Creative Play

An experience stands out and will always be for me why I was at the Arenas Gallery. Delores Witt, octogenarian artist, a person I greatly admire, admired my photo of the Great Blue Heron. She didn't just compliment me. She returned to the 16x20 image four different times. Three times we engaged in conversation that added up to the following: 1) "You have an eye." 2) "This looks like a painting." 3) "You should concentrate on photography and take it seriously." 4) "Many of us might have been in the same spot and not see what you saw and missed the light." The fourth contact I found her close up, looking at the photo, her fingers following the lines that light made around the bird and in the reflection of the water. She studied it hard, and did not know I was there. Why does it matter what Delores Witt thinks? She is an artist. An elder in our community who I have noticed when her painting is in a show. It almost always has a red d...

Tulare Impressions 2016 - Tulare Historical Museum & Gallery The Artist's Reception will be held on Thursday January 14th, from 5:00 PM to 7:00 PM at Tulare Historical Museum, 444 West Tulare Avenue, Tulare CA 93274. Email me at sblairkeller@sbcglobal.net for information if you wish. This piece has gone through quite a process. Since I spent time with Efrain Fuentes in his studio in Oaxaca, Mexico last December, I see all my artwork in a new way. Dots fill my imagination.  "Swallows" began as a clay mono print. I framed in a plain wooden frame. Then painted the frame and did a small amount of dot work on it. It has been hanging in my studio for months now, always plaguing me because it just wasn't finished. But how, I did not know.  An invite to the "Tulare Impressions Show" appeared. Swallows are big in Three Rivers. They build mud nests along our bridges. They used to fill the catfish ponds until dried out from end of Spring to ...