We just came back from a mad weekend dash to Mobile Bay, and after some effort (and a long, lazy lunch at Lulu's) we were able locate a few tar balls on the beach - way out at the tip of Fort Morgan, Alabama. These we gathered up in a mayonnaise jar and brought back to the studio, raw material for the only "oil" painting this ballpoint artist is likely to do for a very long time.
Today I also ordered a new limited lithograph edition of 16 x 20" Shellican prints - 100 of which will be signed, numbered, and remarqued with a dab of oil from the gulf.*
These "Deepwater Shellicans" should be ready by the end of July, and will be available thru the DS Art Studio, and the web site. They will sell for $100 each, with half of that amount going to support the Louisiana Wetland Watchers (see Gator Aid, below).
*My wife Sue Ellen continues to express her horror over my decision to deface my own fine art prints with crude oil. "It will make your pictures ugly," she says. Yes, it will. "The oil will spread everywhere, across the paper, and onto the Pelican." She's right about that, too. "It could make a mess of the frame and everything." Right again. In fact, that's rather the point.
Yes, this oily edition of Shellican prints will be messy. The oil will spread across the paper just as it is now spreading through the Gulf of Mexico. It has the potential to be ugly and inconvenient and even damaging - just like it behaves in the real world. As it slowly spreads across the picture, the oily mark will clearly demonstrate how acts of carelessness impact the things we care most about, in unexpected and often uncontrollable ways.
Sue Ellen is right about most things. Fortunately, she also knows a solid art concept when it washes up on the beach in front of her. She just wanted to make sure that folks had the option to obtain a clean, pristine Shellican print, if they wanted one.
If you prefer your birds (and your art) oil-free, a regular numbered series of 500 Shellican lithographs will be released later in the summer.
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