Selling art work can be rewarding, exhilarating and kinda sad.  I paint for myself. Something strikes me as being better said in color and texture and I spend some time on it until my hand gives out. Mostly I work on a series of ideas and then stop for an extended period of time until there is another project that “needs doin’”.

I’ve been painting  for 20 years now. I sell anywhere from 6-12 works in a given year and give away half as many for silent auctions in the same time line. It always surprises me what people end up buying.  More often than not, people will skip right over what I think are my best work for something else. Something happened in the last week, two works that I feel are heart stopping good have found homes. I painted them both within a week of each other in 2004.  They have been in art galleries in 3 states and group and solo shows for five years. The last 8 months they have been spending what I now know were parting moments with me at home.  And this week, of all weeks, they are claimed.

One work will be used as the cover of a new book of poetry  titled A Walk in Victoria’s Secret by Vanderbilt professor Kate Daniels – it will be released in November of 2010 from LSU Press.

Envy by Nancy VanReece (c) 2004 Contemporary Expression, a div. of Carpe Diem Copyright Management. All Rights Reserved. Used By Permission.

Another spoke to a women as a way to, as she put it:   Serve as a reminder for this last year of “humbleness” They both are the only remaining parts of a series titled  “The Tao of St. Gregory”.

This work, “Envy” was significant to me because I learned that the act is not the same as jealousy.  Jealousy is the feeling you get when someone threatens what is yours. Envy resents the good others receive, or even might receive.

The hands in this painting are mine.  After my injury my right hand was jealous of my left.

I am so happy that these works have found a purpose. Both tell their story well.

I’ve worked on a couple of new projects in a fresh series but have been trying too hard. I had forgotten to just paint for myself. It’s time to paint.

Next Art Show: Crema Nashville, TN June 26- August 28, 2010

What stories are you telling?

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What would your paper home-flag have on it?
What is home to you?

Here are some more videos from Celebration of Cultures for your Enjoyment:

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I have been overwhelmed by the amount of “stuff” I need to be doing, want to be doing, or think I should be doing. I have a pretty good routine but them I get bored and get off the routine and chase nothing for a while.

Lalla Essaydi – Converging Territories #10, 2005
Chromogenic print, 48 x 60 in.
Courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

The Frist Center for the Visual Arts opened in the Gordon Contemporary Artist Project Gallery and exhibition of 17 photographs by Moroccan artist, Lalla Essaydi. The images will be on view through January 29, 2009. The multi-layer complex images are created in what she calls workshops. Essaydi gathers with as many as 20 women and girls in her family’s country home where they sit for lengthy sessions during which the artist covers their skin and often their clothing and the walls around them , with an elegant Arabic calligraphic scripts.

The act of combining the female craft of henna body painting and the traditional male art of Arabic calligraphy is a subversive act. By doing so , she ignores long-standing gender associations of both art forms and the hierarchical distinctions between them. Be sure to pick up a copy of overview of this work by Trinita Kennedy, associate curator during your visit.

January 8, 2009 6 :30pm LECTURE: “Unspoken Words: Contemporary women Artists from the Middle East and North Africa”

FREE in the Frist Auditorium

Dr, Maryam Ekhtiar, senior research associate in the department of Islamic art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, will explore art produced by women from the region with a particular focus on Lalla Essaydi. All the artist use calligraphy as their chief mode of expression as the grapple with issues of gender, socio-political orientation and cultural identity.

Lalla Essaydi – Les Femmes du Maroc #36, 2007
Chromogenic print, 48 x 60 in. Courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

As I prepare for what I consider to be a new phase in my own artful life I have been drawn back to Lalla’s photographs now on a third visit to the Gordon Contemporary Gallery at The Frist. The thoughtfulness of her work is intense. 2009 in my studio will brings a new chapter of symbols, history and advocacy. I hope you can find the time to visit this show and find a way to create your own subversive act of hope and art in the new year.

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