Art And Walls And Windows

My art is hanging in the windows. My art has hung in gallery windows, but here, in my new old big tiny house, it hangs in my windows. My neighbors get a view. Fortunately, I do, too, because I had my photos printed on archival translucent satin. Fancy. Hey, it is art. Fancy happens. The art is also hanging in my windows because there's hardly any wall space where they'd fit. Some accommodations must be made.

Old houses had more wall space. The house I sold was only 868 square feet, but the living room alone had enough wall space for three of the four walls to each represent a phase of my photography: film, early digital, and digital SLR. Convenient. The fourth wall had a sliver of sheetrock that held one friend's abstract painting between the front door and the enormous view window that framed a view of Puget Sound and the Olympics. Every room had room for art, even the bathroom.

In my tiny house, there are even windows in the roof. Let in the light! Keep the place from feeling dark and claustrophobic! There's a bare wall? Fill it with storage. Hide what little stuff is allowed in. A quick survey of the house reminds me that framed art is going to continue to be sequestered to my storage unit a couple of miles away. 

Every visit to my storage unit is a reminder of the boxed-up stacks of framed photos occupying one slice of wall. Opposite them, boxes that are even less appealing hold scrolls, prints rolled up to take up less space. Maybe someday some gallery will ask for them to be displayed, but I don't expect it. And yet, as an artist (and I still retreat from proclaiming that title unless necessary), I understand their subjective worth. As an entrepreneur, I understand their objective value. As a person trying to manage personal finances, I see them as a sunk cost that is costing me money every month to store them.

I haven't seen an analysis, but I am sure that the modern house has a greater proportion of window space over wall space than earlier homes. Shacks were lucky to have one window. Homesteads had more. Suburban houses, more. Eventually, we've gotten to the point where entire walls are made of windows. And some of those window walls move.

I saw that trend when I started selling my art. A friend ran a gallery, so I visited him on quiet days to keep him company. That may be when I noticed that people looked at art on the walls, but they were more drawn to functional art and things like sculptures. Wall art continues to sell; some of my friends are doing well creating it. But I decided to try to sell into the trend of art that can be hung on a window. For anyone who remembers slides, they can seem more vibrant because they are lit from within, not just whatever reflects back from some paper. Another friend was an expert printer and was experimenting with printing on translucent satin. Some subjects simply looked brighter. Scenes like sparkling water, or sunsets, or anything shiny felt truer to the original experience. Photons were flowing through and out, not just bouncing off the art.

That's why I am lucky enough to have art to hang in my windows. One piece in particular is appropriate: a ferry crossing Admiralty Inlet to Port Townsend, my new hometown, on a sparkly day.

But, there are those stacks of frames relegated to cardboard boxes and tubes. They wait for me to move to a bigger, and maybe older house, or ideally to a gallery where they can be bought and moved to many houses.

Maybe that will happen after I finish my next multi-year series, that I'll start after I buy a new camera. I used up the old one. Yes, it is possible to use up a digital camera, or maybe more appropriately, I mis-used it. Hey, nature photography happens in nature. Nature is naturally messy. 

Ideally, posts like this provide some solution to some problem, but they can also simply describe an unintended consequence. There is one solution that I am considering, but it is far down my priority list. Projectors are getting smaller and more affordable. I even have stock in a company that (unsuccessfully) created a projector that fits in a cell phone. (But really, MVIS, try again.) Even a larger one may only be a few-inch cube. Drape a screen over a window or in front of some cabinets, and I get a bigger screen for watching movies, and can scroll art that might otherwise be ignored.

Hmm. Maybe I should revise that shopping list.