Collections 4: Architecture, Airplanes and Insight

Looking around my studio lately, I've noticed that we have three of a lot of things. Possibly because we'd half-heartedly start a collection, then get distracted and just abandon it at three. Or, in the case of the following two sets of items, we'd come to our senses quickly and realize that collections of large items would consume far too much space.

First, today, we have three architectural structures: a log cabin, a two-car  garage, and a church made of matchsticks.

 I would classify all of these as primitives. I purchased the log cabin at the Jazz Fest in New Orleans back in the 80s when we were there participating in a craft fair. I've forgotten who the artisan was, but at the time the person was apparently well known around those parts for making these log cabins.

We found the home made two-car garage in a garage sale, and we just liked the primitive quality of it.

The church, made entirely from matchsticks glued together, was sold to us at a  house sale by someone who said that it was an example of prison art. While it is true that this was a craft popular in prisons for a while,  it was also a technique used in some tramp art. Making matchstick structures may have also been a popular Boy Scout activity at one time. Regardless of it's origin, it is just impressive that someone would have the patience and time to make this sort of thing.

All three of these were housed, as it were, in my family room for years. But when we downsized, we had to move them to the studio, and after I do a little conservation work on some of them, they will be off to the mall and hopefully to new homes.

As we move into the next room and look upwards, we see the next collection of three. Airplanes (and a fugitive windsock from the California Raisins series) hanging from the ceiling in the center of our studio. I do not actually remember when or why we acquired these bi-planes, or where they came from. We hung one up, and each was added in turn as we happened on them.

The crowning touch to this collection came one day when, in a moment of pure inspiration, we added the two wooden mannequins to one of the planes, and it instantly transitioned from being a random collection to becoming a commentary expressing exactly how we feel about our crazy precarious lives as artists and collectors...

 

...always just barely hanging on for dear life.

Collections 3: Accidental Frogs and Stars

Looking around the studio the other day, I noticed that we have several totally unintentional or accidental small collections. How do they happen?

These metal flower frogs and many others have been around for a while. Although they were actually intended to be a collection, I was never sure how or where I was going to display them. At some point in their life, these four leapt into this perfect little found wooden box and became a tiny collection all on their own. Still, I had never hung them because I couldn't find just the right place for them.

We  just recently acquired the three metal stars. We found two at a house sale a few weeks ago and didn't give too much thought to them at all, planning to sell them right away at the mall. Serendipitously, we happened across another one at a mall a few days later. If we did not already have the two, we would have just passed it up, I'm sure, but, apparently, they occupied a little space in our minds, causing us to zero right in on the third. It was priced so low that we could not resist it. Once you have three, I think you already have a collection. So up they went on the side of one of the studio bookshelves.

 Last week I came across the metal flower frogs again and something about them, either the fact that they were metal or their industrial quality, or maybe both, just told me they would be right at home with the stars. And there they will remain for the time being, complementing each other.

I have a feeling that this could be the beginning of an collection of small industrial metal items.

Collections 2: Naive Pet Paintings

Some of you may have already read this one when I posted it elsewhere, but I think it really belongs in the collections series, too. Enjoy!

On one wall in my studio there are four naive pet paintings. Paintings painted by amateurs who loved their pets enough to want to immortalize them in pet portraits.

The first I found  at a garage sale — a little black and white cat sitting on a pink pillow against a purple background with orange flowers. Although it is not a very good painting, I think I bought it because I could see that it was done with love, and I just didn't want it to end up in the trash.

The second is another of a striped cat  lying on a quilt, found in a thrift store. After all, I already had one pet portrait, and I needed to add to my new collection.

The third one, also from a thrift store, was purchased sometime in 2007. It's a scary little dog, but there there is an amazing story attached to this painting.

In January of 2008 a woman bookbinder from Ireland, who found my book clasp site on the web through a Google search, contacted me and wanted to come by my studio to look at the book clasps, and the set up and talk. She was in Chicago visiting family. Her brother in Chicago drove her to my studio, and came in and with her. He was a little odd and kind of edgy.

As I was showing her around he started to get agitated and she asked him what was wrong. He had noticed the painting and was nearly freaking out. I was a little afraid he was going to have a psychotic break or something. However, It turned out that he was the artist who had painted this portrait as a commission for one of his neighbors. He was shocked to see the picture in my studio out of it's original context, especially since I was a complete stranger to him, and we were located far from their neighborhood. I was also absolutely stunned by the coincidence. In fact, I didn't  even believe him until I looked on the back of the painting and there was his signature. I took a photo to document the event.

A very strange circumstance indeed. I can't imagine the probability against such a convergence of circumstances.

I nearly died laughing when I found the last painting, acquired just this year, at another thrift store. It is my very favorite, though. These two dancing chihuahuas must have been much loved, and you can see that they loved each other as well. I give you, Missie and Samba, immortalized by Lula M. Galbraith, Jefferson City, TN., 1983.

I just love these guys! How can I ever stop looking for these paintings and adopting them? Or are they looking for me?