Last night's art soirée

The event went fairly well. I would have like to have more people there, but the people who came were very interested in the work and what I had to say about it.

The event was a fund-raising benefit for art students and art programs at the university. It was a wine and cheese soirée. The event kicked off a month-long silent auction of some of my work. The proceeds from the auction will go to the school of the arts, as will a percentage of the sales of any other work. Currently I have sold five pieces, not counting the three which are being auctioned.

Today my feet kind of hurt. I spent a lot of the day yesterday talking about art in the gallery. I spoke to two Artscore (arts appreciation) classes - one was the class I am teaching - and then three hours at the event.

The first piece to be bid on was Red Bowl Ritual. It is a gourd bowl that has been dyed red and has spirals burnt into the side of it. The spirals were branded into the gourd with a brass rod with one end that I shaped into a spiral and heated in a campfire. I think I want to make some more branding irons, but this time with iron or steel - the brass rod barely survived the heating I needed to decorate one gourd. Maybe I will ask Sr. Margaret for some time with the oxy-acetylene welding/cutting torches.

People also bid on the small piece, Bee Garden. It is a 6 x 12 inch encaustic painting. No one bid on the large encaustic piece, From the Beginning. Perhaps it was because it had a minimum bid price of $250.00. The others had minimum bids of less than $100.00. However, I would not let go of the larger piece for less than that if I were selling it, so I do not want it to go for a lesser amount at auction either.

It is always a dilemma - pricing the work I do...