For the first time this year, I am sending some work to the Grand National Rodeo, which will be held in San Francisco from April 4-12 http://www.grandnationalrodeo.com/. I’ve been working away off and on for the past several months, trying to get a few pieces done for this show. Finally (and not a moment too soon) I’m almost ready to ship the artwork.

We are allowed a base number of 5 pieces per artist, although there is the option of sending additional smaller works which will be displayed as space allows. I’ll have to make that decision at the last minute depending on available space in my shipping box. For the moment, I’m sending at least four works, possibly five if the one I just decided to add can be sorted out in time. The “for sure” ones are three photo works–one relatively straightforward and two photomontages, plus a mixed media collage on canvas with photo elements in it. Mostly I’m trying to stick to a “western” theme.

The collage is called “War Pony’s World”, one of the photos is a close crop of a quarter horse with western saddle and chaps, one is a photomontage of a Clydesdale “ghost” in front of an old abandoned house in a landscape (one of a number of “ghost horse” images I have done, with yet more in the planning), and a more elaborate photomontage called “Ranch Life”, mostly based on photos I took at the cowhorse training ranch I went to a few times last fall for photo shoots. This place is a visual goldmine for someone like me and I’m looking forward to getting out there once mud season has passed.

Today’s photos are of “War Pony’s World”, the mixed media collage (featuring the ineffable Homer, owned by the barn man at Ebon where I ride, and featured in other war pony works I’ve done in the past), and “Ranch Life”, which is fairly self-explanatory. The version I am sending of Ranch Life is mildly different due to complications with my mat and frame size, but this one is pretty close to the end product.

Trying to wrap and box artwork for shipping is a major ordeal for me, and it never seems to get any easier. To add insult to injury on this front, you never know whether or not the works will sell or will be returned, so I have to make preparations as if all the artwork will be coming back here, complete with return labels, forms for across the border shipping, and arrangements to pay for it all. Then we cross our fingers and hope for the best. In an ideal world, all the works will sell at the show and I’ll just get a nice cheque in the mail. No harm in hoping for the best! Worst case, everything comes back, and if the wording isn’t just right on the customs forms, I get to pay tax on my own unsold works returning to Canada! Generally this can be avoided, but there’s always a risk. No wonder I don’t care for this whole process.

©Copyright 2008 by Judy Wood. See original post here.