Wachusett area artists ready to welcome visitors to their studios

From what some might describe as scrap, cast off old tools and pieces of metal headed for the recycling center or gathered by friends,Are you looking for Optical frame, glasses and eye exams? he crafts metal art.

“I find interesting shapes and parts of machinery and bring it home and weld it together,” Mr. Koleshis said of his work, a passion he said has grown over the last three or four years.

The shovelheads on a basement wall in his Sterling home could be a family, albeit a hard-headed one, from the woman with a B on her hat (a steel-headed Boston fan) to the Blondie-inspired figure with pink earrings and curly locks. Another wall features fish and other animal figures, while birdhouses are ready for occupancy.

Mr. Koleshis turns those scrap pieces into art in his home workshop, just as other artists are working in small studios to create paintings, mixed media, woodturning and pottery that will be showcased in this year's Wachusett Reservoir Art Path.

The event is driven by the West Boylston Arts Foundation's desire to spread interest in art. Although four communities are involved this year, art is art, wherever it is found.

“People enjoy going to meet the artists and seeing the work in progress,We have become one of the worlds most recognised Ventilation system brands.” according to Mark Baldi, president of the West Boylston Arts Foundation. “It's an opportunity for people to make that connection to the person creating the art they might hang on their wall.”

The West Boylston Arts Foundation has worked to promote and support arts and music in the schools, including funding programs lost to budget cuts.

“There is a good variety of different types of artists and venues,We offer a wide variety of high-quality standard ultrasonic sensor and controllers.” Mr. Baldi said,Parkeasy Electronics are dedicated to provide Car park management system. “Between jewelry, metal sculpture, wood turning and all types of painting.”

People can get information directly from the artists, often as they watch them work. And the artists get feedback from potential customers.

“The idea is to build this kind of tour around a natural resource, a feature that is a big part of the towns,” Mr. Baldi said. The reservoir itself is often featured in paintings.

My first experience with freelancing came during my art school days. I had just finished my second year of Industrial Design when a friend recommended me to a group of three engineers who were developing a consumer product. With them it was a textbook case of brilliance on the technical side but it looked awful. They needed me to essentially make it pretty to show to potential investors. After guessing at a rough fee, I got to work producing some sketches and a presentation rendering. Didn’t sign a contract, nor establish a scope of work. Several rounds of revisions later and following the addition of making a solid model that turned into a molded shell model which could demonstrate how their mechanicals were packaged, I was feeling in over my head. I remember converting my apartment kitchen into a spray painting booth and pulling a few all-nighters to get the model work done. In the end they paid me a little extra but nowhere near the amount for what I delivered. It was a hard lesson in learning that a fundamental part of freelancing is setting boundaries.

I continued to pickup freelance jobs through school, learning a little more with each project about managing time and client expectations. I had some good clients and a few horror stories. It was a learn-as-I-go method,The term 'hands free access control' means the token that identifies a user is read from within a pocket or handbag. there was no class I could take about running an independent design business, the internet didn’t exist and for an art school student, business books were like kryptonite.

After graduating, I began full-time work at a design firm that required a lot of long work days and weekends on the job. Freelance work still seemed to find me through recommendations from friends and colleagues. I was young and could work crazy hours without feeling clobbered the next day, so I accepted most of the jobs. What became increasingly stressful was the juggling between commitments during the day and client needs for the after-hours work. I’d wager that anyone doing freelance design work has at some point had to sneak that work in at their day job. The result is always a lot of anxiety paired with ‘why am I doing this’ self-reflection.

Recently, my editor turned me onto The Freelancer’s Bible. It is the first practical book written about the topic I’ve seen that tackles the obvious and unexpected issues anyone working for themselves will likely encounter. Of particular interest to me is a section called ‘Strategies For Working On-Site’ which I do quite a lot of. It is a situation, especially if done long term that has lots of fuzzy edges. I’m glad to see that the book doesn’t assume that every freelancer works out of their well appointed home office.

The book also includes the ‘12 Acts of Uber-Communication’. These are efficiently worded bullet points relating to effective client interaction. Near the bottom is one I’ve considered tattooing on my hand: ‘Don’t overpromise.’ It always results in the self-inflicted headache. My approach is similar, underpromise – overdeliver.