Another Man's Treasure

He signed it! As my contest draws to a close at the end of the month, at the beginning of which I first showed you this piece, I received my painting back from Mr. Lynch, signed and ready to be framed and sent to his foundation.

Hopefully this will become someone's treasured possession, acquired at auction for a good cause. Right now this is my biggest hope, that I can bring in funds for various charities with my art. Those who get my newsletter know of one coming up in the Fall. (If you want my newsletter, just shoot me an email.)

From the very beginning, when I started thinking big with promoting my Vinyl Art, I of course had my Oprah fantasy. Mine was to somehow give a painting of Bono, tinted red, to Oprah, have Bono autograph the record on the show, and then auction it off for (red). It hasn't happened yet, but I still have the painting.

This unexpected connection with David Lynch has got me goofy. He is seriously one of my favorite auteur directors ever, and to get to help him out is amazing. We'll see what can come of it!

Peace.

One Man's Trash

I'm so excited I got to do this!

These records were beat, man. A couple had been shoved into the sleeves along with other Beatles records. This is why I love being able to do what I do. A friend had saved the other couple from the leftovers of a neighbor's garage sale, destined for the landfill. Beatles records. Nobody who didn't want to piss off their dads by playing crappy records on his fancy hi-fi would've played these, but they're Beatles records!

This is what I've been waiting to be able to do with my unframed pieces since I started clear-coating them. After painting and clear-coating these 4, I glued them together with Super Glue. I'm hoping I get to do other groups like Led Zeppelin this way, but I don't run across records without sleeves very often. The albums I get with sleeves, I'll normally do framed and won't throw the sleeves away just because. So I need your help. I need commissions of these.

Now, last week I said that the price for unframed single ones will go up to $150 at the end of the month, when my contest is over (which, by the way, only has 24 entries thus far). At that point I will begin offering pieces like this one of the Beatles for 10% less per portrait, plus shipping. So this one would be $540 instead of $600 individually. (I've got to find out what shipping will be, but it won't be too bad.)

I want to do them that much. I'm basically paying you to let me do a whole group and arrange the portraits myself. Plus, you'd only need 2 nails to hold up all 4 records :)!

Peace.

What Cost: Memory, Love?

I love these 3 images and this one of John. When I realized I had 4 Beatles records without sleeves from various sources, all with the rainbow Capitol label, I got excited to try something I've wanted to for awhile. I'll show you next week when I finish.

But first I need to tell you that I'm going to stop offering my pieces unframed for only $100 shipped. The price will be good on commissions requested before the end of this month, but then that's it. I've struggled with this decision since I started offering the pieces unframed at all, over a year ago.

Pricing in general is a tough one for me, not the fact that I make money from my art, but setting them so my work is accessible to even starving college students with the right priorities. I know my work has value, but what that value is eludes me. I started out selling framed pieces locally for $55 (the price of that Johnny Cash at auction currently) and raised them only when I realized that I needed to do so if I ever was going to be able to support our family eventually with my art. Even then, I've had people pay me more than I've asked at least twice and many people give me confounded looks when I tell them how much.

The thing is though, I feel comfortable with the $175 plus shipping price point for framed pieces. It feels good when anybody says "yes, I'll buy one". I don't want to raise that price unless I have so much work and I've already been able to hire my wife as my assistant, meaning when she can quit her job. I'll offer special things, like what I'm going to do with these unframed Beatles, that'll be at different, higher prices, but the standard piece, framed in front of the album sleeve will hopefully stay the same. When I do have that much work, I think I'll increase the price only when someone wants time priority placed on their piece.

But I don't feel good about the $100 shipped for the unframed. I feel a bit bad, like I'm going to be telling people not to buy my work by raising the price, but I don't want to hesitate when someone says they want it unframed instead of framed.

So, they're going up to $150. I feel like the quality and consistency of my work is worth that. Hopefully you'll feel your wall space, or someone else's, is worth that as well.

I don't know how else to value my connection to music, to art, to memory, to family & friends, to humanity. Do you?

Peace.

Now I'm Not Saying I'm Robin Hood

My friend Rodney is having a hard go of it these days. "Soul-crushing" he says.

My friend Robert isn't doing great. Already on disability, he was foreclosed on and had to move. And he's going blind in his other eye.

The randomness of real Life, eh?

This is why I feel SO lucky to be alive and to be able to do what I do. I get to bring joy, to give love, to share passion. My art may simply hang on a wall or lean on a ledge, but make no mistake, it DOES something. I thank Life, G'od, for using me, for allowing me, for guiding me to serve in the way I do.

Besides creating the pieces, I also work my butt off trying to help others do what they do as I can. Being connected means I occasionally can reach the right people, and they can reach me. This Johnny Cash is now up for auction for 4 more days. Help Civia and Musicians On Call, through Country Music Television, help people recovering in hospitals with the power of music. It's only $55 framed as of the writing of this post, a steal for a good cause.

You have to take to give.

Peace.

Poetry: Rhythm Or Rhyme?

Yesterday I realized the significance of the development and functioning of our ears before our eyes in the womb.

Today, does what words mean really matter? For a long time I'd been hung up on words, their individual meanings in and out of context. For awhile I didn't want to talk at all because I couldn't resolve meanings and their reality.

Words don't have reality. They are language, as money and art are. Everything we learn in school is language, how to communicate humanity to other humans. It's the rhythm of humanity that matters, not its rhyme. Certainly not its reason.

Poetry, not just of words, for me is the flow of Life, the river that is always moving and always there. Individual notes, words, whatever matter not in and of themselves. It's how they connect with those around them.

Rhyme is internal, selfish, controlled. Rhythm is free, shared, felt. From the heartbeat we hear first as we enter the river of Life, we listen to that rhythm, constantly seeking to be included in it and differentiated from it. It is rhythm that grounds us, makes us human.

Peace.