Lowertown First Fridays: It's our Anniversary!

Lowertown First Fridays is almost a year old...and we're planning special festivities to celebrate!

Well over a year ago a group of Lowertown artists (including myself) started meeting to plan a monthly open studio event in Lowertown St. Paul. We launched the event last November and slowly the event is growing. We thought it would be a good idea to celebrate our very first anniversary!

As always, there will open studios at several different artist buildings in Lowertown. At my building, the Tilsner, we are hosting a "Best of the Tilsner" show. There will also be an after party at Echo Arts starting at 9:30 pm. Of course, there will be cake!

So, if you missed the Art Crawl (because it was so dang nice) or you want to come back for a second look, be sure to save the date:

Friday, November 5th

6 - 9 pm ! 

Pictured above is a Lowertown First Friday's map that features the locations of open studios (and indicates available parking). For more information and artist profiles, check out our website: http://www.LowertownFirstFridays.com

Also, become our Facebook Fan at: 

http://www.facebook.com/lowertownfirstfriday 

St. Paul Art Crawl--just a week away!

 Leaves are turning color, the evenings are getting cooler, and the art crawl is just a week away! I will have my Tilsner home studio open for the Fall Art Crawl and hope you will stop by to visit! Here are the details:

Friday, October 8th 

                                 6-10 pm
Saturday, October 9th 

                                 12-8 pm
Sunday, October 10th 

                                 12-5 pm

Tilsner Building

                             Studio 507

300 Broadway Street

St. Paul, MN 55101

 
Hundreds of Artists will open their studios to the public during the Fall Art Crawl. 50 Artists will be showing their work in the Tilsner building alone. This includes painters, potters, photographers and much more!  Many buildings will also offer musical or theatrical entertainment. There is so much happening in Lowertown this weekend...you can check it out here! There are over six additional locations within walking distance of the Tilsner that will feature open studios and art--that alone will offer an evening worth of entertainment! It is a great opportunity to view local art--and meet the artists!

 Convenient parking is located across the street from the Tilsner at the Kellogg & Broadway lot (free during the Crawl). You can even catch a shuttle bus there to take you to different locations. Yes, the roads are a bit of a mess (due to light rail construction), but we have been assured that things will be somewhat put back together for the Crawl. But it is always a good bet to park at a convenient spot (like Kellogg and Broadway) and walk between buildings.

This is the best opportunity to see all of my work. Since I have been painting full-time the past 4 months, I have lots of new work to share! Come see what I've been up to!  And as always, I'll be offering my guests some tasty treats (including home-baked goodies)!

I hope to see you sometime during the Crawl!

(For more information, check out the Art Crawl website here!)

2 weeks!

view outside my studio window

Only two weeks until the Fall Art Crawl...which means I am working hard at the studio trying to finish some paintings. After working full-time on my painting for the past four months, I have lots of new work to share...but there is always more work to finish--including these--
 

Back to Trotter's Cafe...

Today we headed back to Trotter's Cafe to rearrange the exhibit of my artwork in the cafe. The September artist only wanted to hang her work in one room...so I got to keep some of my work up for a second month!

We took down all my work in the first room and then went to work changing things up in this second cozy room. I felt more relaxed about the whole thing, so I was able to snap some better pictures of the space.

Alongside one wall, there is a set of inset shelves--I put a few of my small paintings on the lowest shelf, along with my business cards and postcards.

We made some changes--mixing in some of the paintings that had been in the other room, changing how things were hung, and even adding a few different paintings. Here are some closer looks at my art.

Paintings from the Womanspirit series

The Four Seasons

Hope Garden

Offering Peace

I wanted things to look fresh for repeat visitors. I actually like the new look better. If you live in the Twin Cities area, please stop by and enjoy my art, along with a fantastic organic meal. (I enjoyed Tortilla Lucia today--a flour tortilla filled with scrambled eggs, black beans, and monterrey jack cheese, plus salsa--yummy!).

The show is up!

Hubby and I hung my artwork at Trotter's yesterday afternoon. As the pictures I'm about to post are about to show, I didn't get the best pics! We were too focused on getting the work done, the space was a little dark and it was hard to snap pics around the chair legs!

You see, we hung my paintings after the cafe had closed for the day...so staff were already focused on cleaning the space (and baking for the upcoming week)! I'll take better pics (hopefully) on another visit.

It took us two hours to hang everything...and I really felt we were rushing. One of the difficulties we encountered was pounding nails into brick or cement walls. But we knew this and came prepared! I brought far more paintings than I imagined I would need to fill up the space...but I hung everything but one painting! There was a lot of wall space! 

 Actually, when we were all done, I was grateful that we were able to hang the show ourselves (rather than the cafe staff).  It was a good learning experience and gave me the opportunity to hang my work somewhere other than my own studio or home. It's nice to see it all up.

 My hope for this little show is that more people will see my work...and that many of those people are folks that wouldn't necessarily come to one of my open studio events. I was able to leave my postcards and contact information for patrons of the cafe. Hopefully, some of these folks will decide to come to an Art Crawl. And maybe, just maybe, someone will be interested in buying one of my paintings!

So here's the show info (for those of you local)--

Trotter's is located at 232 N. Cleveland Ave, in St. Paul--on Cleveland, just off Marshall Ave. They serve yummy food--with a focus on food that is locally grown or produced. My artwork will be up for 4 weeks--till August 29th. Please check it out!

The river is rising...

Wednesday after the parade we took a walk along the Mississippi river to see how much the river is rising. Areas that are usually walkways are covered in water. Even though we're a considerable distance from the river, the historic building we live in is actually considered to be in the flood zone. There is talk about possible flooding in our basement. Our apartment is safe--we live on the 5th floor--but it will be interesting to see how much flooding there will be in the coming few days. I can watch the river as I type at my computer...

The picture below shows the level the water reached in the historic 1965 flood. (The water has risen considerably since that pic was taken on Wednesday, but we're still well below that mark) Thankfully, we're not expected to get anywhere near that, because that would be very bad. I'm hoping I can get back down to the river to snap another pic to show the progress of the rising river.

 

There are already preparations underway to deal with potential flooding. A load of sand was dumped in our parking lot for sandbagging today. Hopefully there won't be much need for sandbags!

Who doesn't love a parade?

It was a glorious St. Patrick's Day in St. Paul! A perfect day for a parade! I have just a wee bit of Irish in me, but that has nothing to do with why I took this day off to celebrate. I live just a few blocks from where this annual parade begins and it's always a fun day to be a St. Paulite! Even if you're not Irish, it's a fun day in the city. People are just having fun...

There are kids everywhere...well, kids of all ages in fun outfits!

Families and friends marching together in the parade...or watching from the street...

Men in skirts...

And men in skirts playing bagpipes (a lovely sound!)

Dogs are included...

and even an Irish Elvis!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

White Christmas

I couldn't resist posting these photos taken early this evening while Joel and I took a walk through our downtown area. Snow was starting to fall...it was a beautiful sight with all the lights. 

 

 

 

 

 

There's no doubt that this will be a White Christmas!