Welcome To My First Post

Welcome to my blog, beginning a blog is a challenge, not too unlike beginning a new painting on a blank canvas when the possibilities of what will emerge are endless.

My public persona has primarily been as an architect while my work as a painter, for a long time, has been a private endeavor. Expressing myself through my paintings, writing in journals or corresponding with friends and fellow artists has usually been done in the privacy of my studio and not available in the public domain.

Expressing myself in a blog is new and strange, but the challenge of expressing new ideas with words or images is always the challenge of the artist. Blogging feels like a social experiment using a medium that is publicly raw and immediate.

I enjoy painting and drawing but I do not enjoy the marketing and selling side of being an artist. Many years ago I did show my work in galleries and fairs but at some point decided I did not want my art to be influenced by commercial energies. For many years I avoided presenting my work publicly and chose instead to enjoy creating it and sharing it with my family, friends and the collectors who knew my work.

My wife, Felicity, and I recently downsized from Point Reyes to a houseboat in Sausalito and returned to our roots. I retired (relatively) from a long and satisfying architectural career and she retired from running our Bed & Breakfast.

After many discussions about what we were going to do with the rest of our lives and how we were going to support ourselves now that we were retired - we concluded: I like to paint and have large body of work we could sell and make archival quality giclee prints and since Felicity actually enjoys the social aspects of marketing and promotion she could manage the “art business” aspect . This led to a discussion about how and where - which led us to the internet - which led us to Sausalito Art Galleries – an online gallery with international affiliates -which then led to creating a website -which has now led us to blogging.

So here I am blogging away – Currently I am working in oil and have also embarked upon a project organizing my good friend, sculptor, Al Sybrian’s drawings and journals. Al was a very artistic, creative, observant man and it is quite fascinating to read his thoughts on almost all subjects and the people he knew. I will be including some of his more astute and humorous observations about the human condition in future blogs as well as my own thoughts and insights.

I invite you to visit my website www.kirschart.com to see my work and hope you bookmark this blog and participate in the dialog so we can march into the future together.