New Faux Painting Work

Here's pix from another faux finish/ decorative painting job I'm working on right now for a restaurant in downtown San Diego.



The design is to reference a traditional almost Victorian style and feel, monogrammed of course with most significant initial (in this case, "D"). You can the pattern more clearly in this picture of the sample:



This finish is done in acrylic glazes and original stencils on fresh sheetrock walls in the restaurant office. We will utilize the same finish in the main bar area -- with a twist, of course. More photos coming as project develops.

Circus mural begins...

... and I already like it!!

Check out pix from first day of work:

Custom Painting for New Orleans

This is a small painting I made this spring for the College Students for New Orleans, a group of San Diego State Students who fundraise to support themselves on trips to New Orleans where they volunteer in various venues to assist in the rebuilding of New Orleans.


French Quarter by John Hiemstra 16" x 28" acrylic on board.

The lovely framing was donated by The Frame Maker and the painting was presented June 7 along with 20 or so other works by other artists (including one of my wife Heather's gorgeous sterling peace sign pendants)in a silent auction at a fun evening of jazz and wine atop the Imperial Tower building in Banker's Hill. Heather and I are very proud that together our donations raised $1000 to help get something good get done in New Orleans.

Many thanks to our friend Hoa Quoch, who organized this event, for including us and for doing good works for others in need.

Current Paint & Design Projects, plus other distractions

My trustworthy compatriots at Chism Brothers Painting started the base painting over at my circus mural project in Point Loma today, and I am excited to move forward on that project.

I've finalized the full size samples.



I also updated the design sketch for "inside the big top" scene "revealed" in trompe l'oeil on central wall of the room after discussion with both the client and the designer.



At the same time, I've also just started on two other hospitality projects. The first is in downtown San Diego with my friend and comrade, Diane Roberts. I'm also doing some design & mural work for the new cafe around the corner from our new house here in Banker's Hill San Diego, so I am blessed with a bountiful early summer after a harsh winter.

I will be putting up new posts and pictures about all of this stuff and more (like the family photos here sometime, though you can always find me on Facebook and see what I post there.

Finally, about the newsletter: in the scramble of moving, business shifting, new baby arriving, for the last year, there hasn't been a newsletter.

My apologies to everyone who signed up and expected something.

I do appreciate your interest and support and will start tying everything together now that I finally know what's coming next, and there's a lot of it, so stay with me as I get caught up and connect my new set of dots.

Still painting: Circus theme mural

I felt I should add that despite recent evolution of business model and interests and economic conditions, I am still painting, too.

Right now, I'm working on one of the most beautiful homes of my portfolio in Point Loma, creating a trompe l'oeil style circus theme mural for a children's room. The house is a Frank Hope 1930's mediterranean fantasy with many original appointments and a stunning view of San Diego Bay.

This is the fourth part of the house I've contributed to since 2006, and its very rewarding to "return to the scene" of some of my best professional faux painting/ trompe l'oeil painting work.

Here are a couple of the concept sketches for the circus mural, drawn at 3/4" - 1'0" scale.

Mark Jenkins Street Installations

I like this a lot. discovered randomly 5.15.2008, referred without permission, appropriately enough. Check out Mark Jenkins Street Installations.

HD Expo 2008 in Las Vegas

So many thoughts in Vegas, perhaps the purest expression of capitalism in this hemisphere, after a full day of digging the Hospitality Design Expo and all of the fascinating products, services and businesses represented here.

Fascinating is relative, of course, but if you are a design/interior/space creation kind of person who also likes to travel for its own sake and its own rewards (as opposed to travel purely for business), the HD Expo is a robust and rewarding experience.

Of course, I am here on business, on behalf of The Frame Maker, a custom picture framing company in San Diego.

Anyone who has known me a long time is probably saying "What the f#$% is he doing still framing pictures?", and I have asked myself the same question, even though the owner of The Frame Maker, Steve Atlas, has been a client of mine since 2005.

Because I first started framing pictures in 1990, I understand Steve's business petty well through, and its been easy to fit in project to project as framer, designer, project manager, and marketing consultant. Steve and I have many shared interests beyond picture framing, and it has been pleasant and satisfying to work with him.

Before I launch into my thoughts on Vegas and capitalism, a little more context: The Frame Maker handles a variety of contract framing projects, meaning large volume, same size or similar of finished, framed artwork. Typically, our clients are art consultants, art dealers, art brokers and art galleries when it comes to these kind of jobs, and everyone of these art professionals that brings in a lot of work to The Frame Maker has had a solid relationship with Steve for over 20 years.

