Note This

Chanukah is crazy early. Thanksgiving is a week late, and Christmas is everywhere.

Feeling a bit of the frenzy yet?

Frenzy, 2013
acrylic, spray paint on canvas
30" x 40"
©NanciHersh
$1250.00

The true essence of the season is one of gratitude and joy. And in that spirit, Catherine Hartigan and I would like to share our gratitude with, and for you.

Our Catching Up exhibition ends next week, on November 16. As a way of saying thank you we have a special offer this month. You can buy one of my Koi paintings or a Catherine Hartigan photograph during the month of November and you will receive 25 notecards with the image of your new acquisition on the front, and blank inside. Perfect for holiday, thank you or whatever cards.

And in case you were wondering, you can purchase a work of art installments, no interest. It's all good.

Share the gratitude. and thank YOU.

Gone too Far?

or not far enough?

Summer Koi #2, 2013
acrylic on canvas
10" x10"
©2013NanciHersh

This painting above, started as this, below.  

The beginning of Summer Koi #2
©2013NanciHersh

Have we done enough? or too much? and often it is FEAR that drives us one way or another. 

Art, like life is that push pull. We keep working, until it's done or we move on.

Seth Godin in his blog states that 

Fearlessness is not the same as the absence of fear.  

By recognizing and acknowledging our fear, we can have "it", rather than it have us.

Saw the movie the Impossible recently. Freaked me out...especially because we all know it is based on the true story of the horrific tsunami in Southeast Asia in 2004. The beautiful clear turquoise waters become a moving mountain slamming and sweeping away everything in its path.

But heck, we get out of bed every morning, still travel, live our lives, enjoy the water... and keep going. 

One of my favorite quotes is by Helen Keller

Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.

Helen Keller

More Helen Keller quotes

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/h/helenkelle121787.html#RHqmC2ABTJTtJW7F.99 

Win- Win Situation- Artist as Collector

South Florida based artist, Maggie Ruley is this week's guest blogger for our Artist as Collector Series.

Bromeliad, Coconuts and Lime, 1998
acrylic on canvas
20" x 16"
©2013JimSalem

I bought this painting at a benefit years ago.  A local potter, Jay Gogin, had been selected to study in Japan with a famous Japanese artist, and friends threw a benefit to help raise money for his expenses.  Jim Salem donated a painting and I knew right away when I saw it, that this was the piece I wanted to buy.  

It was one of those win-win situations.  I got a wonderful painting and I helped a fellow artist.  

 Jim is an amazing painter and a wonderful instructor.  I have taken classes with him for years.  "Bromeliad, coconuts and limes" is one of his demo paintings.  He starts each class with a half hour demonstration and it is amazing what he can accomplish in that time.  Finished works fetch high prices, and I was able to acquire this one at a very reasonable one.  

He still teaches and he and his partner have their own art gallery- Cocco- Salem in Key West, Florida.  Jim is very generous in both his art instruction and in his daily life.  

I am proud to be able to say "Oh yes-  I own a Salem"

Maggie Ruley is a painter and potter inspired by her beautiful tropical surroundings in Key West, Florida. (Lucky lady)

Plein Air Painting in Collection

This week's Artist as Collector Series comes from painter and printmaker Ahni Kruger.

©2012CarolDiamond

I bought this at Prince Street Gallery … 

Carol (Diamond) & I met in college and I've always admired her dedication to her work.  We have had many lovely moments painting in the landscape, drawing together, sharing loves, parenting strategies, and losses over the years.  

This painting was done on location in the Brooklyn Navy Yards in 1997 when I was very pregnant with my son.  It shows her relentless, tentative searching for form while boldly messing with space and color.  Love the yellow diagonal!  She manages to capture these very complicated structures with suggestive strokes, and I think she truly gives us that sense of being in an industrial landscape, leading us up to and beyond various details, all the while leaving delicious clues about the act of painting.  

To me, plein air painting is about the transient light, shifting forms and impermanence of the weather, an urgency to seize the moment.  Sadly, the significance of the towers that no longer exist is now woven into this.  

About this week's Guest Blogger:

Ahni Kruger is a painter, printmaker and adjunct professor at Drew University and Montclair State University, both in New Jersey.  Her work reflects her travels, her passions and her thoughtful approach to the canvas or paper.

Retail Therapy

Retail Therapy
from the Walks thru Life:Shoe Portraits Series
Acrylic on Canvas
10" x 10"
©2011NanciHersh

Shopping often overwhelms me - unless of course it is an art supply or hardware store.
Then I LOVE the choices, the materials, the possibilities- lurking in each item.

Worn sandals took me outside my comfort zone the other day.   While my Italian green and gold cork sandals were at the shoe maker for repair and my deliciously comfortable Naots (and yet to be painted) sandals are showing their wear, I took myself to a DSW for some retail therapy.

Short on time and so many choices, I decided to try on only what "shouted out my name."  Fortunately, the call quickly from a festive European flowery slip on sandal with a sleek & sexy heel.

My new muse  inspired me to pick up the brush again and  promises to take me out for a very fun adventure...

any ideas?

Kaleidoscope of Colours

Perhaps my favorite shop to feast in the colours and textures of the Paris store displays was at Boutiques le Jacquard Francais on 53 rue Bonaparte. This small, intensely vibrant shop, was a kaleidoscope of colours and textures near our apartment in St. Germaine.

Store display at Le Jacquard Francais
©2011NanciHersh

Home or abroad, swimming in a sea of colour...

Kaleidoscope, 2010

Acrylic on canvas

40" x 54"

©2011NanciHersh

Red Hot Red

These shoes were bought on a whim a few years ago. Everyone woman should have a pair of red shoes.
They're fun, they have sex appeal without one of those 4" heels which would just make me topple over!
It's like trying on a blonde wig if you are brunette.  Do blonde's have more fun?  Do red shoes sizzle?
Maybe, yes, yes, yes.....

I am going to wear them to my Salsa Dance class tonight with my Valentine. 1,2,3,4...

Red Hot Red II, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
10" x 10"
©2011NanciHersh

Red Hot Red I, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
10" x 10"
©2011NanciHersh

Happy Valentine's Day!

Do you have a pair of shoes that make you feel like dancing?

How Low Can You Go

Apparently pretty low!. it's under 10 degrees here!

These sheepskin slippers are well worn, warm old friends and have been the mistaken play toy of Dini the Dog a few too many times!

Well Worn White
#14, January 2011
Acrylic on Canvas
10" x 10"

Say Who?