FEMINA. (oil on canvas. 25″ x 34″) cat no 289

Since I wrote a post on Facebook about my Red Corsican Coffee Pan   just a couple of days ago I’ve received two (private) Facebook messages. Both told me that it was a mistake to have said, about an unsold painting, that I would like to have used the old ‘twisted bottle’ that I had broken in the painting instead of the bottle I used.

The gist of both messages was that they felt that my comment made the painting seem less good and so it was less likely to be sold. They shared a commonly held belief that Russell is utterly crap at marketing his work. That is not untrue; I am a bit rubbish at marketing because I’m not interested enough in selling. A gallery owner did once suggest that I stay away from my own Private View because I have been known ‘unsell’ paintings. He did not get his way and I disagree with the comments I have just received.

My defence is always the same anecdote: I once showed paintings at the house of friends in Islington. My paintings were as a backdrop to a party turning it into an event. The host is a Tax lawyer and his wife is an excellent cook and it was a good party. The hostess, I’ll call her Janis (because it’s her name), worked the floor for me. She asked people if they liked the painting they were looking at and if they said that they did she suggested that they buy it and, for the most part, they did.

I was swanning about with a glass of something lovely in my hand, being alternately a bit of a star bit and a little nervous, talking to people as I watched more red dots being deployed when my sister’s friend Liz told me that she would “like to buy the little painting of the lemons”. “The lemons !” I (allegedly) exclaimed, “Why do you want to buy that one ? It’s the worst painting here” and I led her to it and started to expound about the painting’s faults. Janis had seen and heard the exchange and some time later I felt her hand on my shoulder and her voice in my ear saying “And she didn’t buy the lemons did she.”

Yes, I know, so far this seems to be perfect proof of my finely honed ability to screw up a sale, but there was more…

ZAZIE SE CACHE (oil on canvas. 28″ x 30″) cat no 275

A little later I watched a man going back and forwards between the two paintings that were also my favourites in the exhibition. People buy paintings for all sorts of reasons and sometimes it might just be that there is a certain sized patch on their wall they want to cover. It’s nice to sell any painting but it’s especially good to feel that someone ‘gets it’, that they understand the painting and like it for the right reasons. I asked this man why he liked those two paintings and we talked and he asked me which of the two paintings I would buy. I said that ZAZIE SE CACHE was just too quirky so it would be FEMINA. He bought FEMINA and for five times the price on the lemons and he told me that he too had overheard me unselling the little lemons painting and it was that which had persuaded him to take my advice and buy his painting.

My sister has that little painting of lemons. I asked her and she has just sent me a snap of it… I sort of wish she hadn’t replied, I’ve had to force myself to post the picture (it was a dreadful painting) but at least I’m pretty sure that no one ever reads my BLOG !