Katie Jeanne Wood

Mixed Media Artist - daily painter of portraits, flowers, abstracts and birds

Trying to play catch up – Day 16 of 30 in 30

Pink cottage chic flower painting by Katie Jeanne Wood
Pink & blue floral painting
Palette knife painting on watercolor paper
Available here
Day 16 of 30 in 30

How’s everybody doing? Are you hanging in there with the challenge? I’m going to try to get around to visit you today. I’ve been a bit behind because I’ve been wrapping up paintings to ship out to their new owners. I’ve also been retaking some photos from the past few days that I posted here..I knew I was going to have to retake them because they were blurry. I went ahead and posted them anyway because I didn’t have time to reshoot, and edit them. I knew I’d never get my blog post done in time if I spent time behind the camera. I think I have it all fixed now. Whew. This 30/30 pace is fast. Ack!! Can’t catch up, but hopefully I will today. 

Halfway point – Day 15 of 30 in 30


Cottage chic floral
Available here
Day 15 of 30 in 30

Oooh, thank goodness..we’re at the halfway point. I don’t know about you, but I’m starting to struggle. I could paint until the cows come home every day. I already have most, if not all of my paintings finished for the month already, but the blogging part always becomes more difficult as we get deeper into the challenge. Only 2 more weeks, and then things can go back to normal. Yes!! 

Ice storm – Day 14 of 30 in 30

Katie Jeanne Wood - floral paintings
Pink roses floral painting
Available here
Day 14 of 30 in 30

I’m going to keep this short today, and for the next few days, probably. I’ve been taking way too much time writing blog posts, and I’m falling behind on other things. That, and we have an ice storm approaching, which will be already upon us when this post goes live. It’s suppose to start Friday night, and run through Monday sometime. I started getting alerts from weather.com Thursday afternoon, and when I turned on the tv there was already a warning running at the bottom of the screen on the local channels. I don’t know if they’re over-reacting or not, hope so! Just in case we lose power, I’m going to schedule a couple blog posts ahead of time. If I go quiet, it’s because I’m riding out the storm, huddled under blankets with the kitties. 

Starting new at Artfinder – Day 13 of 30 in 30


Pink acrylic floral on watercolor paper
Available here
Day 13 of 30 in 30

So, yesterday I talked about closing down my Daily Paintworks gallery. You can read why here, if you haven’t already. What’s that old saying, “success is right around the corner..you just have to know where to find it” or something like that? I’m going to shift my focus to another online venue that I’m a member of, Artfinder, and see if I have more luck there. I think I was accepted at Artfinder back in May of last year, but up to now, I haven’t had a lot of time to spend there. Now that I have stopped focusing on DPW, I just freed up a whole lot of time each week. I’m looking forward to exploring the Artfinder site. 

From what I’ve experienced so far, the Artfinder site is popping. Lots of artwork is selling each day..I know this because if you click on random artist profiles, you’ll get a popup that says “this artist sold work 20 minutes ago” or 3 hours ago or 2 days ago..or whatever is the case. It’s very encouraging that work is actually selling on the site. 

There are also popups that tell you how many people are looking at the same piece you are – at the same time you are. Is this not a genius idea or what? I LOVE it!! If it’s an original piece, and you want it, you just might want to click that buy button now before someone else does. It gives a sense of urgency, which is an excellent selling tool, imo. I would imagine it brings the hemming and hawing down a notch, especially if someone sees a piece they feel they can’t live without.   

Also, the few times I have listed paintings there, I immediately got a response..people seem quick to click the like or heart button. Even if it’s only artists supporting other artists, at least it’s something. I’ll take likes over silence any day. You never know when one of those likes will turn into a sale.

As usual, my two Etsy shops will remain open as well. 

Closing down my gallery on Daily Paintworks – Day 12 of 30 in 30

Katie Jeanne Wood - floral paintings
Floral palette knife painting
Available here

Time to put my art journal away for now, and switch back to florals. This is one of my favorite paintings so far this month. I love the color palette I mixed for this one. 

*****

I made an announcement a couple night’s ago on Daily Paintworks that I’ll be closing down my gallery there on the 27th. I’m disappointed to be leaving, but I feel as if I’ve given it my all. Things just didn’t work out. 

I don’t know what happened. My sales were booming there a few years back, but things changed. I can’t really pinpoint why it changed, only how it’s changed. I used to get lots of likes, comments and messages there almost daily. The site seemed alive, and bustling. People were actively looking at, and buying my work. Everyone was talkative, and friendly, including other artists. 

Then I left because I was having trouble loading and accessing the site. After I went back about a year later, it wasn’t the same anymore. Other than a couple people contacting me for business/painting advice, and a few scammers, it’s been like a sad little ghost town for the past year and a half now. Way too quiet.

I tried hard to make it work. I uploaded a variety of my work, from mini to large paintings, florals to birds to landscapes to abstracts to portraits. Without getting any feedback, it was hard to know what to post or who my buyer might be. Last time around I knew what my buyers wanted. This time, I didn’t have a clue, and nothing I did worked. 

As a last ditch effort, I had a big sale, and marked my work down 85% over Christmas. Turned out to be a huge waste of time and effort. It got me absolutely nowhere, but I’m glad I tried. Otherwise, how would I know? Artists always want to blame it on our pricing when work doesn’t sell, don’t we? Even though my work was/is selling well on Etsy, I started to question if my prices were too high for DPW. In the end, it didn’t matter. Nothing sold, no matter what I did.

 You gotta know when to walk away. Know when to run.
– The Gambler by Kenny Rogers

Running seems a bit drastic, but it is time to move on. 

I am going to be starting something new. I will tell you more about that later. 

PS: I’m not in any way saying DPW is a bad site or that it won’t work for you. I’ll give you the same advice I give everyone who asks me about DPW or any website, and that is..results are going to vary greatly from artist to artist. You will never know unless you try. You might find that DPW is YOUR place to sell art, just like Etsy, Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook are the place for others. I know it’s possible to be successful at DPW. I just didn’t have what it takes this time around. I wish the DPW site, and the artists there lots of success in the future.  

Day 12 of 30 in 30. 

Daisies and Roses – Day 7 of 30 in 30


Daisies and Roses
Available here

One of my wishes or hopes for 2017 was that time would slow down a little bit, instead of rushing by so fast. I can see by how quickly the days are passing, my wish won’t come true. We’re on day 7 of the challenge already, so soon. This is when things start to get more difficult..when one day runs into the next, and there’s barely time to breathe between blog posts. Or so it seems, anyway.

Red and greenery floral abstract painting – Day 6 of 30 in 30

katherine-jeanne-wood-9x6-flower-series-no-203-01
Red and greenery abstract floral painting
Available here

Day 6 of 30/30

For a slight change of pace, I am happy to use Pantone’s color of the year, greenery, in this painting. I don’t use a lot of green or blue in my work because I tend to gravitate toward warmer colors, but I do like this shade. 

Scared, yet excited – Day 3

katherine-jeanne-wood-9x6-flower-series-no-198-01
Available here

A goal should scare you a little, and excite you a lot. – Joe Vitale

When I first read this quote on Twitter, I thought, there’s really nothing to be scared about when doing this challenge. I didn’t think I could use the quote on my blog, and almost skipped over it. Then I had a sudden flashback to when I didn’t think my work was good enough to join in any group, not just the 30/30 challenge. I remember that not so good feeling in the pit of my stomach that would never go away. Fear was the reason I didn’t want to participate. Once I took a leap of faith, the scary feelings calmed down, and eventually went away. I am good enough, and so is my artwork. Same goes for you, and yours. 

30/30 – day 3

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