Tim McFarlane Studio: March 2025
When paintings find good homes, last-minute opportunities and weird things start showing up in the studio work...
Those living with your art don’t owe you anything, but when they do share how it’s affecting them and their lives, it can make a hell of a difference…
(Note: In this newsletter section, collectors are only referenced by their first name and last initial only)
As an artist, there’re few things more gratifying than someone liking your work enough to want to bring it into their lives and homes. It’s a true honor that people want to bring a part of my life and hard work into their own space. Their support of what I’m doing means that I get to continue making work that hopefully more people will want to have in their lives. It’s even better when collectors share images of the work installed, as well as stories of how it’s affected their lives.
Harsh Stone White (2002), seen above, was the first purchase of a large painting of mine from my first solo exhibition “Inverted Dislocation” at the Bridgette Mayer Gallery in 2004. In January, the collector, Miriam D., sent me a message and a couple of photos of the piece. She said that she’d been sick and spending a lot of time in bed that week with the painting and that “it was healing her”.
“Wow!” That’s all I could manage to think while reading her message. Here’s someone who has been living with this painting for 21 years and it’s still having an affect on her being. Not only that, but that she chose to share this with me was incredibly humbling and filled me with gratitude for being able to do what I do.
Another collector who purchased Soft Poem 12 (2023) from my more recent solo show at BMG, “All Of This Is True” last year, shared this photo of the work in a space with several other pieces and a note that read in part, “I’ve displayed mine in an intimate niche at home in dialogue with other favorite pieces from East and West. It inspires and uplifts me every time I see it” There’s nothing to add when someone says that your art “inspires and uplifts” them every time they see it. That’s the kind of sentiment that makes all of the hard work and challenges of living an art-centered life that much richer.
Lastly, this past weekend, I had the pleasure of going to a small gathering in West Philly and got to see the recently acquired Soft Poem: Summer Juice (2024) installed in my friend, Kathy R.’s home. I wish that I’d been able to take more photos of the piece in context with it’s surroundings. You get a bit of it here, with the sewing table and so on, but to the left there’s a storage shelf for variously colored fabrics she uses in her sewing projects. The play of colors between the fabrics and this painting is really beautiful.
What made this one special is that Kathy, a yoga instructor, told me that she wasn’t sure that she could afford the piece during a studio visit late last summer. What she hadn’t counted on was being able to pay for it in installments. That changed everything. Seeing the light beaming from her eyes when she learned of this was amazing and she chose to purchase it right away on a payment plan through the gallery. Seeing a friend happy with the artwork and seeing it have a good home is a wonderful pleasure.
My sincere gratitude to every collector past and upcoming for bringing my art into their lives and enabling me to continue my creative work!
Nuggets: In the studio and beyond
Speaking of Soft Poems, I mentioned in my last newsletter that more were on the way and those are very close to being done. I’ve been working with them on and off for the past few weeks and I’m pretty happy with their development, so far. I figure I’ll be able to get them to a “stopping point” soon. I’m in that place where I’m making fewer physical changes and looking at them more, so I’m sure I’ll consider them ready for prime time soon enough. You, dear readers, will be the first to know.
When complete, these will continue the numbering where I left off with the first series: Soft Poem 17-22
To see which of the earlier series are available, visit the “Spotlight” page on my website. Right now, I’m highlighting some of the available works made between 2021-2024 and the remaining Soft Poems numbers 1, 4, 5, 8, 10, 11, and 16 are among them on the last couple of pages in the section: Spotlight: Available Works 2021-2024
There’s nothing like a planned print session that you wind up crossing signals in your head about when it was going to happen. This is the scenario I found myself in last Monday when I visited Alexis Nutini’s print shop to pick up something. I walked in and he was ready to print with the woodblocks, ink and paper all ready to go. Apparently, I’d misread the intention of the last text he’d sent the night before.
Well, long-story-short, we wound up pulling two new prints, one for him and one for me to have that’s based on one of the Tomorrow’s Conversations prints we made in 2021. It’s in my studio now, having been on the wall to properly dry before I store it. I’m going to trim it down to get rid of the push pin holes at the top to measure 42” x 30” (106.68 x 76.2cm). It, along with several of the original prints are available through the Bridgette Mayer Gallery: Tim McFarlane: Tomorrow’s Conversations
Last minute events wound up being a theme for last week. On Tuesday of last week (3.25.25), I received a text at 9:30am from a friend who works at the local Fox affiliate, Fox 29 Philadelphia. He works on a show that highlights Philadelphia-region talent called Good Day Uncut. His 11am guest had cancelled and he asked if I could fill in, last minute at my studio. It took a moment for it to register, but I said, “Yes” and took off going through my morning routine in record time to make it up here in time for the live stream to happen. My thanks to Mike at the station and the show host, Hank, for thinking of me. You can read the extended version of this story here: When Opportunity Texts At the Last Minute
It all went off without a hitch, thankfully, haha!
Video: Good Day Uncut: Tim McFarlane Art Studio
On view:
“Innervisions” at the Clark Atlanta University Art Museum. My painting, Vermillion Shores, seen above, was curated into the show by artist Jamele Wright, Sr and Special Projects Curator at CAUAM, Clarke Browne. “Innervisions” brings together the works of contemporary and Black painters who engage with abstraction as a primary means of personal and cultural representation, illustrating a wider range of Black expression than what has been normally accepted as “Black Art”.
Innervisions
February 6-May 2, 2024
Clark Atlanta University Art Museum, 223 James P Brawley Dr SW Atlanta, GA 30314
Exhibition event page: Clark Atlanta University Art Museum Spring '25 Exhibition Season
Sneak peek
Things are coming into being in the studio and I have no clue about what they are, but they are multiplying…
Exit
That’s it for this month! Once again, thanks for reading because I really appreciate the time you make to read and engage with my emails, it means a lot.
Please take a moment to share this email with someone whom you think may like it and/or my work. If you like more behind-the-scenes views into my studio work and thoughts, check out my studio blog: Art & Life Stirred Vigorously
Let’s be kind to one another. Empathy is not dead, pay it forward.