ILLUXCON IS JUST a week away now. I started a post for the blog long before now, but preparing for the show has captured my every waking moment. What art should I take. Do I need to make new prints; should I even take prints to a top-tier show like this. Would the attendees be interesting in this odd-ball thing I do, or that. So many questions.

If you want to see something about the show, this trailer is a few years old but epitomizes what I have to look forward to. To me, IlluxCon is exciting and daunting in equal measure.

There are, of course, all the usual worries about any trip. Airline craziness, hotel reservations, dogsitting arrangements. I’ve fallen out of the habit of attending conventions, so it’s like re-learning to ride a bicycle. On a high wire. In a stiff wind. With monsters waiting on every side.

I make a lot of lists. Things to do: pack up art and get it shipped off; put together a walkabout notebook of representative work. Lists of things not to forget: business cards; things to draw, sketch, and make notes with; a sketchbook or two; my strongest glasses I need when drawing; cables for my hardware; flyers and handouts. Clothes that aren’t an embarrassment but are comfortable to move in, work in, stand in, something nice go out to dinner in.

I fight off what Amanda Palmer calls “the Fraud Police” pretty much daily. (If you don’t want to watch the video, here is the transcript.) Yet I’m truly looking forward to attending. I am excited by what I’m going to learn. I’m eager to see old friends, as well as wondering what cool people I’m going to meet up with, some who are strangers and some of whom I have conversed with via email.

And though it all, I’m hungry… hungry… for the inspiration and revitalization I am sure will result. I’ve been working alone in a vacuum for far too long. I’ve already started tinkering with this website, and will do more — probably a lot more after I return. And I will most certainly be planning new plans, new paintings, new projects. Transformations.

If you come to IlluxCon this year, look for me among the Showcase Artists. No, scratch that. Yes, you WILL find me there Friday and Saturday evening, but mainly you should look for me attending the panels and demos and talking with those whose work I admire beyond all words. I’ll be out finding new work to be awed and inspired by. I am going to go and soak up all the good vibes, the joy and love for the genre, the will and determination and the explosive exhuberance of being a creative person at heart, surrounded by astoundingly creative, accomplished, skilled people and those who love them.

I am grateful to have this opportunity, and I plan to make the most of it.

Also? I’m looking forward to what I’ll have to write about on this blog, afterward.

Consider yourself warned.