Upde Designs

Happy Friday!!

I have two images, a short video, and a long story for today.

For my Friends on Facebook {Click Here}   if you want to go directly to my Blog Post.

Yesterday was the culmination of a month-long project.  I never imagined how much was involved in the project in both time, work, and money.

I have close to 80,000 digital images on my computer and back up hard drives.  Out of those I have probably printed no more than 20 over the last 18 years as the bulk of my work has been posted digitally.

About a year ago I was offered the opportunity to present my photography work at the wonderful Maquoketa Art Experience in Maquoketa, Iowa.  It is truly a remarkable place and if you are in the area you owe it to yourself to pay a visit.  They have learning experiences and workshops for young children through senior citizens and allow artists the chance to show their work to the public.

So my showing was originally scheduled for December 2017, which gave me seven months to prepare.  Being a chronic procrastinator I didn’t do anything about it and was notified in October that my showing (because of a scheduling conflict) was being moved to May 1, 2018.  Even more procrastination followed plus retirement and then I received an email with a notice of the scheduling of my showing and when I needed to have my work to the Art Experience.  PANIC!

I spent hours looking through those 80,000 images trying to pick a wide representative range of my work from wildlife, landscape, portraiture, farm scenes, and of course  trees.  I visited the Art Experience to see the layout of where I would be presenting and went to the wrong section of the building.  The photographer, that was currently displaying had 47 images.  Wow, I thought, that’s a lot of printing, matting, and framing not to mention the expense involved.

A commitment is a commitment so I started the process.  I selected 43 images and sent them off to be printed.  Then I shopped for and purchased 45 frames and matting materials.  UPS was delivering boxes almost every other day.  🙂

All that “stuff” had to be un-boxed and unwrapped and then assembled.  It was a daunting project to say the least.  Our dinning room table became my storage space and the breakfast counter my work space.  Jeanne was very supportive and put up with all the materials without complaint.

I got everything done and ready to transport so I sent an email to my contact at the Art Experience telling them I had 43 images to show.  I received a reply the next day which stated, “You have too many photographs, we don’t have room for that many.”  Ugh!  Now what.

To shorten the story, the wonderful folks that make the Are Experience work said to me, bring what you have and we’ll make it work.  WOW!  They were so gracious and helpful I was very moved.  One of my friends, who volunteers at the Art Experience came to my retirement celebration and told me that they had it all planned out and bring all my images.  I was very happy.

So yesterday I loaded up the car and took my work to Maquoketa.  Ted, Dick, Wayne, and Helen helped me with the hanging, wiring and placement of the images.  We worked for four hours getting it ready.  It was a fantastic experience that I will not forget.  Wonderful people.

I have a 38 second video below if you want to see the work in progress.

Enjoy your day and be careful.