Upcoming Shows: Get Your Tiny Works of Awesome!

While I grieve summer's warmth ending, the cool, crisp air of October heralds the art and craft show season here. This is a busy time in my studio.

The finished dominoes start stacking up. Sometimes I want to line them all up in a long, winding row like I did as a kid and then knock them all down. They are just too stinkin' cute to do that though!

So while I am crafting like crazy here, you can take a moment to pull your calendars out and schedule trips to my upcoming shows.

We (I say "we" during craft show season a lot as Mr. M helps and other family members do, too) won't be going far from Rochester, NY and the surrounding suburbs for shows this year. If you live within 50 miles of Rochester it's really worth it to come to these shows. Some fabulous artists will be there!

In My Head Studios' 

Upcoming Art + Craft Show Events

Saturday, October 22, 2011

27th Annual St. Rita School Craft Sale
9:00 am – 3:15 pm
St. Rita School
1008 Maple Drive, Webster, New York 14580
Our booth is located in a classroom this year (not the gym) so be sure to come look for us!

 
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Mayday Underground Crafts + Art
10:00 am - 5:00 pm
The Main Street Armory
900 East Main Street, Rochester, NY 14605
The BEST indie craft + art show in Western NY
First 50 people to arrive gets a FREE swag bag of handmade goodies! 
Get there early if you want swag. There WILL BE a line.

Thursday, November 10, 2011
Holiday in the Vineyard Art and Craft Sale
10:00 am - 7:00 pm
Casa Larga Vineyards
2287 Turk Hill Road, Fairport, NY 14450
Open until 7:00 pm so stop by after work! Wine tastings!

Saturday, November 26, 2011 
35th Annual Irondequoit High School Art and Craft Sale
10:00 am - 4:00 pm
Irondequoit High School
260 Cooper Road, Irondequoit, NY 14617

The Rochester NY Etsy Street Team (RNEST) is potentially cooking up some hot, hot, heat for December events! Stay tuned for more about our plans for world domination extreme crafty fun soon!

Giveaway Alert: Click over to the RNEST blog to win one of my handmade domino pendants! The giveaway runs until Tuesday, October 11th!

Happy Friday!

xoxo

- Vickie 

Mayday Underground Crafts + Art: Spring 2011

Mayday Underground Crafts + Art is my favorite show ever! That’s not hyperbole!

The Main Street Armory, where Mayday Underground Crafts + Art was held, is an enormous and beautiful venue. I, in the 22 years I have lived in Rochester, have not had cause to go there for anything, thus solidifying my hermit status even more. Luckily I trusted my gut about lighting. I was worried it might be dark in a big, vast space like that so I checked off “yes” for electricity on the application just in case, even though I don’t have a light set-up ready to go. Yep, day-of-the-show improvisation. That’s me, much to my mom’s and Mr. M’s chagrin. Of course, I didn’t actually pack the lights or extension cords, and I had to politely ask Mr. M to go home and get them. He politely obliged. He rocks!

We were sort of in that no-man’s land at the far end of an aisle past the point where people would turn to cross over to the next aisle. They would have missed us completely because we were in the dark under the balcony overhang. Amanda so very nicely said we could move out a little on an angle. We were very careful not to take too much advantage of that though, as it wasn’t super fair to the other vendors under the balcony. I think everyone in that aisle should have been moved out about five feet and into the light.

The extra lighting we brought made a huge difference. I believe it contributed greatly to the near-record breaking show total we made. Lighting is definitely on the list for future shows. I hope to find some battery powered halogen lights, if they even exist. (My dad could have made them for me if he was still around, goshdarnnit.)

I still cannot believe the positive responses to my work. I am so lucky to be doing what I do. Art can be a solitary life with little to no feedback on a day-to-day basis. Then you do a show and you get filled up with about six hours of happy dance from customers. It makes the solitary confinement worth it! It gives me an answer to the times I am in the studio asking myself,

“Why am I even bothering with this?! Does anyone even care?!”

So I have to work to hold on to the feelings of show days to remind myself that I’m not just pushing paper and paint around on canvas or dominoes.

I am creating joy.

I lose sight of that until I see smiles when people are looking at and buying my work.

The talent at this show was unbelievable. I think it was the best collection of artists I have ever seen at an indie show. The number of young indie artists was greatly encouraging (I think I have recently aged out of the “young” category, I’m afraid). Nice to see the newbies getting their feet wet! Of course it’s always fun to hang with my Rochester NY Etsy Street Team buddies! I was next to my pals Michelle from The Quilted House and Stefani from Pine Tree Designs!

On a side note: The doors to the stalls in the bathroom at The Armory were gorgeous antique wood doors. Tall and slim and carved with really ornate designs. But they left me feeling more like I was walking into a church confessional than a bathroom stall! It kind of creeped me out and made me laugh at the same time.

