Impact NW Workshop

Well, I just finished a cozy little meeting with some folks from Impact NW and they want me to bring the encaustics out to their organization.

I don't know yet if it will be just once, or if it will be a few times, but I do believe it will be helpful to their clientele.   Encaustic painting is powerful, even if you haven't got a clue what your doing.  Hopefully, they will get some healing from the experience.

I just need to get better at my traveling circus of wax.

Portland City Arts is on board

Well it looks like I will be partnering with Portland City Arts..  I love those guys.  I have done lots of shows with them in the last year and am really excited to have them work with the Recovery Panes Project too.

It looks like they will show the finished works at the Olympic Mills Commerce Center this fall and throw a kick ass reception.  They always put on a great party.  On a personal note, I will be doing some personal shows with them as well in the next year.  Check out my website www.kellywilliamsart.com for more details as they become available.

I am looking forward to seeing how the audience participates with the art work. I am still working out the kinks in the framing being magnetized,  so people can rearrange the art, but I trust it will happen.

This is going to be so cool.  I keep imagining those slider puzzles, but every arrangement IS the picture.

Recovery Pane

           

"Working with, and knowing personally those wrestling with addiction, witnessing and seeing the separations both within and around the person struggling in the way, and the role of self, acceptance, self love, and surrender to the process.  The way chaos can surround the individual, and which itself ultimately is the setting for the starting ground for change.  Seasons of change, balance of different aspects within, scars and wounds as a part of the sculptures of self, the joining towards peace with self and external relationships."

Online Pepsi Grant Competition Blues

Oh my word... what have I gotten myself into?

I am competing online against huge organizations with tons of followers.  This grant would be huge for the project and I am doing my best to promote it, but mostly I just feel like I am going to irritate everyone around me screaming..  "VOTE, VOTE for me, VOTE again." 

There is no way I will be able to do this for 27 more days straight.  I am ranked #60 today, but will need to be in the top 10 to get funded..

I believe in what I am doing and am willing to go to great lengths to help those around me heal, but self-promotion is not my strength.  I need a new strategy to get the word out other than me yammering about it all day online and irritating people on facebook.

I wish money didn't matter.  And it rained chocolate covered espresso beans.  And that I wore a size 2, but that isn't ever gonna happen.   Well, maybe I should have a snack and some coffee and quit whining about it and get back to calling, emailing, facebooking etc, until people get the word out.

VOTE at www.refresheverything.com/recoverypanes  pass it on.

The project begins...

This is the one of the first Recovery Panes we've gotten done so far--more to come!

"I have witnessed addiction firsthand for as long as I can remember. Spending weekends with my grandparents introduced me to alcoholism—something I didn’t even realize was a problem until I was 16 years old. I had no idea that not everyone’s grandfather drank water glasses of straight vodka all day long.

When I was 17, my grandfather passed out on Christmas—went straight down and hit his head on the hardwood floor. That was when the ultimatums started: “You stop drinking, or I’m pouring all your booze down the sink.” “You stop drinking, or we’re not paying the mortgage anymore.” “You stop drinking, or we’re moving away.” My mother was trying her hardest to shove our family into a box that would hide our problems—but our problems wouldn’t fit in the box. Inside, I knew, she just wanted us to be normal. She wanted to keep my grandfather’s alcoholism a secret, so she trapped us in neverending circles of fights, ultimatums, cold turkey quitting, relapses, threats, and tears.

We’re still there today, chasing each other in circles."