Hi there , 

You've been very much on my mind and I've been intending to write for some time now, but life has taken a dramatic shift the past two months. I've waited to make a formal announcement until I wrote you first! 
 

TraillWorks has taken many different turns over the years, and as of this month, it is exactly 20 years since I formalized my business name, set up a sole proprietorship and got a sales tax authority. In that time I've operated out of three different home studios, two different rented retail spots that also operated as a gallery, exhibited in many galleries, shows, and venues, and taught in various spaces including art centers, co-working spaces, and outdoor parks. 

When I moved to North Carolina, it was the middle of the pandemic, our home ended up having a mold-filled HVAC system causing me to become very sick and greatly limit my work. After I spent time healing, remediating our home and replacing our entire HVAC system, I finally began working again, but as you may know from emails in the fall, my husband was let go from his position. Fortunately I started working at the Durham Arts Council over the summer, teaching camp, and also picking up some studio classes for adults. Through that experience, I made many new connections and found myself in November, teaching at my son's high school, filling in for the art teacher out of maternity leave. 

During that month, I learned about an open full time art position at a nearby middle school in Durham. I was contacted, quickly interviewed and asked to come in the next day to tour the school. I was offered the position and officially started teaching on January 6th. This is bringing me full circle to where I began my art career, out of school, teaching in a middle school in NJ. I never thought life would take this turn, but then again, there's so much we can't ever anticipate in life. 

It was a bumpy beginning since I started two weeks before the end of a semester, but the image above shows off some of the work that the students created in just the past week. We started a new semester on Friday, and I'm feeling like a beginning teacher, with a whole lot of experience and wisdom to offer, and a ton of lesson planning to do. 

I'm taking my life day by day, fulfilling my responsibilities as the art teacher at Lucas Middle School, and planning to continue to operate TraillWorks in a lesser capacity for a while. I'm currently finishing up a home portrait commission that I started last year, and am booking another one. This will assuredly keep me busy. 

Several of you were instrumental in me landing this position - either in offering support or recommendations, and I will personally thank you for those votes of confidence. 

I'm not sure how frequently I'll be writing my newsletter; I'd like to keep it up monthly, but I also don't want to overpromise. I also haven't forgotten that I owe quite a few supporters a studio Zoom session to review all of the lessons learned at the NOAH Convention back in October. I will offer this in the near future, but my priority at the moment needs to be preparing for each day at Lucas. I have 6 classes, 6th - 8th grade everyday. It's a full, but fulfilling daily adventure! 

I appreciate you so much and hope you'll continue following my journey as an art educator, artist and business owner. 

Creatively,

Check out my Classroom!

I've had now three public school art rooms, and this one is by far the largest! It is the south, and there is more space here. Lucas Middle School is transitioning to a Montessori school over the next year and I'll have access to training. This is exciting because I've seen first-hand how a Montessori model has worked for our younger son, Auggie, and I'll be interested to see how it impacts the art curriculum and my approach. I'm also incredibly grateful for my family's support; Joel spent all day on a teacher workday, helping me set up my room. I have to credit him with his creative eye in planning out most of the above bulletin board. I gave him a quote, suggested the string, and what I wanted to do with the artwork, and he put it all together. We were trying to channel his elementary school art teacher, Ms. Traci, who had the best bulletin boards!

Below is an example of a 7th grader's work from last week. We started off with uninstructed observation drawings of plants, on loan from the ag teacher across the hall. Then they moved into blind contour drawings, following by block-ins, focusing on shape. The final day was spent putting all of those skills together into a final observation drawing. Truthfully, I think we needed a little more time for all of it, but I'm thrilled with what they did having no art all year and meeting me just two weeks ago!

CURRENT COMMISION

This commission is coming along slowly but surely for a very special client, who is a good friend. It also marks my first home portrait in North Carolina. It's 14" x 11", oil on cradled panel, which was stained with a wash of pink before beginning. Below you can see some of the many greens that have already gone into this work.

CURRENT CLASSES at DAC

Meanwhile, I'm currently also teaching a Thursday night class at the Durham Arts Council, Watercolor Further, which is a new class, based on classes I've taught in NJ for more experienced painters. The class is ten weeks and I'm developing the focus based on the participants and their personal goals for watercolor. We started out learning about complements and making colors that could be used in white, and now we're gradually building into painting a larger finished work, based on compositional sketches, Notan studies, and timed full color thumbnails designed to help build confidence and intention in mark making and values. I'm excited to see where this group goes. 

I also recently taught a one night class, Loosening up in Watercolor, which used timed painting and exercises commonly associated with figure drawing sessions, but using objects and painting in watercolors. Loved the class and the students! See some of their works below. 

In the spring, I'll be offering another round of Beginners and Beyond Watercolor at the Durham Arts Council - so keep an eye for an enrollment announcement. 

support my work: become a paid subscriber or purchase work 

commission art: let's create something memorable

learn with me: take a workshop or book private coaching

for exhibitions and workshop inquiries: send me an email 

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