BJ, Coffee, and Watching Paint Dry - Day 1

Here's the run down. I get a call on today at 8:38am. It's my good friend BJ of the Glave Kocen Gallery. He's got a client that's interested in one of my paintings. Here's the catch. This client likes the painting but wants one very similar (that means a cityscape) to it with the same dimensions (30" x 30"). I rarely have square paintings let alone cityscapes as the painting that the client was interested in was actually done for a show of all square paintings of Richmnond. After a short pause I told BJ that I don't have any paintings that size but maybe I can make something. Now here's the other catch...he needs that painting by Thursday morning (8:30am). "&$#! just got real." 47 hours and 52 minutes left.

It gets better. I have two classes to teach today(1pm to 4pm and 6pm to 9pm). First of all I don't have any idea as to what I'm going to paint. So after taking the dog out I drive to the bottom on my way to the first class. I downloaded and emailed the photos to BJ while in class. He quickly replied as to which photo reference he liked best. Now all I'm thinking about is how to finish this thing with the little time that I have.

After class I had to settle my second problem...I don't have any panels at home that are big enough or wood strips to make the panel. I made a quick stop at Home Depot (which wasn't quick enough). The only panels that were available were too big to fit into my truck. After searching vigorously for someone that was qualified to cut lumber I got out of Dodge and headed to the second class.

After yelling (because that's just how I teach) for about 3 hours I made it home by 9pm. What an awesome girlfriend I have. When I got home she had all of my supplies laid out for me... the miter saw, gesso, wood glue, paint and episodes of Futurama in the DVD player. The remainder of the night was spent preparing the panel (literally watching paint dry).