A Reconsidered View of Marketing and Branding

The View From the Fort -©T Grillo Laird - 24x48 oil
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During the past two months or so while I was away tending to family issues, I spent very little time on Facebook. My hands were full and my mind was occupied with solving the problems at hand. But I did have time to think about where I was going with my painting. I had just come from a very productive landscape painting workshop that has given me a blueprint for the direction of the work itself. The more I focused on this blueprint, the more I realized that I don't want to spent my finite resources on the overly time consuming process of marketing and branding - the two hot buzz words right now. I came to the conclusion that I'd always had before I started reading and investing in the flood of marketing advice now available:
I do not want to become a master marketer of mediocre work!

Like many who have succeeded quite nicely at establishing a large and loyal following, I'm sure I could succeed at the branding game too with the right actions. I had to have this recent forced vacation from these efforts to remember my north star. I intend to focus without distraction on the improving of the work itself. Only when I've seen tangible results of this focus, will I potion off some of my time again for the effort of making my work known. 

So, if you see less of me on Facebook and on the many painting sites where I post on Facebook, I am more not less busy in my studio and on site working on my craft.

Plein Air in the Grey North

Chesapeake Fall - 9x12 oil - © T Grillo Laird
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It's been a long time since I've painted the fall season up north. It almost felt like I'd never done it, I've become so used to the colors and terrain of the Florida Gulf Coast.

This little piece was painted in Maryland at the studio of Hai-Ou Hou. The landscape, flatter than my coastal home was a challenge and I had to take my plein air piece and work it further in my studio to get anything close to acceptable. Like southern New Jersey which was my next stop for the following 7 weeks, the weather was consistently gray. I didn't mind the grey skies- they always set off fall color beautifully. But the lack of light became difficult to deal with. I'm happy to be back in my Florida sunshine!

At the Walter Anderson Museum

Waiting - 6x8 oil sold

Ten days ago, while on the way to Austin, we stopped for a couple of hours at the Walter Anderson Museum in Ocean Springs Mississippi. Walter Anderson and two of his brothers were artists during the mid 1900's. Click here for a short bio about him from the museum's website.
When you step into the museum, the first thing you see is a 20 minute film clip about Anderson's life. Time was too short to watch more than a few minutes of it. We chose to look around the museum instead. I knew of Anderson but hadn't studied his work. The one or two pieces I'd seen looked like folk art and primitive styles have never appealed to me. But the more I looked, the more I wanted to look. Some works were just pencil sketches, Some were watercolor and many were lino-cut prints. Most were of shore animals and coastal landscapes.
The expressiveness of Anderson's line surprised me. Rather than the naive portrayals that I expected, each work had exactly the kind of line or shape that perfectly described the character of what he drew. His cats were fluid, slinky and intent. Each type of bird was drawn with long delicate line or chunky marks of pigment according to it's character or way of moving. Plants with thick tropical stalks were drawn with strong unbending marks and petals of flowers with soft curving lines. His landscapes of coastal shoreline and live oak trees looked unlike any I've seen yet they accurately expressed the humid, moss draped environment of the Gulf Coast.
Here are a few examples for you to enjoy.

Here's one I especially like. The different densities of black and the fierce rectangular eyes and thick beaks amid a flurry of wings, is foreboding and beautiful at the same time.

He used a lot of red and purple in his paintings.

Look how this frog is alive with motion!

Austin Again

Afternoon reflections on Ladybird Lake in Austin 

This Tuesday marks eight weeks of travels since I've been home. These past few days spent visiting family in Austin, top off a late fall season of tending to family duties, enjoying holiday visits and attending my first workshop. Tomorrow at dawn we'll start the long drive back to Pensacola.

January promises to be a busy month. I'm teaching three painting classes at Pensacola State College's Continuing Ed. It's not too late to get in on these. Click here to register. Another gallery has called with the offer to join their artists. Read my blog next week for more about this. And there's an art fair in March to get ready for.

But for now I'm enjoying the remaining few hours of my Austin visit. Each time I visit the Austin area, I like it better. It's true, it was brutally hot when I was here last June, but I got some good work done despite the heat. Already we're planning an early fall camping trip for 2015.I can't wait to paint the colors of early fall! 

But for now, it will be good to get back to work in my studio. I'm fired up with plans for 2015! No resolutions. Just a crystal clear North Star. Stay tuned! 

On the newly constructed Boardwalk on Ladybird Lake