As a Christmas gift to ourselves last December, I booked a 4-day stay in the wonderful historic and scenic town of Mendocino, scheduled for mid-February. For those of you who are unfamiliar with it, Mendocino is about 140 miles north of San Francisco, and is perched on headlands overlooking Mendocino Bay and the Pacific beyond. The views just from the main street are spectacular and the town is almost surrounded by the Mendocino Headlands State Park where short trails lead to even more.
As usual for a trip up there, I gathered together a portfolio of photos of some recent work to show gallery owners in an attempt to persuade one to take me on as one of their artists. Rejection is the norm because virtually every gallery is “full” and it is very rare one of them would have the physical or business space to take on another artist. In the case of Mendocino, this has always been a long-shot because there were only two or three galleries in the first place where my work would fit in and in the past each one was representing all the artists they could possibly handle.
The first day, walking around exploring the downtown shops, I was quite disappointed that a couple of galleries I had thought might be possibilities seemed to be out of business. They were just plain gone! The final one I had actually not even remembered (it turns out it had merely moved to a new location). It was set back from the main street with a beautifully kept front courtyard with a white picket fence and gate along the sidewalk and greeted visitors with a bright, sunny front porch entrance. As we walked through the front door, the quality of work was immediately obvious — really high quality paintings, stained glass, ceramics, sculpture, jewelry and woodwork. I thought to myself, “This is where I want to be.”
The next part has always been awkward both for me and a prospective gallery owner. It is generally a short back and forth almost always ending with something like, “We are completely full right now, but we will keep you in mind if a space opens up.” It seemed apparent that they liked my work, but the ultimate response was the same as usual. However, something seemed a little different this time. The owner, Lynne Prentice, seemed puzzled about something, like she thought she might have heard my name or seen my work somewhere before. At any rate, Karen and I left after really marveling at a lot of the wonderful work being shown and continued exploring the downtown shops, disappointed but not very surprised.
Fully a half-hour after leaving the gallery my cellphone buzzed. I saw it was from the gallery and answered and heard Lynne say, “I know where I’ve seen your work! A client from Florida sent us a silkscreen print of yours of Mendocino for us to sell on consignment. Yes, we definitely would like to have your work in the gallery!”
At last, a “YES!”
Just before my birthday in March, ignorant of the Corona virus at the time, Karen and I loaded the car with almost 20 acrylics and oils (and a few silkscreen prints) and drove them up to Mendocino to the Prentice Gallery. I will happily be joining a wonderful group of other artists and craftspeople. Of course, as luck would have it, immediately after leaving all my pieces and getting home to Pacifica on March 15, the gallery had to close due to Covid-19, but today Lynne is “virtual re-opening” with a newly designed website and will be physically open limited hours from 12 noon to 3pm on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays for the time being. Please check out all the great artwork at the new gallery website. I am sure you will really enjoy it!
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