I had the wonderful opportunity to get an inside view into my own family's business. Splendora Gardens is, at the moment, an art studio and gallery open to the public, that doubles as an event space for large scale event in Splendora, Texas. Weddings, school award ceremonies, and even graduations can be held inside the large space.
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Before I went to my internship, I actually had a chance to see the property for the first time before I had to live there. My aunt was getting married to a painter named Carlos Canul, so naturally they used Splendora Gardens as the ceremony space. It was a beautiful wedding, and it showed me the scale of events that could be held there; while also giving me the chance to explore the property and see where I would be living during my internship. There was a brief moment within myself where I felt very anxious about going on this journey. I was worried about leaving behind my friends and evolving as a person. I was scared of being alone and the havoc this trip would cause on my relationships.
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When it comes to the physical portion of my project, I painted an original while down there. I was not going to waste the opportunity of going to an art retreat and not doing art. In my down time, I took up a painting that I worked on for the three week time period. Seeing that both my aunt and my uncle are artists, I was surrounded by like minded people for critics of my piece.
"Dragon out of Frame" is a small canvas painting created using gouache paint. I have had a fascination in drawing dragons for awhile now, and even created a similar creature to the one I painted for my Ghost Ranch Osprey week trip. |
Other than pompous artists and the super wealthys' way of talking to me, I did not face too many struggles. The biggest and fiercest struggle, however, came from something that was not human nor was it controllable: that being the weather in Houston. We faced many rain storms and semi-floods the last week I was there, and when I say semi-flood, I am saying worse floods than could be seen in Durango. It was frustrating to stay home at the studio everyday when Ruby and I had plans to travel into Houston and look at art or eat at a exotic restaurant. Mother nature really threw a wrench into most of the plans Ruby and I had that week, so the last week of my internship became me sitting home alone and doing art by myself. Even though Ruby and Carlos lived just down the road from my tiny house, a tree had fallen into the road and blocked there cars from coming up. This left me even more alone than I was, and the excruciating boredom of having nothing to do was kicking in. Luckily for me, these crazy rainstorms did not affect my internship the whole time, it was a bit frustrating in the moment. No matter how much I love the rain, the sound of the drops on the tin roof of the studio, and the thousands of frogs hoping along the road - I missed the bright blue, open sky more than anything.
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