Letting the Light In and Keeping the Lights On—Online

I hope this finds you and yours in good health and finding safety and solace in these frightening times. Please be careful and stay well.

The Holton Studio family is all healthy, thank goodness. But in compliance with orders from the city, county, and state, the shop’s doors are closed until the virus calms down. Though the Studio has been reduced to minimum operations, we’re still working and here for you; more on that below.

Letting In the Light

Sadly, the orders to close the physical gallery came just a week into the one month run of one of the most exciting shows we’ve ever had, “Treasures from the Bay Area.” This juried exhibition of paintings by the San Francisco Bay Area chapter of the California Art Club, is still online to enjoy, however, and indeed paintings are selling.

Especially meaningful to me at this time is the painting shown above. Robert Steele’s, “Old Marin County Barn” (oil, 16″ x 20″) is part of the show and is hanging in the showroom behind the design table. The otherwise dark interior of an old barn lit bright by the morning sun coming through its door and old gappy siding doubly illustrates the idea that a framed painting is a window letting in the light, and letting us to see through and beyond our walls.

So that we can help you let in the light, the lights here are lit—if mostly electronically. We’re using the website, email and answering the phone—which is still ringing, thankfully! The site is current and being updated. If you’re at home feeling closed in these days, and could use help bringing enough light into your life, please have a look at the current show online, as well as the work of our regular roster of artists. Do not hesitate to call to purchase paintings and ready-made frames and mirrors. And with UPS service going strong, we are able to ship.

We also, as always, offer gift certificates. I emphasize these especially for anyone looking to help us navigate immediate economic challenges. (There’s nothing wrong with buying one as a gift to yourself!) It would be very helpful to us and much appreciated.

As for our main stock in trade, custom framing, this is in fact an excellent time for those of you both local and afar to contact us to work together to design your framing for your pictures—even though we’ll have to wait things out before filling those orders. We’re thankful to have put in long hours over the years, building up the website as a design tool and resource for you, and developing our skills in handling custom framing by mail order. (I’ve gotten pretty good at Photoshop!) These skills will allow us to serve local customers as well for the time being. Please call or email us with your inquiries. But if you’d rather wait a bit on your custom jobs, again, keep in mind those gift certificates!

The Lights Are On

So we’re alive and well and the light keeps burning here at Holton Studio—but only secondarily because of the services we can provide and the things we can produce and deliver. The light still burns here first of all because of people. In this challenging moment, my gratitude for the enduring, faithful, and dedicated work of our little company—Trevor, Eric, Jessie, Sam, and my dear wife Stephanie—is immeasurable. In all truth, we are not just a company but a family bound together in common cause and affection—that special and especially strong affection that cooperative and inherently rewarding shared work creates.

And our family here also includes the artists of the gallery. We remain deeply thankful for their friendship and loyalty, and for the privilege of framing their beautiful work, as well as representing them—though our efforts in the latter regard will necessarily have to become more creative. (But then, isn’t creativity the point of all that we, as artists and artisans, do?)

In addition, there are perhaps a dozen key people—you know who you are—who in various selfless ways have contributed significant aid and support to the business. Their belief in us has more than made a difference, it has been indispensable, and we can’t thank them enough.

But not a jot less thankful are we for you, our customers and fans—many of whom have become like family too—who inspire us every day with your appreciation, not only for the framing we provide you, but for the ideals that drive us. As a frame complements—that is, completes—a picture, neither the painter’s work nor the framer’s is completed until you place it in those greater frames that are your homes, becoming at last what they are made to be: windows of imagination and memory letting in and helping sustain in daily life, even through dark times, the human spirit and the light of the world.

Because of you, the light at Holton Studio still burns.

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