetic closure.

Now a few of my paintings from the past few weeks.

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Diversions

I spent some time perusing a new interest, jewelry pendants. I have been collecting unusual bits and pieces since forever, not sure where I would use any of them.

One of my collection items was from a “yard sale” from my time at Schonbek. I purchased a bulk quantity of smoke quartz drops, along with several other rock crystal pieces. I have also collected a variety of local hardwoods in a variety of sizes, much of it harvested from my own property.

I combined the Smoky Quartz with a variety of local hardwoods hand worked to fit the shape of the drops, strung on a simple cord necklace to to create a rustically elegant jewelry.

I put these few pieces in the Workbench Collective gallery and I will see how they do. I plan to sell these an a variety of other pieces at the Arts and Craft fair Nov 18th and 19th at SUNYPlattsburgh field house. I now need to figure out how to display them. I have developed a tag that describes each piece to answer the common questions.

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Holiday Season Begins

The holiday season is often the busiest of the year, but this year I limited the events, not knowing how my shoulder surgery would go. I am only planning on the Arts and Crafts fair at the Plattsburgh state field house on November 18th and 19th, along with Sparkle Village in Saranac Lake on December 1st and 2nd.

I have tried a new framing style for my large vertical paintings. This happened when I was looking at frame thickness and put one piece over the other. I know I have seen this style of frame somewhere before but not sure where. I love the way it accentuates the vertical look.

I have spent some time painting like the ones above as well as playing in my workshop on some new ideas, I hope to introduce them those in a post soon.

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Recovery

After several weeks of not being able to paint due to shoulder surgery, I’m getting anxious to get the brushes back in my hands. The good news is I have been cleared to begin using it again. I’m going to have to work back up to longer sessions but is a pleasure to get the paint flowing again.

I spent time in my easy chair updating the web site with more current paintings. I plan to blog every other week through the fall.

I am looking forward to doing the farmers markets in Saranac Lane and Keene valley this coming weekend. On the Columbus Day weekend (Canadian Thanksgiving) I will be doing a 2 day event at Gore Mountain . I will also be returning to the Workbench Collective one day a week to volunteer, it’s a great artists collective.

I was able to reframe a couple of paintings with driftwood frames over the weekend., as well as make a couple of racks for selling my boxed cards on the market.

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Sidelined

Eastern Tiger Swallow Tail

I have been sidelined after having surgery on my right shoulder on September 5th. Yes that is my painting arm, so I am no longer painting or drawing every day. This breaking a streak of almost 6 years of daily making art. I have been told it will be 4-6 weeks in a sling so that will stop my painting and participation in the farmers markets. My next scheduled market is October 8-9 at Gore mountain.

The summer season at the farmers markets has been both a challenge and fun on many levers. Almost every weekend had at least one day of rain. Despite the weather issues I have excellent sales. I have sold a significant number of paintings, both my large driftwood famines pieces as well as my 5”x9” and 7”x9” framed studies.

I will say, editing my web site and blog with my left hand if a challenge but it needs to be done. I will post a lot of my past artwork photos and update the blog.

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Attempted Art Scam

I need to post about something that occurred during the past week. I was the target of an art scam.

This is how the the scam works. I received the following email from a person named Josh Goldfield.

Greetings!
My name is Josh Goldfield from FL. I actually observed my wife has been viewing your website on my laptop and i guess she likes your piece of work, I’m also impressed and amazed to have seen your various works too, : ) You are doing a great job. I would like to receive further information about your piece of work and what inspires you. I am very much interested in the purchase of the piece to surprise my wife. Kindly confirm the availability for immediate sales. Thanks and best regards,
Josh Goldfield

Being interested i responded stating i had works available and asked what pieces he was interested in. This is the response i got back.

Hello : MotleyArtist
Thanks for the message, however, I would greatly appreciate if you could possibly recommend a few completed original piece within my budget $450- $2000 ready for immediate sale… Just need something within that price range for a surprise to my wife (can tell she likes your work). I would appreciate if you can figure out a piece of work that would serve that purpose. Kindly email images and prices of any available works in that range. Thanks and blessing

This made me very suspicious since I don’t list any paintings over $400 on my web site. At this point in time I did a Google search for “Art Scams” and found several interesting articles. I found many articles like “How to Recognize the Signs of an Art Scam” and “7 Signs You are Dealing with an Art Scammer” All the various posts pointing to this being a scam. I have heard about scams where they buy an item, only pay by check or bank payment and include in the payment is fees that you are the then pay to the shipper. I responded back again asking about what subject would be of interest and a couple of images that I like, but stated I need his feedback.

Dear : Ron,
Thanks for the message, I must tell you I intend to give my wife a surprise with the immediate purchase of the piece. Also If you’d like to know, I’m relocating to the Philippines soon and our wedding anniversary is fast approaching. So I’m trying to gather some good stuff to make this event a surprise one. I am buying the any painting you recommend for $600, s a gifts to her. I’m okay with the price, I think it’s worth it anyway, so I’ll be sending a check. As regarding shipping, you don’t have to worry about that in order not to leave any clue to my wife for the surprise. as soon as you receive and cash the check, my shipping agent (who is also moving my personal effect) will contact you to arrange pick-up. I would have come to purchase the piece myself but, at the moment, am on training voyage to the North Atlantic Ocean (I’m an ocean engineer) with new hires who are fresh from graduate school and won’t be back for another couple of weeks.
Regards,
PS: In the meantime, kindly get back to me with your full name (you want the check payable to) cell phone no. and contact address (preferably for Usps ,fedEx not P.O box) where a check can be mailed to, so I can get the check prepared and have it mailed out to you right away.

I’m now sure of the scam and want to see haw far it will go, not that I want to waist time but figured I could post here about it, I stated that i could only do credit cards and have it processed through my web site of invoice through Square. He responded.

Ron,My wife handles the family credit card/paypal issues, and in order not to leave any clue to her for the surprise, i can only make the payment via bank transfer payment …so let me know if you can accept bank transfer if yes kindly get back to me with the follow info; Bank Name , Bank Address , Acct Name , Acct Num , Routine Num , THANKS

This is where I stopped responding to the emails. I want this to be a warning to other artists that scammers are out there and we are a target group. It appeals to ego and they use money as the bait.

Be wary, and if it sounds to good to be true – it is.

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Back to Painting

I have taken a little time off from posting, and now my goal for 2023 is to post once a month at a minimum. January is a slow time for doing events and shows here in the Adirondacks, it’s winter and time to enjoy. I am working on building an inventory for the spring shows.

I have been working on some paintings of a more southern theme like pelicans, sea turtles and whales. I need to update my note card collection and these have been requested a few times.

I had a great season, and a shout out to the Workbench Collective in Plattsburgh NY. They sold several of my paintings, cards and lamps. I recommend a visit, it’s a very classy shop and represents a number of great artists.