new cat series

I've been working on these little guys for my friend.  Having had a special kitty many years ago, I appreciate what he means to her.  She's chosen the first one but the other 2 are for sale and I already sold 2 others before I had a chance to scan them.  I didn't know kitty pictures were so popular!

Visit my website or my facebook page: 

maryquintrall.com

facebook.com/quintrall.art

The other day I hung my work at Harris Ave Cafe (Next door to Tony's Coffee)

I love Fairhaven (Bellingham). I could hang out there every day. It's beautiful and diverse and fun and scenic and they have gelato.

I've had a few cafe shows and the logistics of hanging are always challenging. This is the first time I used monofilament. Some of the screws the work hangs from are facing down. As in from the ceiling-like. This would seem to make gravity a problem but it worked out. The coffee shop was open but the cafe was closed. I prefer closed because I hate asking people to move so I can hang my work when they're just trying to enjoy their coffee or get some work done themselves.

Well, it's up, thanks to my assistant who checked for level while I was on the ladder so I didn't have to climb up and down that many more times. Phew!

So, go get a cup of local joe and check out my show.

http://www.harrisavecafe.com/

http://www.maryquintrall.com/

My garden is usually teeming with poppies in June but this year something went wrong. Maybe it was the weather. Maybe my chickens ate them. (Because that happens. I have to wrap my pretty garden in not-so-pretty chicken wire for most of the summer and since summer was late this year, so was I.) But I did get a few plants sprung up and one of them is very happy and not even in the usual garden. It jumped the walk and planted itself in the most inhospitable thing that could be a flower bed it could possibly find. It had been a volcanic-rock-covered, no-respectable-plant-would-grow-roots-here kind of spot, but I'm glad the poppies found a home there. The sun hits it from the opposite direction as the usual garden and the light can be very dramatic. As it is my custom, I wanted to get some poppies painted this summer and summer was slipping away. This one started out with grey background and red poppies placed with authority. Sometimes you have to boss a painting around. Then came the blues and yellows, which together, of course, made green. I scratched in some stems and splashed in some light. It must have worked because it sold the first time I showed it. (thanks to my buyer!) Selling a piece its first time out made me feel like I know what I'm doing at least some of the time. Note to artists afraid to show your work: hardly anyone ever says if they don't like something. Showing your work is the best experience to keep you showing. As Nike says, just do it.