Our Memphis npr station WKNO fm has a wonderful twice daily interview show called Checking on the Arts. I listen to npr wherever I travel, and some of the stations occasionally have live bands in the studio or something, but I have never encountered such a frequent and broadly arts supportive show as we have here. I'm so grateful to Darel Snodgrass and Kacky Walton for their dedication to it, the research they do, the kindness to all of us trying to make a living at the arts, and the great questions they invariably ask.

I love listening and hearing friends, artists, musicians, theater directors, and a whole host of other people each day talking about the things that make Memphis so wonderful to live in.

Darel kindly had Elizabeth Alley and me on the first of this week to talk about our show of travel paintings at Memphis Botanic Garden (up till January 2). I was in Cape May at the time (we had prerecorded it) and completely forgot it was airing, so Darel was also kind enough to share the file with me.

Making art is a solitary and non-verbal process much of the time, and I find that I really learn things about what I do and why I'm doing it every time I go in and sit with Darel and have to think about the probing questions he asks. I also just love the whole crew down at WKNO, so it's fun to have an excuse to drop in the office and hug everyone. Anyway, we had a blast, and here it is if you'd like to hear about our travel paintings and what that process is like for each of us.

Here's an old sketch of Justin Willingham, the afternoon WKNO host, in their studios.

I met professional photographer Jackie Kane while I was up in Cape May. Since I'm working up there on my own largely (though the staff there always make me very welcome), it's fun to get to meet and talk to fun and interesting people. I met a couple of artists this time (I'm talking about you, Doug!), and it's always neat to talk shop. An added bonus was Jackie turning her talents to take shots of me while I was working. (The full set of them is on her site here.)

She found me on the coldest day I actually did work outside (middle 30's), so I'm embarrassed about the hat situation. I need my broad floppy hat instead of my cuter winter hat to give me shade while I work, so I had a stocking wool hat on underneath it. Sigh. A fashion plate I am not.

But it's kind of fun to get to see my set up through someone else's eyes.

Here's my favorite one. It really embodies the act of creation to me.

You can see lots more of Jackie's work here. She's got a great eye and gets that beautiful light I never manage to achieve in my photographs. Her Ferris wheel at night series is super cool.

 Cape Resorts, the hotel group I do illustrations for in Cape May, NJ, has a holiday slide show of my watercolors going across the top of their website. It is such fun to see my work being used.

I'm just about to head back up there, too, and paint their Christmas festivities for a second year in a row. It's a busy week, with the MBG Paris show a week ago (and still up till New Year's), my home show this past Sunday, and my upcoming departure Thursday morning.

The home show was great fun. I loved having so many friends come through, and I made some new ones as well, which is always lovely. The show wound down the last half hour when my friend and touring musician Andy Cohen showed up with his guitar. I got out my bass, and we played a little music before our respective evening engagements. A perfect way to end a fun day.

And now I'm gearing up to go back to a place I've really come to love. I just hope the snow is all gone by Thursday....

More screen shots from the Cape Resorts website:

I'm setting up today for tomorrow's Open Studio Sale from 12-5. It's only one day this year because of the marathon tying things up on Saturday, though it turns out that the race was cancelled after all due to ice and cold.

I'll be here no matter what the weather. I've got hot cider, and later this afternoon I'll be baking the cookies I mixed up yesterday. So come on over if you're out and about, or if you've got a little cabin fever built up. Hopefully we're through the ice, but I'll be open regardless.

April in Paris and Lessons in Spanish is UP! It's my joint travel paintings show with Elizabeth Alley at Memphis Botanic Garden. The opening is tonight from 5:30-7:30 -- free and open to everyone. Bring your friends and have a glass of wine on us!

It was a long hanging day yesterday. I'm grateful to be working in a smaller format these days. Instead of hauling huge canvases (or, even worse, huge pastels under glass), I could carry my entire show into the building in one trip. Here it is:

The downside is the long layout process for that many pieces. I ran out of time at the end and didn't get a final count, but I think I hung almost 100 watercolors and prints.

I lay them down on the floor first, take a snapshot of the layout on my smart phone (a marvelous tip I got from Elizabeth last time we hung a show together), and stick them on the walls with poster tape. Marvelous stuff.

There were tons of nail holes in the walls, so my arrangements changed a bit as I moved to the wall, trying to hide as many of them as possible.

I worked so late it was pretty dark to get a decent photograph, and the lights weren't adjusted for my show yet (hopefully MBG can make that happen before the opening tonight), but here's how the first wall looks. Overall I'm pleased.

I needed a break after the last print, which was architectural and complex, so I decided on a garden one next.

I've always loved the geometry and mass of formal gardens and had been hoping to find more of them in France than I managed to. Most of the topiary I found was a disappointing knee high, but I did find a few gardens I wanted to paint.

Chateau de la Chatonniere was a few miles out of Azay le Rideau, where I spent several happy nights at the beginning of my trip. I didn't have a car, so one day I packed a lunch and my painting gear and just hiked out to see the chateau gardens. That was the day I discovered that while the French are scrupulous about crosswalks, they are less likely to give quarter to pedestrians on the side of a country road. But it was a lovely day, and I had fun painting in the gardens.

The carving on this one went much more quickly, which was a welcome break after the Opera print. I was able to pull a proof on just the second day of work and see what it was looking like.

I did a bit more refining, especially in the chateau itself, before pulling the second proof. It's almost finished now, and I'm trying to figure out which watercolor I want to work from next.

I'm putting together my 2014 calendar this week. I spent so much more time painting in Paris this year than I did in Memphis that I decided to focus on Paris this year. It's the work I'm most proud lately.

Because it's not Memphis, it won't be sold in as many locations this year, so put your order in with me now if you'd like one! You can email martha1kelly@aol.com if you'd like to be included in my order to the printer.

Here are the images for the calendar:

I was working on a print today from Ile de la Cite (my third Paris print for the December show at Memphis Botanic Gardens), when I noticed on Facebook that Rene Miller is in Atlanta right now. Rene is one of the two musicians who befriended me in Paris, and they played on Ile de la Cite most Saturdays. I spent a number of very happy weekend hours sitting on various sidewalks and listening to him play the blues, accompanied by the excellent Stephen Harrison on bass.

Rene is in Atlanta for three weeks visiting his family, and happily I'm already heading down there during that time for a dance weekend. If I go a day early, I can catch him playing in a blues club down there. We talked on the phone today, and it was great to get a visit. I'm excited just to see him and catch up. I've missed both the guys, and I've been listening to Rene's cd in my truck for the last month, singing along and remembering Paris.

Here's a street video of Rene and Stephen doing my very favorite song of theirs -- an old time jazz tune called "Arkansas." They were kind enough to play it for me each week.

In other news today, it's the two month anniversary of Mr. Darcy coming into my life. That's my housemate Neil in the background. I'm really lucky to have them both around.

Saturday was the Urban Sketchers' International Sketch Crawl. Urban Sketching groups across the world went out to draw together. The Memphis chapter met up at the Peabody, our grand old downtown hotel. It was a fun and elegant place to draw.

After the duck parade, several of us when across the street to have lunch and keep drawing at the Flying Fish. Tom Pruett let me try his water soluble markers. I keep trying markers and having trouble getting the effects I want. These are made by Tombo, and they were fun to try. I might have to get my own pack. They're neater than watercolors, though I like actual paint better, despite the trouble.

I recently unearthed these two sketches of a dinner I had with Elizabeth Alley. We had fun visiting and drawing over dinner and comparing recent sketching journeys we had taken. It was fun to have dinner with someone else who also enjoys drawing through a meal.