Hi, everyone! Yesterday was cold and damp. Today is expected to be milder and drier.
We had lots of Open Studios fun yesterday, and I hope we’ll have even more today. Remember, I am No. 119 on your Somerville Open Studios map, close by the Mudflats trolley stop in East Somerville.
See you this afternoon – this time wearing a sweater in honor of May in Massachusetts.
I will be showing on my front porch today, Saturday, 5/2. I look forward to seeing you all.
However, the forecast is for rain showers on and off all day, so I am adjusting my exhibition accordingly. There will be work for you to see, but the main thing will be live art making by me, so that if the weather turns, the more delicate things can be whisked to indoors safety.
And yes, for those who know me, “live art making” does mean I’ll be working on the things I didn’t have time to finish yesterday.
This weekend, May 2 & 3, 12-6 pm, is Somerville Open Studios, the biggest arts event in our quaint and scenic town. Naturally, I’m behind my time in letting you all know about it, but such is me.
I’ll be turning my front porch into a mini exhibition celebrating the spring season, its moods, symbols, weather, and magic, featuring our wild city rabbits among others.
Weather Note: The forecast is for “chance” of rain this weekend. Please subscribe to this website or follow me on Bluesky to receive updates in case I get rained out on Saturday or Sunday.
You can also see my collage-assemblage, “Pink Yarrow,” at Somerville Museum, and a new collage-painting, “April,” at the Brickbottom Gallery, both indoors.
Enjoy a sneak peak at some new works in progress, which I hope to bring out for SOS.
On the magic of rabbits.
Rabbit, bring me luck. Rabbit, bring me many. Rabbit, bring me happiness, But for my foe, not any.
That little ditty is my pitch for wild rabbits as a role model for our times, because they symbolize the four powers we all need right now. Good luck to get through the storms. Abundance to meet our needs, one way or another. Joy in love and pleasure. Resilience to take the blows and never back down because, dammit, these are our streets.
I think, for most people, spring is a cutesy-pootsy season of flowers and baby animals, but I see it differently.
To me, spring is a time when the new forcibly replaces the old, dead, and rotten. Spring brings out the big passions and changes everything, ready or not. It’s births and beginnings. It’s melting and mess. It’s bright colors and clean green shoots pushing through the mud. It’s migrating birds, emerging bees, and for me, it’s the rabbits.
The old rabbits of winter, scarred, skinny, and strong. The new rabbits like delicate treasures nested in our flower beds.
Rabbits making the first of many babies. Rabbits dodging a thousand dangers. Rabbits robbing our gardens, lounging in the sun, grooming their tiny little faces with their tiny little paws (omg). Rabbits waging war all over town to claim and defend their territories, be they lush parks or weedy train yards.
If I have my way, it’ll be all lush parks and gardens, because where the rabbits thrive, so can we.
-Jen
Note: This post contains 407 words, which according to western numerology, reduces to 11 and then to 2. In tarot, 11 is the number of Justice in some systems and Strength in others, and 2 is the number of The High Priestess. Justice, Strength, and Wisdom.
How to stay hopeful when it all gets to be just too much seems to be the question of the day, at least among the Youtubers and pundits I follow. How to weather the slings and arrows, pick yourself up and dust yourself off, and all that.
Well, honestly, I’ve always been too bloody-minded to lose hope for very long. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had plenty of dark nights, but I get too angry at the effrontery of upstarts to meekly accept whatever they want my fate to be. To me, hope has never been the thing with feathers fluttering in the deep recesses of the heart. Rather, it’s the thing that spits out a bloody tooth and wades back into the fight for another round.
Life has been a real fight lately, hasn’t it? We’ve all been well and truly in it, and there’s no end in sight. Here at the house attached to the studio, we’ve been dealing with medical crises and all the attendant crises that come along with needing urgent help. Don’t worry, it’s working out. Life was saved. Sickness was cured. Needed work is being done. But this past month has been scary and exhausting and expensive, recovery and caring are not yet finished, and neglected work, home, garden, etc., knocked into the proverbial cocked hat by personal disaster, are demanding to get back on the agenda. Time is ready to march on even if I’m not.
