The New Studio

Down the hall from my clay studio is another room that has had a couple different identities since the building of this house in 1999.  For years it was an entertainment room, with couches, easy chairs and a big screen TV on the wall.  Jim and I rarely saw it during daylight hours, and in fact, the shades were always pulled on the window and the patio door.   Last year I convinced Jim to bring up the TV and create an all-purpose hang-out room of our living area, and turn the entertainment room into his photographic studio.  We  now spend a lot of time in the living room, and find it quite cozy!  However, the TV room-turned-photo-studio has a couch and some professional photo equipment and no one goes in there.  At least its inherent darkness would've been useful for its new intended purpose.

I have not sculpted for more than a year (there I said it), and for the first time in close to thirty years, I seriously feel that chapter may be closed in my life.  All of the equipment still stands and waits for me in my studio, it's tough to see it idle.  The last 50 lb. box of clay still  lays unopened on the floor.  And to be honest, my hands ache with the thought of those years of sanding I did, knuckles unable to bend with pain and stiffness at the end of each day.  Every gentle, little, sculpted face took many hours of hard, hard work to smooth to perfection between the bisque firing and the final firing, and the paint fumes left me dizzy after weeks of meticulous painting.  So sad to let my career go, but it's not the first time I've transitioned to another art form, and the painting, writing and illustrating I've been doing this last year or so have been like coming home again, as that's where I started so long ago.  

And just as I was struggling these last weeks with decisions regarding my studio, my sweet husband confesses his decision to avoid studio photography altogether.  His suggestion?  That I convert that old TV room space into a studio for my writing and painting.  Yeah, I know... PINCH ME!!  

It's amazing how beautiful the view of the garden and the bay is out the window when you fling the shades open!  I've ordered a drafting table that will arrive within a week or so.  The couch will have to go before that happens, but I've already starting sketching a series of transition pictures, the first I'll scan and post in the next couple days.  

We'll see what this new chapter in life brings!  Thank you all for helping me move through this change, I've gone from denial, to acceptance to celebration....   and I'm sure you all knew what was going on before I did.