A Blast from the Past!

I don't have a new painting to post today so I thought I'd do something different.  If you read my bio you know I started painting and selling my work in 1976.  I started teaching tole painting a year later and did that for over 15 years.  I probably taught an average of 12 to15 class sessions a year with an average of 15 students per class.  I taught adult-ed at 2 different high schools and at various craft stores, two YWCA's and also home classes.  While going though some old photo albums I found some photos I took "back in the day".  The first two are of a class I taught at Fitch High School in Austintown, Ohio in October of 1985.  I taught at Fitch for 15 years and always had a full class.

If you click on the photos to enlarge them you can see the items the students were working on and the subject matter.  Each student worked on their choice of project and pattern at their own pace.  The other thing I noticed when I looked at these pictures is all the big curly hair that was the style back then.

Here is one of me working on a painting at home that was on the same roll of film.  How many people use film now days?   I just realized that I am the same age in this photo that my youngest daughter will turn on her birthday on Sunday.  Where did the years go?

 

This is the completed painting and below you will see some more of my work from that time period.  Everything was very "country" style.  I was working in oils back then and had not started to embellish things with dots.

The last photo that you will see below was taken a few years later at a craft show.  It is in black and white.   Big curly hair and large shoulder pad were in style.   Why when we look at old photos, what was in fashion at the time that we thought made us look so cool, 20 or so years later looks so funny?  By the time this photo was taken I had made the change to acrylics and was starting with the dot borders.  We lived in Amish country so that was the focus of most of my paintings.  I sold almost everything I painted and am happy to say that is still true to this present day.  Hope you enjoyed this "blast from the past".