Workshop

I got lost on the way to the workshop this morning, I went to the Capitol Building instead of City Hall. The lobby of the Capitol Building was awesome, all marble with offices in ivory and dark wood. I was 15 minutes late, which means I did not pay attention to where I parked and it took me 1/2 an hour to find my car and cost me an extra hour of parking by a few minutes.

This morning was an hour on pricing, insurance, overhead, and that kind of stuff. I learned about CERF, Craft Emergency Relief Fund, and the Studio Protector (the artist's guide to emergencies, http://www.studioprotector.org/) Then I waited around for my 10 minute consultation. While I waited I talked to another guy there about websites and another one about crating and shipping. The girl I met yesterday was there waiting, too. She works part time at St. Luke's and the job comes with health insurance. She just got another woman a job there and will look in to getting me one.

At my consultation I explained what I wanted to do and showed some samples and asked how I could get to my market. He had some good suggestions, but his best suggestion was to include a set of cards with each commission piece, with the painting on the card. They would not cost much and make the customer feel like they are getting more, plus they have something to show off to their friends that can't come over and see the painting, plus I get more advertising directed at my market. It was a brilliant idea and I think I might try a sample printing with the piece I did for Marsha (the boy sleeping among red sheets) and send them to her.

I forgot that yesterday the speaker talked about artist's Mad Syndrome, and I really related. I don't think Mad stands for anything, as in MAD, but it is when artists thinking about what they should create fly all over the place, as in I think I will do a watercolor of a cat, no a dog, no a horse, no maybe I will do it in oils, oh look at that solar print, that's NICE, I should try solar prints, I will sign up for a class, oh look at those great new watercolor colors, I think I will try that new purple, oh wait look at that blue, maybe I should work smaller, no bigger, look at that plant, it needs watering, while I'm at it I think I will have a peanut butter sandwich, now what should I work on again? I do that all the time!

After the workshop and finding my car, I went home and ate, priced my stuff for the Eagle gallery and drove it over so it will be there for First Friday. She has too much stuff and a bad printing of my flier. I will bring her a better flier tomorrow, but I hope she sells some artwork because right now it is too crowded and work is hard to see. She made me nervous, a gallery owner should be able to print a nice flier and display art so it will sell. I think she might have her own version of Mad Syndrome.

Then I went to Fast Frame and got the bigger painting of Hazel framed. I learned about reverse bevel mats, which I had never heard of before. This is when they bevel the mat to the inside, so no white edge shows. This was hard to do in the old days, but now the computer cuts the mat and it is as easy as a regular bevel. Now there are 4 kinds of glass you can chose and 4 kinds of Plexiglas, regular, UV protected, non-glare, and museum. Choosing framing always takes me a long time and now it is even worse! The framer was really patient. I picked out mat and frame for another piece, although I did not order it yet, so at least next time I will know what I want.

Now I am super tired.

Dad asked if I could look for some information about companies leaving California, since we heard about a few just before I left but then did not hear anther word about it. Here are two links:

http://nevadanewsandviews.com/2010/08/25/companies-fleeing-california-for-utah-over-confiscatory-tax-rate/
http://www.independentamerican.org/2010/04/22/companies-leaving-californiasome-to-nevada/

This list is from the first site:
Abraxis Health, Adobe Systems, Inc. Alza Corp., American AVK, American Racing, Apple Computer Audix Corporation, Apria Healthcare Group, Assurant Inc., Barefoot Motors Bazz Houston Co., Beckman Coulter, Bild Industries Inc., Bill Miller Engineering, Ltd. BMC Select , BPI Labs, Buck Knives, CalPortland Cement California Casualty Group, CalStar Products Inc., Checks To-Go, Chivaroli & Associates CoreSite, A Carlyle Company, Creel Printing , Dassault Falcon DaVita Inc. , Denny’s Corp., Digital Domain, Ditech DuPont Fabros Technology, ebay, Inc., EDMO Distributors, Inc. Edwards Lifesciences, Electronic Arts, Inc., EMRISE Corp., Facebook FallLine Corporation, Fidelity National Financial, First American Corp., Fluor Corp. Foxconn Electronics, Fuel System Solutions, Gregg Industries, Hewlett-Packard Hilton Hotels Corp., Hino Motor Manufacturing USA, Intel Corporation, Intuit of Mountain View J.C. Penney , Kimmie Candy Co., Klaussner Home Furnishings, Knight Protective Industries Kulicke & Soffa Industries Inc., LCF Enterprises, Lennox Hearth Products Inc., Lyn-Tron, Inc. Mariah Power, Maxwell America, Miasolé, MotorVac Technologies Nissan North America, Northrop Grumman, One2Believe, Patmont Motor Werks, Inc. Paragon Relocation Resources, Pixel Magic, Plastic Model Engineering, Inc. Precor, Premier Inc., Pro Cal of South Gate, Race Track Chaplaincy of Amer., Red Truck Fire & Safety Co. SAIC, Scale Computing, Schott Solar Inc., SimpleTech Smiley Industries, Solaicx, SolarWorld, Special Devices Inc. StarKist , Stasis Engineering, Stata Corp., Tapmatic Teledesic, Telmar Network Technology Inc., Terremark, Terumo Cardiovascular Systems Toyota, True Games Interactive Inc., TTM Technologies, Understand.com, USAA Insurance, Yahoo.

The second site gives more details, but was posted last April.

That is a long list, although only a few went to Idaho.