Missing Provence (and a new landscape painting of the Luberon)

I've really been missing Provence. But with the U.S. dollar faring so abysmally against the Euro, right now I'll have to console myself with paintings. On my last trip to France, I fell in love with the Luberon. With its gorgeous scenery, wonderful olives, cheeses, and wine, it is an easy place to love.

"Sentier aux Coquelicots" (Trail of Poppies) Oil on canvas, 24x30" (SOLD) ©Jennifer Young

The village of Lourmarin is a little gem, and a great destination for the plein air painter. There is no train station there, but in many ways, I see this as a plus because it wasn't overrun with tourists. It was lively enough in the daytime as it is a very charming town and popular with daytrippers (it rightfully earned a listing in the book "The Most Beautiful Villages of Provence".) But at night it was extremely quiet and peaceful.

Lourmarin is easily walk-able, and for a small town, there were a number of good restaurants to choose from. On longer hikes we soon found ourselves out in the dazzling countryside, with vineyards, olive groves, cherry orchards and lots of wildflowers in the spring and summer. Needless to say, I always had my painting gear handy. Thanks to my fabulous husband, my burden was usually relatively light, which is why he soon took to referring to himself as "le pack-mule". ;-) Further afield, short drives easily took us to some of the other charming villages nearby (Ansouis, Bonnieux, Roussillon, etc.) which had their own charm and beauty.

I am sure we wouldn't have done wrong basing ourselves out of any one of the many lovely villages in Provence, but our time in Lourmarin was pretty darn near idyllic, and I long to return. Loooong. And I'm sure I will. It might take me a little time to save the extra pennies, but I will.

p.s. I did!

Slideshow demo: Provence cafe painting start to finish

While I diligently documented the progress of my latest Provence painting, I was remiss in posting about it here on the blog. So to make up for it, here is a short demo that shows the development. The painting is of an al fresco lunchtime scene in the lovely French village of Roussillon. To see a the slideshow (with captions), click here:

"Dejeuner a Roussillon", Oil on Canvas, 36x24" ©Jennifer Young

New "Art for Food" charity auction listed- Provence watercolor

Here is the latest in my series of charity auctions for the Central Virginia Foodbank. I am listing this little Provence watercolor of the Luberon Valley  on eBay, and you will notice some adjustments to the listing due to the things I wrote about in my previous posts here and here.

“Summer Vineyard” Overall size 8×10″ (image size 5×7″) (SOLD) ©Jennifer Young

Online charity art auctions- The learning curve part II

Look for a new "Art for Food" auction posting later today. Meanwhile, here's  a follow-up to my previous post  on the charity art auctions I'm holding for the CVFB. Filed under the "hadn't thought of that one" category: 1. Sales tax: Only after a couple of auctions were listed did it dawn on me that I probably had to collect VA sales tax. Doh! A call to the VA Dept. of Taxation confirmed this.  I am selling the item and then once I collect the profits, I'm turning around and donating the money to charity. Even though it's a donation, it's still a retail sale and subject to the tax for in-state sales. I can't really do anything about past auctions but pay the tax myself. But for the future a statement to collect sales tax in Virginia will be included in the listings. 

2. Framing: Due to the time involved in listing and promoting the auctions, making the donations, as well as packaging and shipping (not to mention creating the artwork), I cannot provide an in-house framing service for the charity auctions. Watercolors should be framed under glass, and shipping glass requires a lot more time and care in the packing and additional cost (and risk). It also adds another dimension of confusion to my whole accounting process. The good news is that these pieces are created in sizes that can be matted inexpensively, and fit easily into standard-size frames  found readily at local frame shops and even craft stores.

3. Donations: I started these auctions out with 100% of the proceeds going to the charity. However, since these auctions are an ongoing 6 month project, I really do have to consider the processing costs. Paypal, my online money transfer agent, assesses processing fees, reducing the total amount that I collect. If I can designate 95% of the proceeds to the charity, this will defray my costs for processing and any listing fees (for eBay listings and/or extra features).

More thoughts on eBay: I've been reading more on the eBay/Missionfish deal and can see that there might be some benefits to listing there. I've learned that in addition to your auction being listed on eBay's site and in the GivingWorks category, it is also listed on Missionfish. There are claims of better visibility and higher returns for GivingWorks listings over regular listings. Without having listed there I don't know how accurate that is.

The main hesitation I've been having are the Missionfish fees. At first blush, 15-20% of the donation seems like a painfully large processing fee. Will it really save that much time over ArtByUs in the processes of listing, fulfillment, documentation and donation? Will the venues provided through eBay GivingWorks increase the number of bids? If those two things were true, it might very well be worth a try.

Online charity art auctions- the learning curve Part I

The online charity art auctions I'm holding for the Central VA Foodbank have thus far been both satisfying and challenging for me. Satisfying because I am connecting with some wonderful people who have been willing to bid on and purchase my paintings for a good cause, and challenging because of the learning curve I've experienced with holding these auctions in the online environment. Several people have asked me about the ArtByUsauction environment I have been using. ArtByUs is relatively new compared to eBay, and it only auctions artwork and handmade items offered by artists, galleries and dealers. I started out with ArtByUs for several reasons.

 First, it is currently free for artists to list there. While I believe their intent is to eventually charge for this service, this makes a huge difference to me, especially considering that I am allocating all of the proceeds of the winning bid to charity. I will note here that eBay will refund your listing and final value fees through their GivingWorks program, according to the amount you donate to a charity, but only if the item sells. And in order for eBay to list your auction as a charity, they require you to work through an organization called MissionFish. The charity is also required to be registered with Missionfish, so if your desired charity is not on their list (as mine, initially,  was not) it is up to the fundraiser to ask the charity to go through the registration process. While eBay does refund some or all of the listing and final value fees, Missionfish takes as much as 20% of the final value of the donationfor it's intermediary services. On the other hand, going through Missionfish.org may offer some people peace of mind, as I have read reports of past fraudulent charity listings that took place on eBay outside of their Givingworks program.

There are pros and cons to using both ArtByUs and eBay for the charity auctions. While ArtByUs is free, it does not get the traffic that eBay does--not by a long-shot. So, at least in my case, I am the one who has been driving traffic to my auctions. It's been reported to me by at least one bidder that the registration process is also a little slow and can be a bit confusing, and the interface is a bit clunky. ArtByUs doesn't have as many bells and whistles as eBay, and, since eBay is owned by the same company that owns PayPal, Paypal is fully integrated into the eBay site. With ArtByUs, everything is pretty much a manual operation for me in regards to collecting the winning bid via Paypal and donating to the charity, so it has been more of a time consuming process than I anticipated.

Having said that, the support staff with ArtByUs is responsive to any questions or issues. They currently offer free basic listings, and unlike eBay which seems to attract a lot of bargain hunters in search of any number of products, ArtByUs lists only artwork.  And while eBay does get a whole lot more traffic, my feeling is that this does not necessarily mean that my listing will be discovered. I do not have much experience with eBay thus far, but from what I have heard, competition is fierce and a lot of people experience the needle in the haystack syndrome unless they spend a lot more money with additional listing features. So it is likely if and when I list over there, any bidding would be as a result of my own contacts there as well.

For these reasons I've started out with ArtByUs. It's likely that at some point I will list over at eBay, and if I do, it will be interesting to see how the experience will compare to ArtByUs, and if the auction bids on eBay will be substantial enough to offset the other associated fees.  

There were a few other things I discovered only after I started the project that I had not really thought through when I first conceived of it. I'll share a bit more about that in my next post. Meanwhile, if you've had bidding or auction experience with Ebay or ArtByUs, I'd welcome you to leave your comments.