So, when all has fallen into confusion, when I’m hopelessly behind on every task, exhausted to the point that I can’t even sleep, and the 10,000 things rush to fill every hour of the day, I open my eyes and look for the patterns in the chaos. This is what I call magic. To find the hidden structures that reveal the sense of it all. Thus I orient myself, ground and center myself, and gradually regain control of my reality.
Art and storytelling are my arcane methods for that.
I cast spells to shine clear lights on dark things, draw boundaries, invoke powers, steer and shape energies, and explore mysteries – until I feel pulled together enough to stand stably on my feet again.
And this year, because we’re all really going through it, I’m sharing my magical explorations with all of you. From now through at least New Year – maybe to spring, I’ll see how it goes – I present “Finding Magic,” a small works series celebrating the winter months of 2025-2026.
Talismans and amulets, tiny things to accent a threshold or guard a book. Symbols of power, resilience, prosperity, emotions. Worlds in the palm of your hand. Portals to other realms. Small wishes to bring good things into challenging times.
In the northern hemisphere, where I live, winter is the season for new beginnings, containing as it does not one but four new years – the solar new year of the winter solstice, the astronomical new year at the close of the calendar, the planetary new year at Earth’s perihelion, and the lunar new year in February. It’s a season for resting and resetting, for looking back and ahead, for personal transformations, for the quiet inner work of healing and growth.
With “Finding Magic,” I invite you to come along with me as I do that work for myself and offer what I find to you.
There seems to be a trend – or I’d like there to be a trend – of artists celebrating the end of the year with affordable small works series to tell the story of the year that was. “Finding Magic” is about pulling ourselves together to wade back into the fight next year, stronger, refreshed, clear-eyed, and empowered.
It will be all small items in various media, priced for any budget at under $50 and under $100 depending on the piece. Follow this site for updates as new pieces are finished.
Jen Fries, Eye Amulets, pastel, watercolor, and ink on paper, roughly life-sized, $25 each, part of “Finding Magic.” Display, carry, use for ornament, journaling, or to ward off unwelcome pests and gossips. Email me if interested.
And if you happen to be in the Boston, Massachusetts, area this weekend, stop by the Brickbottom building in Somerville for our Open Studios event, November 22-23, 12-6pm. Info here. I’ll be in Unit C322, showing the first of the “Finding Magic” pieces along with larger works on similar themes.
It begins at 12:00AM and runs through 11:59PM. For this whole day, we are suspending all non-essential commerce. No shopping. No buying. Especially, no corporate brands or chains. If you must spend money, go to small, local shops, preferably in person, to avoid giving business to Google et al., and pay in cash, to avoid giving business to credit card companies and big banks.
You might think a single day of across-the-board economic shutdown won’t have any effect. But I happen to be a fan of consumer activism, so let me explain why I encourage you to get on board with Blackout Day.
First, this day is just the beginning. We might call it a “shot across their bow,” i.e. a warning to remind the people trying to dismantle our Constitution and way of life what leverage We the People of the United States really hold.
One inescapable fact of the USA is that it runs on money. For good or ill, the US is a mercantile nation. Money is the body and soul of our politics and our power structure.
And there is no money if there is no We the People. The US economy runs entirely on the labor and purchasing of millions of Americans. That’s us doing the jobs and us buying the stuff. Anything that interferes with us showing up for work or us buying stuff from stores slows the economy immediately. If it keeps up a while, our “envy of the world” economy quickly starts to shrink.
And boy-howdy, do the billionaires start yelping when that happens.
Remember the 2008 crash, when the global economy very nearly collapsed and countless Americans lost their homes and were drowning in debt. Remember how the economic pundits and the billionaire CEOs were all over media complaining about the slow recovery after that crisis of their making. Remember how they blamed the American people for unpatriotically – yes, some of them actually invoked patriotism – saving our money instead of spending it like they wanted us to.
Remember the pandemic, when there were no jobs, no open shops, even the supply chains were shut down, but we individual worker-consumers were still getting scolded for not getting out there to lend it, spend it, send it rolling along. I will swear to my last breath that I heard multiple capitalists on US media literally declaring that keeping the economy going was more important than keeping ourselves alive, and we were betraying the nation by staying home just to stay healthy.
