Website Launch and New Collectors Photos for a Year

The NEW website!

Delicious New French Cafe

New Room Painting in Progress

I'm not-so hard at work on a new painting

                                                  from a magazine image of a nice little room
                                                         with a big comfy chair and a desk.

Here Come the New Ceramics!

Cases of ceramics with photo labels

Boxes of ceramic items in transit



I'm spending the weekend working on new items for the holidays and FINALLY adding new items to my ceramics shop on Etsy: allisonsceramics.etsy.com It has taken me forever because my work was in storage in my dad's basement for the last 5 years and I had no place to house it in my own house, but that's all changed!

Today I will start posting them to my Etsy shop and next Friday they will be for sale at the University City Arts League Holiday Craft Sale along with my photography, cards and wall hangings. The UCAL Holiday Craft Sale runs through December 23 and has wonderful handmade art work from their many students and professional artists. a portion of the proceeds benefit the Arts League in their providing visual and performing arts classes in West Philadelphia.

Upcoming Show: Space Planning

I'm currently showing work at Wellpoint Oriental Medicine in Fairmount in Philadelphia (2014 Fairmount Ave.) in an evolving show over the month. I had to move some work in to keep the walls from being empty as another artist moved out, but I only had the work sitting around my house to put up on short notice.

Starting next month, date TBA, I'll hang work in the waiting area, hallway and a second room that doors treatment doors open up to face. The space appealed to me because the eastern medicine, acupuncture and massage connects well with my nature photography and environmental conservation interest. It led me to start thinking about Feng Shui when I was hanging the nine pieces currently in the waiting room (the flowing water photo should flow into the building, not send energy out).

I wish I had more training in wall placement and creative show hanging. It's always a struggle to hang shows myself and feel like I did something to make the work more dynamic and not just static dots on the wall. Anyone teach a class in show hanging?

Come check out the results as they change from what I already hung in the space to the new pieces that go up in early November!

Etsy For My Fantasy Home

Someday when I own a home I can decorate it anyway I like and if I had a limitless amount of money or alot of time to build it myself, it might look somethig like this:

Etsy-Tastic Spring Items!

LOVE GIVEAWAY on CHIC & PINK BLOG

Don't miss the giveaway on Chic & Pink's blog of LOVE items: an 8 x 10 Photograph, a 5 x 7 card and a chunky LOVE magnet! Follow the link http://chicnpink.blogspot.com/2010/02/etsy-extravaganza-giveaway-day-3_10.html

and leave a commnet on her site about your favorite etsy item of mine! You can also win a 10oz Sugar Shaker Pure Soy Candle in the scent of your choice from Flower Child 417!

Thanks Chic & Pink for the feature!

New Painting!

Here's my newest painting! It's another scene I photographed at the Woodford house in Fairmount Park, here in Philly. I have to tour these other houses.

New Year, New Fabulous Cookbook!

For the last couple of years I've treated myself to a new cookbook every year and this year I'm so excited by "My New Orleans" by John Besh. It's a huge beautiful coffeetable book with fantasticphotographs, but what impresses me the most is his mission to save the rituals, incomperable local ingredients, and what makes New Orleans different from getting muddied by post-Katrina influx and disorganization. With sections on celebrations like the Feast of St. Joseph and Revillion, features on strawberries (from the North Shore strawberry festivals), creole tomatoes, figs, seafood and odd items like mirlitons you'll find out alot about New Orleans you didn't even know. The writing is beautiful. Besh grew up in Slidell, LA and trained in restaurants there and in Europe, fought in Desert Storm and returned to the area to settle with his family where he runs several restaurants, so the stories are personal and the photos feature family and people he knows from the city.

I was most impressed with the section on the Vietnamese community and the new Urban Farm Besh is supporting, a 28 acre farm being developed by the community to allow locals to farm, hold a market and sell to local restaurants. Besh also raises his own hogs and cattle in town for use in his recipes. His comittment to local food is a huge asset to rebuilding a sustainable local economy that benefits the residents of New Orleans.

Last year I picked up these two cookbooks at the Big Blue Marble bookstore next to Weaver's Way co-op in Mt. Airy

Paintings In the Works

Here's one of the new paintings I managed to get done over the holidays.



And here is the photo I took at the Woodford House in Fairmount Park that I used as a reference image.



Here's another painting when I was first laying out the shapes and the reference image I pulled from a magazine hanging from my bookshelf.



Here's the same painting almost done (no flooring).



Here's the finished one. I'm really excited to finally be working on these again after being away from them for longer than I can remember. I posted both of these on etsy and I'm going to try and get some small 5 x 7" paintings done before going back to work on Monday!

Black and Blue Branches Print in the Works!

I'm headed to Silicon Gallery on Tuesday to check out the first proof of one of my paintings, the Black and Blue Branches painting in my etsy shop, http://www.allisonspaintings.etsy.com/.

I'm so excited! I had a customer purchase the print and another painting last week and I get to go pick out the finish and paper. I know it's going to be beautiful. Silicon does the scanning and burns cd's and then prints the image. The scans are really high resolution and you can see every fiber of the original.

Painting in Progress on Native Plants

I placed an order with Yellow Springs Nursery and I was so excited to see the plants I bought and to plan my garden at West Philly High School, I decided to make a painting of the plants we selected. The sketches came from looking at my garden in Spring Gardens and the Wildflower Guide helped me with the rest of them. I should be done by the end of the week!

The plants arrived today and we planted them in the beds!