I’m moving my studio.

Ha! That’s really funny because I don’t have a studio. I have to drag everything out, unpack, set up, THEN I can start painting. In my kitchen. That’s not so bad. The hard part is breaking it all down when I’m done painting for the night – scraping down and wiping my palette, washing out and drying all my brushes, moving a still-wet painting on the easel to a safer place (kids and a cat and a dog, oh my!).

[sigh]

Garaged
I *tried* the garage, but Sacramento has 2 seasons: freakin’ hot and freakin’ cold and rainy. About 2 weeks between them on either end that are nice, and for about 4 years I managed to paint during those 2 weeks, but it wasn’t easy and quickly got either freakin’ hot or freakin’ cold.

Office-slash-studio
So I’m experimenting with putting my studio in my home office. We have a 3 bedroom house + office (with French doors!). The office is right off the dining room/living room/main entrance to the house and it’s not quiet at all. Hollow French doors and hollow walls don’t really help.

Not to mention that my office is a total mess. Or was. Or, well, half-is. I spent about 3 or 4 hours last night cleaning out my “computer graveyard,” as my wife calls it, and just flat-out tossing stuff. I had gone through the bookshelves (10 shelves quadruple-packed with books, with books on top, too) in the Fall and those are in the garage, in boxes, awaiting a trip to either the used bookstore or the Thrift Store. Or both.

Multipurpose space
The office isn’t a one-trick pony. It’s a workhorse. Now it’ll be even more so!

  • Office space for when I work from home one day each week + evenings and some early mornings
  • Home office for paying bills, sorting through the bank account, paying taxes, etc.
  • Important paperwork storage
  • Computer room
  • Home studio (music recording on my PC, though haven’t done much of that since I usurped my mixing board for band practice)
  • Managing and/all side businesses (there’s been a few, still a couple)
  • Book storage
  • CD storage
  • Music room (guitar, bass, amp)
  • Art studio!!!

Did I mention that this is a small, 10′ x 10′ space? I manage to cram a lot of crap into a small space.

It’s all about me, of course
I need a space where I can just go paint. Where I can sneak in and paint when I’ve got a half hour while the kids are watching Dora or otherwise engaged in making each other scream and cry. I need a space where I don’t have to completely build up and tear down every day. I need a space where I can be more productive. I need a space where I can use my computer at the same time that I’m painting.

The only down side is LIGHT. There’s no overhead light in the room and the window is in the sheltered area that is the front entryway, shaded by the garage and the dining room (the sidewalk is between them, the window is way back in the shadows). Ventilation is good, though – I can open the window in the winter and not worry about rain at all because I’ve got at least 5 feet or so of distance from where the rain can reach. I’ll need to see if the light is good enough or if I have to invest in one of those fancy art lights. Or maybe a full-spectrum bulb in a $5 clip-on would work?