Pulling out all the Stops

My eyes are positively blurry from all of the computer work I have done this week. I am doing all I can to get my work out there (or should I say here?) on the internet. You can now go to my shop at www.deborahgallart.etsy.com, order prints on demand from www.fineartamerica.com/profiles/abide-studio.html, become a fan of Deborah Gall Art on facebook, or follow me on www.twitter.com/abidestudio. Soon there will bargains to be had on EBay. I'm exhausted just thinking about it! It has been challenging and fun, and I hope will help spread the word and the art. Sometimes ya just gotta try.....

Rejected, Selected, or Directed?

Being a professional artist is risky business I have come to understand. Being a professional artist with a retail setting even more so. Every time I submit a piece or pieces for an exhibit or show I am opening myself up for rejection. It's actually quite common, those rejections. I have recently decided however that I was not the object of rejection, my work was just not selected. That is a subtle yet all important difference. One is about me, my heart, my self-confidence, etc. The other is about the work and the juror; it is about the wrong fit, not bad work. The other day at the gallery a person (can't call him a customer or a gentleman really since he was neither) spoke out quite loudly against a painting I had on an easel just outside of the shop. Insensitive. Rude. Both describe the comment he made. Further consideration showed me Uninformed would be another valid word. Again, not a valid commentary on me or on the work, but in this case a reflection of the speaker.

So, I have decided that I will take these "bumps along the road" as direction. Protection not rejection. And along the way I'll pat myself on the back for once again risking it, trying something new, and putting myself out there. So I'll keep the faith, stay the course, and do it all over again.....