Set for the trip: Synthetic Landscape in my studio on Sunday afternoon.
On Monday, Olivia and I drove to and from the Orange County Center for Contemporary Art, delivering Synthetic Landscape for the upcoming Global Warming: Artists Speak show.
A 742-mile round trip. Left at 8am (was planning on borrowing my in-laws’ van, but the painting was three inches too long, so we had to hustle to Enterprise to rent a cargo van, which worked brilliantly, but we departed two hours later than planned) and returned to Tempe at 9pm. It was a haul.
(Yes, I am fully aware of the irony of driving a van — which gets 15 mpg on highways and consumed approximately 50 gallons of gas during the round trip — to a show about global warming. There and back, the van emitted about 1,000 lbs. of CO2 emissions. I hope it was worth it.)
But I must say that the people at OCCCA are supernice. Had a pleasant chat with Laura Hines-Jurgens, the curator of Global Warming, and Barbara Thompson, director of exhibitions. Very enthusiastic and cool people. I’m really glad to be a part of the show.
Things have been a bit overly hectic lately, with freelance writing work (a good thing) and fixing up Synthetic Landscape (not such a good thing). I devoted Saturday to repainting parts of Synthetic Landscape that I was never happy with. The uneven sheen in some of the paints I used (despite matte medium), especially in the “Chevron mountains” part, had been irritating me for about three years. So I repainted the dark blue stripe, the green grass, the orange in the Gulf logo, and the light blue sky. In all the colors are much more intense, and I’m really happy about that.
OCCCA is spacious and historic gallery (was once an auto showroom, going back to the 1930s). I found downtown Santa Ana quite charming, as well. I recommend the completely restorative peach and banana smoothie at The Gypsy Den.
You will find Synthetic Landscape featured on the homepage of both OCCCA and the Santa Ana Arts District’s site (santaanaartsdistrict.com).
Global Warming: Artists Speak will open at the Orange County Center for Contemporary Art this Saturday (September 1) at 6:30pm. More details at occca.org. Sadly, though, I won’t be attending the opening. The show runs through Saturday, September 29.
Until next time, I wish you happiness and the causes of happiness,