"We Are Queens"; original mixed media collage on 6"x"8" gallery wrapped canvas; available for sale

Rochester needs more shows like this. Amanda and Casey and all the Mayday vendors have proven three times now that this city supports indie shows. Let’s have more!

The next Mayday Underground is slated for November! See you there!

- Vickie

Home Show Success

Altered Vintage Domino Pendants

Altered Vintage Checker Pendants

My twin sister, Valerie, had a home show party last night at her house. She invited me to bring my jewelry to sell. So I have been working my butt off getting more domino pendants ready for the show. And it was a good thing too because we did really well. Might have been our second best show total ever, mind you we’ve only done a handful of shows. The domino pendants and Scrabble tile pendants were big hits. I also sold three microscope slide glass collage pendants, which surprised me. Almost everyone who came bought something from me. Two people came back for more! A custom order might come from this as well.

The girl who was selling purses bought two domino pendants. She showed them to the shop owner she works for. The owner loved them and called me this morning to ask if I would like to sell in her shop! I meet with her tomorrow! Now I have to figure out how to transport these things without getting all the necklaces tangled up.

I sold so much that my Etsy shop looks empty. My mission is to get photographs taken so I can restock my shop. I have to make more domino pendants to do that because I’ll be dropping off about 10 to the shop. So keep your eyes open for new additions to inmyheadstudios.etsy.com.

You should check out what my sister is selling and give her some love!!

All New Buffalo Indie Market

Mary Stephens, Founder/Director of the new Buffalo Indie Market in Buffalo, NY, has launched a monumental undertaking in setting up a monthly independent artists’ market. Local artists now have a place to set up shop and sell their handcrafted wares. The Market will be open every second Sunday of the month starting May 11, 2008.

The first event will be on Saturday, April 12th from 11 am to 4 pm at Pearl Street Grill and Brewery on the second floor in the Pan American Room, 76 Pearl Street, Buffalo, NY 14202. The Pearl Street Grill and Brewery will be the home of all the Market’s events.

The Market’s mission is “to bring a monthly market of unique and stylish handmade products to the Buffalo community while nurturing the professional talents and business potential of up & coming designers & crafters. The Buffalo Indie Market offers local consumers a whole new way to shop and provide the Buffalo community with a space to discover hand-made jewelry, handbags, clothes, stationery, pottery, knitted items and more.” [quote source: Buffalo Indie Market website]

More about the Market: “When starting Ry Stephens Design, a handmade cards and invitations business, Mary [Stephens] quickly realized the need for a more current year long market. With the recent growth of on-line markets and independent artists, a need for a Buffalo market of current handmade products appeared obvious. In October of 2007, Mary took part in Brooklyn Indie Market, which is a weekly Independent Artists market in Brooklyn, New York. The warm welcome she received there and the pleasant community atmosphere developed by Kathy Malone and Johanna Resnikoff, a native of Buffalo, spurred Mary's desire to start an Indie Artist market in Buffalo. Buffalo has long awaited for a market that brings all the latest handmade creations from the local Indie Art community to the area’s consumers.” [quote source: Buffalo Indie Market website]

Buffalo Rising Online recently gave the Market some great press. See it HERE. There is also a group at Indiepublic for members interested in networking with each other.

I am looking forward to hopefully participating in this market in May. Even though I am not from Buffalo, it still is a local scene for me as it is only a 1.5 hour drive from Rochester. Now we indie artists in Rochester have to get on the ball and open our own market. Mary Stephens has set the bar pretty high.

Thank you, Mary, for all the hard work you have put into this! So many people are going to benefit from it.

Applications for future events can be found on the Buffalo Indie Market website as well as flyers and postcards to distribute for advertising the events. Spread the word!

We Tabled It

The open house at Second Saturday went very well. I’m told the crowd turnout was high for the event. Sales were not fantastic, but I had a great time meeting people and seeing the other artists’ studios in the building. And that’s what the day was all about for me anyway. I was just so happy to be there.

Thank you to Christina Laurel for inviting me to be a guest artist!! Christina is a very talented collage artist whom I met through the Arts Council in Rochester, NY. She has been teaching me a lot about the local arts scene and introducing me to a bunch of great people. At her recent art show at the Williams Gallery, titled “Layers”, I fell in love with one of her pieces of work. To my surprise, she offered a trade for one of my pieces called “Checkered Past”, which is shown above (it’s the big orange collage on the left). So we traded at Second Saturday. I’m thrilled! I’ve never done a trade and it’s great because I can rarely afford artwork I fall in love with.

Getting my table display together proved to be fun work. Mom and I stopped by a thrift shop and found the two candelabras to hang jewelry from. One candelabrum looks like a person wearing a hat. I think the felt bead necklaces look striking displayed this way. We made the tablecloth and the wood display stand on the right in the photograph. Since I have a table display now I plan on applying to a few local craft shows. Yay! More new art adventures!

More photographs at Flickr.