Isalos Fine Art

We had a nice turnout for the Black + White show opening. We'd hoped to really be on  the ball for this show and not need to stay up late the night before and  have get up early to finish, but no... Those red walls needed more paint, and the grey walls some touching-up. And as usual, once we had all the art unpacked, we wondered how it could possibly all fit together. Well, it came together. The wine flowed, the munchies munched, and the red dots appeared on the price tags.

Getting blurry: Jaqueline Wilson, Vaino Kola, Eugene Koch, Stuart Kestenbaum, Susan Webster

This seems like a good time to mention next Friday, which will be the first First Friday Stonington Galleries Open Gallery Night. We've joined up with the other galleries and artist's studios in town- thirteen in all- for this event. This is a good opportunity to stop in at all those places you've wondered about, but have never had the (time, courage, curiosity.... insert excuse here) to venture into. There's plenty of nice surprises out there. Check them out at stoningtongalleries.com.

And, if you're planning on imbibing much of that complimentary wine some galleries provide, you might think about taking the gallery tour via Eddie's Island Taxi and Tours. They're planning on doing gallery tours, on Open Gallery Nights  or anytime.

Well, why not? There's something about this earthy, brick-red color, that makes black & white artwork stand out. Of course we ran  out of paint before we could apply a second coat, but maybe this will do for now. We've left the outer walls their usual light grey. Is this boring you? Do you really care? I can only assume you're reading this in the first place because you're interested in the all the picky little details we fuss over during the fast-paced existence of a small-town gallery. (Just in case you missed it, class, the previous sentence employed irony).

 Katy Allgeyer, Birches, III, acrylic on canvas, diptych, 15" x 60", $1,200

Work continues to arrive for the  Black + White show. I've lost count of how many artists will be in it. One drops out, but another two tentative yes's are added. The postcards advertise 23 artists, the posters and newspaper ads - 24 or so.

Siri Beckman, Phosphorescence, wood engraving, 8" x 5", $450 (framed)

Vaino Kola, Winter Light, etching, 19" x 17.5" 

We've been busy getting ready for the upcoming Black + White show, which opens this Friday. It seems like every day there's another little graphic design project for Rebecca. Today it was the posters, which she's out hanging right now. We mailed most of the postcards today... and I guess we'd better put an ad together for the paper by tomorrow. Artists have been delivering work daily. I've been adding images to the website as I get jpegs. I've been trying to imagine how this show will hang, and I admittedly don't quite know. We have nearly as many artists as we had in last November's Small Works show, but we've got some pretty large works for this one.

 Gifford Ewing, Acadia Mountains from Bean Point, Sorrento, ME

silver gelatin print photograph, 16" x 20" 

Today I got away from the gallery long enough to take an airplane ride around the island, courtesy of Penobscot Island Air

Stonington Harbor... yep, there's our roof 

 Grog island... yes, that's a tennis court

Little Sheep Island...see the little sheep!

Yeah, so the Lupine Festival is happening. The Lupine Festival Gallery walk happened last night. This has been the first Lupine Festival with nice weather. We seem to be getting plenty of visitors from Maine, which is nice. Temperatures in the 70's. It's the first dose of summer.

Tomorrow Evening we'll have our first Stonington Galleries event. Eight of the participating galleries will be open for an Open Gallery Night to kick-off the Lupine Festival. To celebrate, we're having a mini show of seven new paintings by Rebecca Daugherty, part of her "Road Work" series. We'll try and do something special for each gallery walk: some new art as well as some wine and cheese. For more information, go to www.stoningtongalleries.com.

To see Rebecca's new Road Work paintings, click here.