Pre Show Jitters

Well, I guess I am finally ready. We packed up the art last night; 84 pieces to be exact valued at $15,840. It seems like a decent amount but I wish I had more. It is so hard to know how much to carry and display, this is one of those things artists never talk about. It has been my experience that artists in general are kind of a cagey bunch; like they feel if they share any information it will somehow detract from their own position. Artists who have been doing the Art Fair circuit for years and years especially, hold back information and don't seem interested in meaningful discussions with "newbies." We generally do everything we can to appear seasoned and try to act like we know what we are doing. And we do fine most of the time except for that incident at Brookside where we dollied in on a luggage carrier, one of those $15 things from K-mart that we bought because we didn't have room to fit a real dolly in the truck. Oh yeesh did I look like a dork when all the other artists had these enormous industrial strength dollies and I could only carry about 80 pounds on my little collapsible luggage thingie. Luckily we recently upgraded to a camper shell on the truck which vastly expands our cargo space so we can now carry a real dolly too.

But I have found only a few truly open people and I just love it when that happens. My friend Rhonda, for instance, is a show veteran of 25 years and we have become very close and openly share tips with one another, often talking a couple times a week, planning strategies, etc. We will try for some of the same shows next year; we seem to feed off each other's energy which is really nice if you can get into a groove with someone like that. Plus I love her art and own a piece myself . Rhonda has had a hugely successful year and carried about $40,000 inventory to her biggest show. Just hearing that sort of number makes me break out into hives and my inventory sounds so small in comparison. But I do believe it will be perfect for this show. I am simply in that pre-show mode where I am second guessing myself and it's time for John to hit me in the head with a ball bat or something. I will truly need more for Kansas City though; from what I have heard, this amount will not be adequate.

Which is why I have 16 prepared canvasses that are ready to be worked upon my return. Plus I have scanned some of my new photos and will carry the images with me so that I can consider their meaning and hopefully write some captions during the show. At the last minute (meaning about 4 pm yesterday) I suddenly decided I didn't want to make the 54 mile drive back and forth all weekend so I booked a room at the Hampton Inn. It will make life much easier on us as the show ends tonite at 10pm and opens tomorrow at 10am so being just a few miles away will allow for a more leisurely experience. Plus John can shuttle back and forth to the room if he wants.

The only downside is this cat situation. I had a talk with each cat individually yesterday, did this loving supportive little "I don't know if you're the one, but we still love you" talk (while John was laughing his ass off in the background) then I sprayed a bunch of orange citrus spray on the rug cause cats hate oranges. And we had a poop-free morning, hooray! But now I am nervous about us leaving for a couple days.