Our first stop was Construction Junction. Construction Junction is a non-profit organization that sells used and surplus construction materials: drywall, tile, paint, cabinets, sinks, toilets, doors, windows, architectural salvage, shingles, vinyl siding, brick, slate... If it can be used to build a house, this organization probably has it, right down to doorknobs, hinges, nails and screws.
- Want an old-fashioned cast iron clawfoot tub? There are four of varying sizes for sale.
- Like those old sinks with the separate hot & cold spigots? Construction Junction has just the sink for you.
- Need a new stone fireplace and mantel? There are two complete layouts for sale! Prefer wood instead of stone? Check out one of the salvaged pieces, some of them even with inlayed mirrors.
And now we know where to take all the left-over materials.
In the evening hours we attended Art All Night, Lawrenceville's annual exhibition of local amateur and professional artists. Anyone is welcome to come and enter one piece into the exhibit. Videos, photographs, sculpture, paintings, collages, found objects and kid's pictures are all encouraged. A lot of the work is for sale.
Art all Night is not a juried art show but a celebration of the artist in all of us. The work runs from mundane to brilliant.
Each year the organizers find an unused warehouse to mount the exhibit. This year it was a three story loft space, with family-friendly exhibits on the first floor and adult material on the second and third floors.
We went early, around 9pm and the place was inundated with people. As always, the children's art was beyond cute. I fell in love with a little lithograph print. For a grand total of $9.00 I could have made the young artist's night. I wish I had purchased it but, as in prior years, I did not bring enough cash with me.
This is on purpose, as I see so much at this show every year that I want to take home and hang on the walls. The problem is that I have a ton of stuff that needs framed, so J has called a stop to my art purchases until I take care of what I have.
Specifically he wants me to frame my grandmother's cards. My grandmother, Kay Logan, was a watercolor artist. She started painting late in her life, after her six kids had grown and left the house.
When I was kid, she would paint cards for birthdays, Halloween and Valentine's Day. I still have most of the cards she made me, carefully wrapped in acid free plastic for the day when I have enough money to get them professionally framed.
She also made sure that I had a good education in the arts and encouraged my experiments in drawing and painting. She is the reason I got to see most of the major art museums in New York City. She is the reason I buy paintings when we travel. I will never reach her level of talent, but at least I got the chance to see the world through her eyes.
My grandmother died at the age of 83 on September 30, 2002. While cleaning out her house, by mother and her siblings found stacks of unframed paintings, watercolor sketches and framing materials. The framing materials went to the local art collective. The paintings and sketches were divided up into six piles. From that pile my mother allowed me to select one painting and some sketches, which hang in our dining room.
My mother said that my grandmother was a hard woman. Trapped by society's expectations of what a woman was supposed to do, she thought (as do I) that she was frustrated by the limitations imposed on her. Once her children were grown she was able to break out of those constraints, and became a much more loving and gentle person.
If you come across a painting at the local flea market, check out the signature in the lower right hand corner. Look for a delicate K. Logan. Let me know what you think of it, if you find one.
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