Were any of those pundits, capitalists, or CEOs on the brink of starvation from the faltering economy in those crises? No, they were not. So why did they care so much?
If I were an economist, it would be complicated to explain, but I’m not, so it’s simple.
The heads of US industry, the leaders of our dominant businesses, our CEOs and Directors, our would-be American oligarchs are, at the end of the day, little more than glorified peddlers. Take a hard look at them, all those Big Corp brands. They’re all basically hawking junk on street corners, just like a hundred-plus years ago when they were selling liver pills and miracle tonics off wagons and conning yokels into selling their land for wildcat oil drilling.
All these years, all these generations, these latter-day robber barons built their fortunes by conning – or extorting – the rest of us into giving them all our labor and all our money.
When we stop giving them those things, their house-of-cards empires start to shake. It never fails.
A dip in commerce means a dip in profit margins – a hiccough in line-go-up. It doesn’t matter if it’s just a one-day event. The blip will appear on the radar, and the voting shareholders won’t like it, since the only reason for any of these grifters to exist at all is to maximize profits for voting shareholders. Blips don’t maximize.
So on February 28, we will do our best to put a blip on the radar.
If they’re smart, they will listen to our demands. They will back off their attempt to turn the US into a fascist client state to Vladimir Putin. They will restore order, funding, and staffing to the US federal government. They will obey the orders of the federal courts. They will pass a proper federal budget. They will restore our support for our traditional allies and trading partners in accordance with our treaties. They will quit fucking around with things they don’t understand.
If they’re not smart, then there will be more blips. Bigger blips. More blackouts will follow, along with longer boycotts and labor actions.
If they take away our rights from us, we will take away our money from them. If they take away our liberty, we will take away our work. If they take away our Constitution and our system of law and representation, we will take away the life blood of the economy and their industries.
And we shall see who wins the argument. Myself, I’m betting on We the People, because we have the numbers, and without us, they have nothing.
Now, as a movement, economic resistance is relatively slow and requires discipline, organization, and cooperation. It demands that we change long-accustomed habits, that we support each other in our communities, and that we all do some creative problem-solving.
But today is just one day. The first day. So let’s try it out, and see how it goes.
At the very least, not spending money for a day isn’t going to hurt you any.
And remember, this is just for non-essential spending. There are people who would prefer a total shut-down of all transactions, but those people forget February 28 is the last day of the month. It’s Rent Day for millions of us. We must be reasonable. Do pay your rent, by whatever method you normally use. Pay your bills if they’re due. If you have to fill a prescription or keep a medical appointment, etc., take care of it. That is essential spending, not non-essential.
But stay the hell off Amazon. Stay away from the big box retailers. Don’t log into your streaming services. Don’t send money over the internet or pay for anything by credit card. Don’t order in from a chain restaurant via a corporate gig-work delivery service. Just don’t.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I run a small business out of my studio. I would very dearly love for you to buy my work.
But not today. Not online today. Today is for a different kind of work, without which I might not be able to keep doing my life’s work.
You know what I’ll be doing today, instead of trying to sell you my art? I’ll be doing some creative problem-solving. For example, I think I’ll research alternatives to Paypal and Venmo (the same company) so I can offer you a more ethical way to do business with me. Might take some time, but it’s a great day to start, don’t you think?
And I’ll do some artwork, so there’ll be fresh stuff for you to buy as well.
Today is the first day of the economic part of the pro-democracy resistance in the US.
Today is also the last day of the last month of winter. Tomorrow, March 1, we begin barreling into spring. Is there a better moment to wake up? To dump the old in favor of the new? To clean our house?
I went for a walk before I wrote this and saw the first green shoots rising from the ice-soaked ground in a neighborhood park.
That’s an allegory for you, right there.
This is how the weather changes. This is how the tides turn.
Well, I’ve just about settled down from the rush of Open Studios at the Brickbottom Artists Building in Somerville. It was a great weekend, despite a rainy start. The energy was terrific. I want to thank the wonderful folks who bought art from me, as well as everyone who stopped to talk with us about our work.
Also all the OS organizers who worked like mad and did a great job, our lovely hosts who opened their loft for us, and my fellow artists with whom I shared the space. It was a blast, thanks to them.
