I am not a post-studio artist, but for a long time, I was a pre-studio artist with a mind’s eye for a canvas.
Now, I have an actual studio. It is a real space with high ceilings and tall windows. It’s peaceful. I work to music. I like this Philadelphia neighborhood. You just don’t hear gas-powered leaf blowers here. People come and go to the gun range across the street (and sure, its sounds do softly pepper the soundtrack of whatever music I have on, but I already lean into surrealism) - or to the soccer league court behind the buildings. Kids ride bikes. A cat weaves in and out of the open bay of the van repair business. I get takeaway food from the cart nearby or from the Honduran place on the next block.
Even the plant that used to live in an old bathtub is thriving.
Sky-watching can be as good as people-watching.
Unfiltered Philly sunset (next to studio muse collage).
Old shoe racks now hold a serious oil paint investment.
I've been in for some repairs.
It is amazing being able to have multiple projects going on at once. I far outgrew the home studio space.
Hallways here in the building.
"Does that say PARIS?" Me: "Well, it DID."
That's my door. It has an EXIT sign above it.
Looking out from visiting a floor up from me.
I go through these. I use them up. "Pinch me!" Did I really conquer survivor's guilt to be able to do this?
Moving in. Somehow I have managed to make it feel larger rather than smaller in here once I moved everything in. It's all about the flow and zones.
Early days in the home studio at the beginning of the first 3 year that I am now documenting.
The home studio became far more cramped than this. I would prop canvases on half-open drawers of the ThisEndUp vintage furniture that stores supplies.
The home studio was prim and even pretty. Then it became overrun. I had things drying on the bushes outside and lining the halls. My first expansion before the industrial space was into the dining room and my consulting office space. That served its purpose because I could not walk on my own for a while but could push a wheelchair around as if it were a rolling walker, but with supplies loaded onto the seat so I could move things around between rooms.