Patti Gibbons Art

I wish I had been able to snatch tonight's image on my phone camera, but there was not enough light to catch the subtleties. Today I need the magic of words to keep this image safe for me. Twice a week I home, from Rhinebeck to Kingston, around 6:30 PM, give or take a dalliance with a friend. As I drive home I watch the seasons change in the late afternoon light, along a stretch of road that snakes around lands that run to mansions, farms, and the river. Gently it spills out onto the bridge which joins the banks of the Hudson with a mountain range.  The Catskills are the prize at the end of my journey. I watch with the wonderment of a child how nature and light paint the sky in every conceivable weather and light combination.  Today the sun is a low golden orb in a cloudless sky;  it has turned the mountains a color I cannot mix. They contrast with a huge endless sky that encases a field of  yellow, orange, with a hint of green which spills into a ...

AH....been a long time since I have posted. Since the last time, I have further simplified my life. The elimination of fragrance and chemicals was a symbolic start to what turned out to be a further purging. I closed my Rhinebeck studio save for 2 days a week for teaching. I realized after a year and a half of working 6 days a week, that there was no place like home, and it was financially suicidal to keep up two art studios. So my home studio is where the art and materials live, where I work and teach privately, and Rhinebeck is where I teach group classes 2 days a week.   I am starting to enjoy my retirement - two whole years later. It took a long time to get off the manic work train. I did not even know why I felt the need to go to a job every day..it was simply habit. Get out of your pj's and report to a job.  It was my own business - but I am a tough boss.  Eighteen months later, I fired myself and reorganized. I still work hard, but it is at my hous...

So I left you hanging for a month. Sorry..but it has been that long that I am still trying to figure out what chemicals I am still in touch with that are making my body crazy. A month ago I landed in the dermatologist's office for blisters and redness of my lips. This had happened before with a lipstick, and I threw out all of that brand, and five years later, bought another one by the same company, but a different chemistry. Shortly thereafter, same story, different year. Only this time it was not going away even when I stopped using all lip products. I had myself dying of lip cancer, and horrid images were running through my mind. My doctor said "hmmmm contact dermatitis, we need to find out what you are reacting to", so I had one of the tests where 80 substances were put on my back in big bandages, removed in several days, and I was then marker-ed with a purple body marker with boxes around each substance.   The reactions were monitored, and it was revealed that ...

The word simplicity was jingling around in my head all day while at work at the Tibetan Shop. While CD's of chanting monks played, I made phone calls, haggled with the cable company and tried to track down the automatic payment trail of my gym membership. I was making deeper cuts into my lifestyle. I kept telling myself that this is all good - I am leading a simpler, more authentic life. Well into the second year of my reinvention,  the bank account was yelling for me to put my brakes on. So back went Sadie, my lovely sexy convertible.  My gym membership. That wasn't too hard as I never had time to work out there. But it was a defeat that I wasn't pumping iron or spending an hour on the elliptical machine.  My drink and dinner budget shrank to a once-a-week "starving artist"  late afternoon meeting with my business partner where we get a slider and a local mud beer for 9.50. I have no clothing budget, and I am grateful that I have a husband who sa...

January was a period of recovery from my Business class, 4 shows, and the holidays. February is a tough month; I have a new saying "every time the snow flies, a dollar dies" as students cancel, or I am unable to get to my very part time job. So when the going gets rough, I sell on eBay. I have been selling on eBay for 16 years and have made around 3000 transactions. I have excellent ratings, and it has kept my studio heated and business bills paid when I needed money. I have joked that I would sell everything in the house if I had to.  For the most part I enjoy it - from the treasure hunt/junking to find things to sell, the research, and then the excitement of the auctions.  I have an entire education from it, and have become quite knowledgeable about many things, from illustrated books, ephemera, to photography and more. The most recent exciting research came from photographs I started listing from an album that  I've had for a long time.  So long that I don...

WOAH. The summer went by and I did not make one post! It was a busy summer since I worked most weeks 6 days a week, whether in the Tibetan shop, teaching privately, or in my Rhinebeck studio.  I took a week of to go to the Cape, but the rest of the summer I was hard at work. Since I left teaching, summers off are a memory of the past. I thought that I would have a hard time working all summer for the first time in many years, but when you are doing things that bring you joy, and are no longer in a soul-sucking job, it isn't much like work at all. While on vacation I got a phone call from Lea at Marist College, asking if I was interested in being in a class thru WEDC , an educational program for women in business. It was a no-brainer, and I soon found out how little I really knew about being in business.  It is a 60 hour class, and I get a certificate at the end of it. I  have to write a business plan, present it to the instructors, the class, and other outsi...

I love Cape Cod- the ocean, the dunes, the hiking, the salt marsh, the food. Wellfleet. Provincetown. Orleans. Seals. Whale watching. Mack's Shack. Jules Besch. Kayaking Boating. And junking. Garage sales and estate sales abound on the Cape. Even if you don't buy a thing, you get to see the inside of many an incredible (and some not so incredible) homes. This trip's finds were not as plentiful as usual, but still for under 30.00 I got the following Foley Food Mill 2.00 (oh all that tomato and apple sauce I will make with this) 1907 6" thick illustrated Webster dictionary 2.00 (collage heaven) Stretcher Bars 1.00 - for the roll of canvas I will be getting from a friend Frames 1.00 for the little watercolors I do. 2 vintage John Denver songbooks 1.00 - that is to resell on eBay Phillips charging/speaker system for iPod/iPhone 20.00 for my studio. Old glass slides to make "slides" with. (I use them to make ornaments)  I can't wait t...