You know how it is. Sometimes you plan one thing and it leads to another which leads to still another.

The action of putting together a show of my paintings earlier this year in the dead of February and the doing led to:

• finishing quite a few in-progress paintings and wiring up all completed paintings
• inventorying /digitizing/ naming and pricing of all the large paintings I have for sale which will make it so much easier to shop my work around to other venues
• creating a digital Art Newsletter for people who have purchased my work, who might like to view my work and for local media and galleries who I would like to approach for future represention. This led to the development of a comprehensive email list
• giving a series of watercolor classes at our studio which led to the development of a new curriculum for experimental watermedia and a wait list for more classes as well as some income
• giving an artist talk /slideshow /presentation of my work to a group of live people which led to my unearthing and digitizing important art works from my early years which led to some  self-reflection on my developement as an artist
• Finally, even though people have seen my work at various venues including in our studio, it didn’t prepare them for seeing a collection of 30 paintings in one place. That was a real eye-opener for me about the importance of viewers being able to see a lot of your work at one time to get a true sense of the type of painting you do.

For these reasons alone, the art show would have been a great success for me. But that’s not all. I had the chance to talk to people about what I do and why I do it. Most artists work in solitude and in spite of posting images via the internet, there is nothing like seeing the work live and having a real conversation with viewers and collectors for an exchange of ideas and reaction to take place. I also sold paintings which was a wonderful affirmation and motivation to continue.

If you are sitting on a collection of your work, whatever it may be, I suggest you take the step of arranging your own pop-up show because it will lead to new opportunities for your growth as a person and as an artist.