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

American Art Festival San Diego

Its been a long month since last post, much of it preparing for the American Art Festival show we are at right now (I'm writing this courtesy of my new wireless broadband card). Here is a pic of Heather (with Logan in sling) at our booth with my fine art paintings on the walls and Heather's hand forged jewelry displayed in cases att the front.


Thanks to everyone here (so far) for their enthusiasm for these paintings. I showed the first of this series in April at Artwalk in Little Italy and have developed eight new paintings since, six of which are on display in the photo above.

Chalk Video & SDFS Update

I got another great email last week after this year's chalk painting event in Little Italy.

Hi John, I was at the festival last Sunday with a couple of friends and enjoyed watching you paint. I took pictures that day and later thought I'd create a quick movie as a thank you for my friends who took me. Since this wasn't planned, I didn't get any contact info on any of the artists that day. You are the only artist I know how to contact because of the t-shirt you were wearing for sdfinishingschool.com. You are very talented and I enjoyed your art and your websites very much. Since you are in the video I made, I thought you might enjoy seeing it. I wish you every success and hope to see you and your work again some day. Sincerely, Terry Whitley

Check out Terry's really cool video of us all chalk painting at the 2007 Gesso Italiano in San Diego's Little Italy. Thanks, Terry! I always greatly appreciate documentation of me working and I'm sure all of my chalk street painting fans will appreciate it, too.

On another front, I am disappointed to write that the SDFS 2007-2008 school year has been pushed entirely into the 2008 calendar year, despite the certainty of my last set of posts. I confess to having underestimated how much time I would have open for SDFS after Logan's arrival in September coupled with an unexpected surge in service demand the last two months, all while preparing for my presentation with Heather at next month's American Arts Festival at the San Diego Convention Center. Its the first time we've shown together even though we just celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary last week. Of course I've been also doing my usual October events in Little Italy and here in Sherman Heights at next weekend's Dia de los Muertos. My apologies to everyone waiting for more info and who thought they had a set schedule for workshops. I need more time to organize my materials and finish up details on both the SDFS site and the various videos of this year's projects, not to mention update my portfolio site as well. Please stay tuned to these posts for developments as they happen and a special offer from Heather for your upcoming holiday shopping. As always, thanks for your support!

Starry Night chalk painting in Little Italy

I had a blast today doing my sixth year of chalk in San Diego's Little Italy for the annual Festa. Thanks to everyone who came out today and shared their thoughts and complements about this painting. Here's the first few photos, I'm going to bed.





Especially thanks to everyone who took pictures of me working for me, I'll be doing a larger presentation using all of your work soon!

Here's a pic of my 2006 piece displayed today:



I will be sure to post when this piece gets installed!

Logan is here! and other events this fall

The biggest news of all this year is the birth of our daughter Logan Annelise on September 18, 2007. Logan was 20" and 7lbs 10oz when she arrived at 7.58 pm.

My amazing wife Heather labored for two hours as the sun set outside our home and Logan was born by candle light in the water, just after dark under the guidance of our awesome midwives Jamin and LaShel.



Anyone keeping score may remember that Hunter's birthday was two days later, here's a cute picture of us



Oh yeah, work stuff:

I will be finally ready to open registration for the new season at the San Diego Finishing School-- the form should be live this Saturday morning October 13, 2007. The limited spots are available first to SDFS newsletter subscribers, so if interested, click here to sign up for that newsletter and priority registration opportunities in the future.

I will be around Little Italy all weekend to talk about the School and chalk on the street at Beech and India as part of Gesso Italiano and the Precious Festa October 13 and 14, 2007.

I will be doing a Day of the Dead altar in Sherman Heights at the end of the month and will be posting exact details next week.

Heather and i are also doing the American Art Festival at the wonderfully convenient San Diego Convention Center Thanksgiving weekend Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I will have more new paintings from the cloud series I showed at Artwalk in Little Italy in the spring (see earlier post), including a large series of small paintings instead of the other way around.

Heather will have much of her custom jewellery there as well as a selection of her popular peace sign and wishbone pendants, both of which make great gifts!

More details, preview of new paintings, and all that new portfolio stuff coming as promised, as soon as I can.