Passion for Painting

This is the painting project I am currently working on. It was designed by Anne Hunter and appeared in The Decorative Painter, Issue 1, 2010. Ms. Hunter is the kind of designer I would like to be if I could draw.

My first passion is decorative painting. I have been painting since 1990 after I set out to live on my own. My sister and I were visiting the shop of a local painter and I really loved a welcome heart she had on the wall. I asked my sister if she’d paint it for me, knowing I would never receive it from her. So I started taking classes. I’m retired now and nearly every day I spend time painting something.

I live in a very small cottage at Indian Lake, Ohio. From my kitchen windows, I have a wonderful view of the lake which I love. I’ve set my kitchen table in front of the windows and made that my “studio.” This means that every time I’m warned in advance that I’m going to get company, I have to stash all my painting stuff in the back room.

My infamous back room is chock full of things to paint. I call it my 401k, hoping it holds its value better than the economy. You will never see a photo of my back room. I warn everyone who visits that if they open that door, they will be struck blind. I make occasional stabs at organizing it, but then I have to clean up the kitchen in a hurry and everything gets stashed in the back room. Then I have to start all over again. My 401k consists of:

65 canvases, all different sizes, cataloged and on two closet shelves 3 shelving units full of wooden things to paint

a small 4-shelf unit with only papier-mâché items

1 top shelf in the laundry room holding wooden items cut out in 1992

2 large totes completely full of wooden ornaments

1 smaller tote full of metal things

Can you tell that I subscribe to the philosophy that she who dies with the most things to paint wins?