Now midnight approaches, soft jazz plays, and my cat is asleep on my lap as I write this quick note. As soon as I click the Publish button, I’ll shift her so I can go to my own bed, absolutely exhausted – and start afresh tomorrow.
I’ll end with this: Many of the Open Studios visitors told me they were feeling inspired by all the art and meeting the people who made it. They felt excited and interested and wanted to take up creative hobbies again that they had dropped for one reason or another. I can’t tell you how happy that made me. I deeply hope they do it, all of them.
Today’s world is so inhibiting, even discouraging against us expressing ourselves. Before we take the first step, we convince ourselves we’re not good enough. Even to try is just too pretentious of us. But that’s just bullshit.
Art is one of the most basic human things in all of life. It’s like walking and talking – a natural impulse. But it’s not brain surgery. No one will suffer if we screw up an art project. So don’t hold back. Don’t worry about results, or winning approval, or any of that. Just do it. Slap some color onto a piece of paper. Squish some clay. Write down some words. Decorate that cake. Pick up that ukulele. Do it just to please yourself, not for likes or subs. It’ll make things better, I promise.
Good night, everyone, from the EST time zone, and thank you. Never stop creating.
Thanks to my colleague, Amy Norrod, for these photos of my art and set-up.
You are cordially invited to visit with me at the Brickbottom Artists Open Studios event, this weekend, November 23 and 24, 12-5 PM each day.
Yes, I’m actually coming out of my house! I’ve been doing so much work that I decided to make one of my rare public appearances to show it off and tell people all about it. I’ll be displaying medium and small works on canvas, small works on paper, journaling/note cards, and tiny micro-zines, and I’ll be happy to answer questions and engage in sociable chit-chat.
Behold! A selection of the art I’m bringing to the event.
Meet and Greet the Artist
Technically, I’m not literally opening my studio. I’ve been a member of the Brickbottom Artists Association of Somerville since 2020, but I only live near, not in, the physical Brickbottom Artists Buildings. I’m what we call an Affiliate Member. (Though, to be honest, I’m really freaking close, just a few streets away.) So I am bringing my studio to you, thanks to a kind and generous resident who is hosting several Affiliates for this year’s event.
I’ll have pieces for exhibition and pieces for sale, and I’ll be there to say hi, chat you up, answer all your questions great and small, and generally make myself pleasant.
Start Your Holiday Shopping Early
This is a great chance to exploit my fever of experimentation, as I will be showing a wide selection of small artworks and handmade cards for mailing or journaling, all very easy to buy, carry home, and gift to loved ones or yourself.
Works on canvas are ready to hang. Art Books and micro-zines can take you on amazing journeys, as books do. Mini paintings can adorn any desk, wall, cork board, or table, easily. And journaling and note cards are the ideal chance to embrace Art as Lifestyle, with original, unique abstract paintings designed for work as journaling cards, bookmarks, or note cards.
Hand-painted abstracts for journaling, writing, or display.
Business Stuff
If you’d like to buy some of my art, please be advised I’m accepting cash only at the event.
Yes, I know, it’s terribly backward of me, but I do so few of these events that it would actually be less efficient to set up a system to process credit cards.
But I realize it’s inconvenient for many of you, so you can also buy art online, right now or any time between now and the end of the event on Sunday evening.
If there’s any art on this site you particularly like, email me, and I’ll let you know if it’s available and for what price. You can buy it online before the weekend and pick it up from me in person at the Brickbottom.
The journaling cards are $15 each, or buy three and get a fourth card free.
Be sure to ask me about any other special offers as well as ongoing or future projects on the event days.
Brickbottom and Joy Street Open Studios, Nov. 23 & 24
End of November Web Forecast: Expect an unseasonably heavy flurry of update posts from yours truly for the rest of this week.
Okay, it’s been a period of time. My last post was made the night before Election Day in the US, and by now, we all know how it turned out. Sigh.
I just want to say that, for me, nothing has changed from what I wrote then. I chose hope. I’m not googling how to change my mind after the fact, like many maga voters reportedly did. You can read the full pre-election post here, if you missed it earlier.
