A visitor

A sudden bout of anxiety hits me five minutes before the studio visit. My palms are sweaty, mouth dry. I take a quick look around the studio and take a deep breath as I see her car pull up in the falling snow. Having seen my work at a local framer, a director of a fine art program and collection of one of the New York City hospitals, reached out because she was interested in my Marking Time series (read more about this series here). We played message tag for months before a sudden “how about tomorrow?” message arrived the day before.

After ten years of having a studio outside the home in a former factory building, I was uncertain about hosting a studio visit at my home studio. Add to that the restrictions and forced isolation of two years of Covid, and I was feeling overwhelmed and unprepared!

It had taken time to dig out the studio, re-organize and get everything in its place after the summer months of making, and the arrival of my daughter and granddaughter for the winter months. But as I looked around, I was pleased with what I saw. I had hung my poured pulp pieces, the 26 inch square cyanotypes and had the Marking Time series pieces, framed and unframed, laid out on the worktable.

What I’ve missed

The director was warm and gracious and immediately set me at ease. To acquaint herself with my work and its trajectory, she asked to see earlier series. I respected and appreciated that she was interested in a fuller understanding of my work.

One of my favorite things about a studio visit is the rich conversation that is sparked when two people look at art together. This is something that can’t be planned. The art is a jumping off point to discuss other artists, their work and its connections to mine, and trends in the art world. We talk about materials, concepts, the evolution of my ideas and the threads connecting it to other artists’ work. I scribble down artists’ names and exhibits to look up. I enjoy showing her my workstations and images of the pop-up papermaking studio I put together on the driveway over the summer.

The coffee, tea, and cake sit untouched…we are too deep in conversation to pause, or to even sit down as I pull out work, detail my process, and we share images with one another on our phones. Covid suspended so many of these interactions and I had forgotten how illuminating it is to see my work through another’s eyes. How necessary, energizing and satisfying it is to my art practice to dive deeply into art and ideas.

Farewell for now

More than an hour later, our conversation winds down. Eight Marking Time pieces have been chosen. There is also serious interest in the handmade paper with embedded ephemera (read about these here and here), and in another series. I am thrilled that my work resonated and that it will be in this collection. With a goodie bag of catalogs, business cards, postcards, and a pack of original mini monotype notecards, the director leaves exclaiming at what a great studio and visit it has been. I sit down to my cold tea to wonder why I was so anxious about sharing my home studio.

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