I am here exploring future possibilities for how The Frame Maker addresses these jobs, especially when the numbers suddenly jump from 300-400 to 2000-3000 pieces in a single job, and then drop off again a short while later.

The Frame Maker is just a 10,000 square foot shop, so space is always an issue when the jobs get really big.

But my issue has always been about the hourly guys (and girls) in the shop, who hire on for the crush and then get laid off when it slows down-- having been there myself, I am hell-bent on finding a way to even this out in Steve's business, which has a solid crew of four. Since 2005, with my help, we have knocked out several contract orders totaling thousands of frames, on time with a less-than 1% return rate.

The cliche goes that good help is hard to find, and the manager in me couldn't agree more. Thats why when you have someone good, and someone you've invested any training in that has stuck, they should stop being expendable, and their added productivity channeled into growth of the business.

Now we're getting to the good stuff about Vegas, because one of the best bets in any casino is the odds bet on the craps table, which you can raise as you go. The metaphorical beauty of gambling is that you strip out the product, the people, and the lifestyle (of being in business), leaving the financial transaction almost naked before the existential verification of "win" or denunciation of "lose".

Instead of driving home from the office at the end of a bad week, paycheck in hand but spirits demoralized, you trudge out of the casino with empty pockets and a head full of "should have....." and "if only...." when you lose.

Period.

No Monday morning, no Christmas bonus.

No cage, but no stability either.

Winning, of course, is brilliant, but so is a successful business deal or a series of good sales or a run of good ideas, for that matter.

And since none of those things go on indefinitely, the question could be raised as to how valuable stability is anyway?

The ideal of living or business be to sustain brilliance, or something like it, in building a business or making your fortune on the craps table or making the kind of complete business presentation that the companies here at HD Expo are doing, bringing their whole "show" on the"road" to present to industry peers and potential clients, where one introduction could be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars (or more) down the road.

Given that some of these booths alone cost hundreds of thousands of dollars (or more-- and I know from my past life working with Scenery West), it seems more than fitting that this show is here in Vegas, where that is still a pretty big bet. (for more specifics about the HD Expo, check out The Frame Maker Design blog at www.theframemaker.com)

HD Expo 2008 in Las Vegas

I'm sitting in the Ventian Grand Canal typing this after attending the "Green Day" section of the Hospitality Design Expo in Las Vegas this weekend. The actual show starts tomorrow, and I will be adding to this after I check out a few things tomorrow. If you'd like to know why I'm here and what "Green Day" is, check out the posts I'm making for The Frame Maker on the Design blog.

Where have I been?

Yes its been several months since last post and though it looks that way on this particular blog I didn;'t fall off the face of the earth.

In fact I've been busier than ever with kids and the marketing of my art (and others') though I confess to not making much new art.

That said, here are a couple of links to fill you in quick.

My main client of 2008 has been The Frame Maker, the best custom picture framing shop here in San Diego. Some of you may know I've been in (and out) of the framing business for almost 20 years now (ouch!) but this year I've been marketing consultant and web designer with very positive results.

The Frame Maker's site was beyond lost to searchers at the beginning of the year and by April could be found on the first page of Google for a number of working searches like "custom framing San Diego" and "museum quality framing San Diego".

In addition to developing the content and look from scratch (hand coded with just a little help from my PHP expert and ally Brian O'Leary, I'm writing a series of simple blogs that provide a lot of useful content to potential clients looking for our kind of services as well as a lot of useful content to search engines wanting to know if The Frame Maker site is any good to anybody.

Clearly its working, with a number of recent clients with cool custom framing projects informing us that they found us and/or chose to use us because of our presence near the top of Google searches and the info/message on the site.

Next stop: social media for the Frame Maker, which I've been exploring as marketing for my fine art painting. Check out the sweet little slideshow of my work below, courtesy of Art Review, a new site specifically for and about artist with a boat load of fascinating content, if you're into art.

Please visit me on Art Review at http://www.artreview.com/profile/JohnHiemstra and also on Facebook at www.facebook/JohnHiemstra.

I don't do MySpace anymore because I think Rupert Murdoch and his evil henchmen have way too much influence in dumbing down the world, and MySpace's spam problem reflects exactly that. If you don't know Facebook yet, I *highly* recommend it.

Stay tuned, more good stuff coming.

Find more images like this on artreview.com