However, when I say I choose hope, don’t expect any pollyanna-ist reassurances here at Jen Fries Arts. No fluttering of the thing with feathers. That’s not my scene. My style of hope is the kind that spits out a bloody tooth and wades back into the fray, because where there’s a will, there’s a way, and I will be damned if I ever give up on what I know to be right.
Of course, it’s all been terribly inconvenient. There were emergency jettisons of certain social and personal connections, some of whom wouldn’t leave quietly. I still feel physically like I’ve been in a car accident. There’s My Sainted Mom who feels just as bad and just as pissed off. And on top of everything else, the cat’s been poorly, poor baby.
All of it utterly derailed what was supposed to have been a whole month of prep and info for my Open Studios event, which is scheduled to start – checks notes – frikkin this weekend. November 23 and 24.
So this is just to get you all caught up. Expect an unusual-for-me rush of posts about the Brickbottom and Joy Street Open Studios weekend here in quaint and romantic Somerville, MA. Also some website and shop updates. I’ll be doing all this work tonight and tomorrow, basically. Apologies in advance, but the new info will be good for you to have.
For starters:
Open Studios, November 23 and 24, at the Brickbottom Artists Building, 1 Fitchburg Street, Somerville, MA.
I’ll be sharing space with some colleagues in Unit B450, in the Bakery Building of the Brickbottom complex.
I seldom do these kinds of events, so this will be a rare opportunity to see me outside my little stoat burrow. I’ll be showing small to medium works on canvas or paper, hand-painted journaling cards, some micro-zines, and maybe some hand-made art books if I can finish them on time. I’m also up for chit-chat about methods, styles, affordability, sustainability, and life in the zombie apocalypse.
So if you’re around then and there, come on by. Info at Brickbottom.org.
I joined Bluesky as an alternative to Facebook, but I am still also on Facebook and Patreon. Of course, it’s all just social media with the usual nonsense, so …
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It has a kooky name, but it’s a fun event. In Somerville’s city-wide Yart Sale, Saturday, August 10th, the local arts community open up their yards and front porches for impromptu art exhibitions and sales. It’s a relaxed way to get to know your more boho neighbors, soak up the culture of Our Fair City, and maybe pick up something beautiful for your home or a gift. I’ll be participating again this year, showing new and favorite works.
Rain is predicted, but the forecasts so far think it will clear out well before noon on Saturday, so we should be good to go. Just in case, the rain date is Sunday, 8/11.
Visit the Somerville Arts Council Yart Sale page for event details and an interactive online map of all the participants, HERE.
I will be on my porch, 12:00 to 6:00PM, with a short break at around 3:00.
I’ll be showing paintings and collages, artist books, and tiny art that’s great for bookmarks, journaling, and notecards. If you will be in the Somerville area this weekend, do stop by for a meet-and-greet.
So, I’m participating in a city-wide arts event, organized by the Somerville Arts Council, amusingly called YART Sale. (See what they did there? It’s a yard sale, but it’s art, so it’s … yeah, you get it.)
Today is Thursday, 8/10. The YART Sale event is Saturday, 8/12. (Rain date 8/13.)
This is called Advance Notice!
In my defense, or at least deflection, Somerville only published the interactive online map of all the participants yesterday. We’re a last-minute, seat-of-the-pants kinda town here. It’s how we roll.
Here is the link to the online map: YART Map. And here is the link to a pdf of the participants, alphabetical by something (not sure exactly what), that you can print and carry around with you if you prefer to be analog: YART Listings.
And here is the direct link to my listing on the online map: ME at YART!
This will give you all the details in case you are in the metro Boston area and would like to stop by, see the work for real, meet the artist for real, and so forth. I’m #62 on the map and one of the 5 closest to Sullivan Square, which would make me first or last on your itinerary, depending on which end of the city you start at. I will be there the full afternoon from 12 to 6, with a short pit-stop break when I can get one.
By the way, if you are in the metro Boston area and have been longing silently for one of my artworks, this is your chance to buy it and avoid prohibitive shipping costs with in-person pick-up. If there’s a piece you especially would like to see in person, just email me at jen@jenfriesarts.com or contact me on Facebook, and I will make sure it is on the porch on the day. Or if you prefer to use a credit card, just contact me about it. If anyone buys art today or tomorrow via the Artrepreneur shop (See Shop tab, above) or by emailing me, and can pick up in person this Saturday, I will refund any shipping costs that may get charged automatically and will have the piece ready for you during the YART event. Make sure you let me know you’re picking up.
