Yes. I have written about this before. Yes, I will write about this again. I think I began this monstrosity somewhere around 2007. With a giant “X” on the canvas and a dot in the center. It’s disheartening, the lack of progress that has been made in such a lengthy span of time. I doubt I’ll finish it before I meet my untimely end in a meteor shower, or a train wreck, or a swarm of diseased pelicans. Which is unfortunate, because it’s challenging to sell an unfinished painting unless you were at your creative peak sometime around the 1400’s and were funded by someone with the last name of Medici. I think I missed the window on that one.

So year after year I periodically pick and poke at this canvas, visiting it when I feel the need (usually times of stress or emotional strain) upon which I have to go rummaging around my supplies in search of my vast collection of black and white inks, wee brushes, and pen nibs. When you haven’t touched such things in several months and have also moved house in such time, this can prove to be a daunting task. I have found myself wont to give up at times like these and simply purchase new supplies.

My timing…impeccable.

Blick Art Supplies finally opened a store right on Broadway and Pine.

This pleases me.

The type of work I do, both in paintings and in masks, requires an intense amount of detail, a very tiny brush, and a steady hand. Acrylic paint? Trying to get the desired effect with acrylic paint is akin to flossing with knitting yarn. And yes, just as painful. Acrylic paint tends to glob on the canvas, wrap around the brush as you’re painting…flow release is no help.

Acrylic ink…ah, now that’s the melody. Graceful, flowing, opaque…synchronizes harmoniously with my vast collection of size 00 sable brushes. Unfortunately, the only art supply store (until recently) in my city houses a paltry supply of virtually everything I need save for brushes. It has been a frustrating four years of being an architecturally-obsessed artist living on Capitol Hill.

But now, oh my…
My initial visit to Blick yesterday. Opening day. Made a bee-line for the drawing supplies aisle. And Oh…the beauty, the splendor…the choir of angels that poured down from the heavens…

I thought to myself, “They will do well here…”

To add to the bliss of the situation, I learned upon my arrival at the check-out counter that the prized inks I clutched so eagerly in my hands were buy two, get one free.

Shit.

So back I went. Which proved to be dangerous as I had to pass an extensive collection of graphic pens, of which I have more than is considered natural or healthy. I won’t comment on whether I took any home or not that day. Irrelevant. I grabbed a few more bottles of ink, threw on my mental blinders, my resolve unfaltering, ignoring the beckoning canvases, the seductive shellacs, the ridiculously unnecessary sketchbooks, and resumed my place in line, willing it to move quickly to remove me from temptation.

And…despite my doubts, I survived. For less than $50.00.

And I am now equipped to pick and poke at the 4’75” X 5′ bane of my existence for another fifteen minutes or so.

Voulez-voulez-vous bane of my existence, thy name now be Blick.