An Empty Calendar Is Death, After All

Since the beginning of this past fall, I’ve had a great pleasure of becoming a teaching artist at The Cleveland Museum of Art, and more specifically, am a part of their Art & Insight program which partners with organizations to bring in medical professionals and medical students to take part in exercises using the art collection. European portraiture is my thing of course, but it’s been a great way to do a crash art history lesson on all the pieces in the museum. And trust me — that’s a lot! It will be years before I am fluent in all of them, but I’ll get there when I get there.

I’ve been busy starting my new body of work that was made possible by The Ohio Arts Council. The show will have an opening reception in November at 78th Street Studios as part of the Hedge Gallery new satellite space, which is also next to one of my favorite record shops, Bent Crayon!

This will be very different work for me and it’s the first time I’ll be having a dedicated show of the new direction I’ve been going in. I read a horoscope a few months back saying that for me, as a Gemini, unveiling a new creative direction in public in June was the worst time to do so and it would not be well received. I normally don’t put much stock into horoscopes — let alone the Astro Twins — but the description was a little too on the mark and specific with my situation as I was negotiating a gallery space. I’m glad the show got moved to the late fall!

There are a few other exhibitions I am having in May and in June, but I suggest you visit my website and join my email list to get all the details.

This month I also found out that my husband will be having heart surgery in early June at Cleveland Clinic. Man, no matter what I can’t seem to get away from that place, can I? It was a shock to both of us, and the doctors, that he even needed something so invasive given how healthy he is and is in zero pain. It’s my turn to play nursemaid now, and you better believe I’ll be on the scene with those nurses! He has seen me go through this now — what, 6 times? But he isn’t like me. Frankly, he isn’t taking it well. I’m currently making a list of all the food I’ll be ordering for him at main campus because there’s now way he’s going to eat the crap they serve as hospital food. He has to take a month off work and won’t be able to drive, so I guess I need to come up with a lot of activities and road trip ideas so he doesn’t go crazy. If you didn’t know already, he is a runner, so this will be extra hard.

We also have some news coming in this summer on the Elephant Stone Records front, lots of visitors, a trip to NYC for my husband’s book event there with Jack Rabid, and that’s not including a few secret projects, my other freelance jobs, and so forth. I’ve had to put a pause on portrait commissions until 2017. Did I also mention I might have another surgery on my leg this year?

I’m normally pretty together, so if you have been experiencing severe delays in email replies and phone calls, this is why. But it’s okay. For me, to look at my calendar and see it be empty is like death. I can’t stand an empty calendar!