This is also a great opportunity to join my Patreon (see button below). Be among the first to join the free community, then introduce yourself on Saturday and get an embarrassing public acknowledgement from me right there on my porch! Or subscribe for $5/month and enjoy a 10% Friend of the Studio discount on any YART purchases, plus an even more embarrassing public acknowledgement.
And if you’re not buying or joining, that’s fine, too! Visit. See art. Chit-chat. We’re supposed to have nice weather this Saturday.
This is my first venture out into the YART wilds, and as usual, I’m doing it completely half-assed. But I dunno, I feel good about it. It’s the kind of casual, heck-whatever event that appeals to me, so I hope to add it to my permanent calendar.
Let’s see how it goes.
-Jen
PS: There is an extremely slight chance that a reading from Chapters 1 through not-yet-published 5 of An Alchemy of Dragons may occur, if requested. Fair Warning. – J
As my long-time subscribers know, when I run into a creative problem, I tend to retreat into my burrow and gnaw on it – and gnaw and gnaw like a determined squirrel – until it’s dealt with. Then I come back and tell you a bunch of new stuff and resume posting.
Well, I’ve just finished another round of gnawing, and I am now emerging from the burrow.
The tough nut this time was Chapter 5 of An Alchemy of Dragons, appropriately enough. In Tarot, 5 is the number of struggle, complications, and finding one’s way, all of which describes the part of the story where Protagonist 1 finally meets Protagonist 2, and the perfectionist author has to obsess over every single freaking word and comma and every possible plot permutation over and over again.
I finally cracked it. Vistas have opened before me. The plot is improved all down the line. Necessary world-building edits for continuity are identified. Research has been done and decisions made about how to handle things that will come up later.
Plus, a lot of new writing and art projects were spawned in the process. Ideas a-poppin’ all over.
While I was at it … I launched a Patreon!
Now, don’t get nervous. Yes, I’m asking for money. I’ve been asking for money. There are donation buttons all over the website. Don’t pretend you haven’t noticed them. I have an online shop at Artrepreneur with its very own link in the navigation tabs. I know you’ve been avoiding it.
All I’ve done is add another support option. Jen Fries Arts is not going to change.
So why a Patreon, then?
Because Patreon will provide a secure system for subscribers who wish to become monthly supporters, and it will, I hope, help me manage my time and work flow and offer projects that would be hard to do on the WordPress website, as it’s currently set up.
Patreon demands consistent engagement by me, the creator, which should address that whole burrow-retreat problem. No more only hearing from me after you’ve started thinking I must have died. With Patreon, I’ll be getting paid to produce work on a real schedule, so I’d better do it.
Also, Patreon provides tools and a platform for things I really want to do in future, such as invitational social events, interactive online projects, discussion groups, and so forth.
Supporting my studio is completely optional, but it is deeply appreciated.
I will always strive to make my money by selling my creative works, but we all know how the world is today. Sales lag desperately behind basic living costs. A creator can easily go utterly broke before their career can catch up with their rent. If I want to keep doing what I’m good at, I need to monetize it.
I refuse to put ads on my site and turn Jen Fries Arts into just another corporate marketing page. The only alternative is to encourage people who like what I do to pay for it, whether by purchasing the finished works or by patronage.
In an upcoming post, I’ll explain the details of the options I’ve set up. Please watch for that. It will be added to the About section, as well.
Click here to check out my Patreon now: Jen’s Patreon.
More upcoming posts will include a statement regarding generative AI because all the cool kids are doing it, and my big-picture plans for the Alchemy project, which is getting pretty ambitious.
In additional studio news, I have a new artwork on display in the summer show at the Brickbottom Gallery in scenic Somerville, MA. The exhibition is called “Carnival,” and it is running now through July 29th.Click here for gallery details. I will post notes about the new piece soon. The snakes are part of it.
So that’s the update. I’m back, sleeves rolled up, getting down to business, and I’m really glad to see you all again.
Jen Fries Arts 