The Letters: Portrait of an Artist, Jim Houser is a book about Connie and Jim Houser’s passion for art and each other as well as for living and family. It is a dialogue about their adventures in pursuing those loves and achieving recognition for their accomplishments. In 2008 the book garnered FIRST PLACE in the DIY California Book Fest and HONORABLE MENTIONS in A DOZEN BOOK FESTS including the New England Book Fest and the LONDON, ENGLAND book fest. It is a readable, visual delight. There is a profound degree of “suchness” or Zen quality in Jim Houser’s paintings as well as a lyricism not unlike the clear concise resonance of Robert Frost’s shorter verse. Those essentials are shown in the almost forty paintings photographed for The Letters: Portrait of an Artist, Jim Houser. The imagined and inventive device and use of letters (or messages) in "The Letters: Portrait of an Artist, Jim Houser swiftly conveys the actual events in Jim and Connie Houser’s lives. The creative partners are portrayed in a rapidly moving dialogue that involves the reader in artist’s competitions, art gallery shows, foreign and domestic travel, family life, and an understanding of the profession of producing a fine work of art in modern times. The Letters: Portrait of an Artist, Jim Houser explains that a fine work of art is very different from the remainder of artistic endeavor. Fine art engages the viewer in a visual dialogue that distinguishes it and bonds the viewer in love or hate but never mediocrity. Not a run of the mill coffee table book, The Letters: Portrait of an Artist, Jim Houser is a charming and accurate account of the modern day artist’s life while creating works of art and bringing them to the public’s attention. The story encompasses the tragedies and the successes in the Houser’s lives and their interaction with others. Written by the artist’s wife, Connie Houser, herself an awarded artist and writer, it spans the artists’ relationship thus far and offers insights into their creative work. The Letters: Portrait of an Artist, Jim Houser follows the artists’ creative work accomplished during their hectic everyday existence. The same full lives of having a family, a home, and a job to pay bills, necessary today to most people. Although the letters themselves are an imaginative artistic device to enliven the book, the events are true. Not satisfied to just get by, they made career choices that would eventually make them both candidates for inclusion in the prestigious Marquis Who’s Who editions of art, literature, America and the World. Jim has been represented in those volumes for fifteen years and Connie joined the ranks in 2004. Photographs of his paintings will also appeared in the 2008-2009 "Who ́s Who in American Art" Artist ́s gallery. Their ability to continue to work under conditions that might discourage others is made clear in The Letters: Portrait of an Artist, Jim Houser. Jim‘s profession is painting and Connie’s is writing and painting. The rest of their work, although they contributed much, enjoyed it, and performed with excellence, was done to pay the bills. Jim was a 30-year college professor and full-time family man. Connie organized family matters, taught part-time, while writing for various publications and magazines plus painting. The carousing hours were the working hours for their creative efforts because silence reigned. Their many travel adventures in the states and abroad guaranteed they played hard with the same energy and enthusiasms. When Jim began winning countless awards for his painting, he was invited to show at numerous exhibitions and in New York City galleries. They added these events plus art show openings to their already hectic schedule. Through it all they managed a fulfilling family life while taking creative care of their parents and allowing them their desired home life.

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Self-taught mixed media artist Jim Houser's creative journey began as a child when he started drawing in sketchbooks brought home to him by his father. Over the years, driven by impulse and inspired by words as well as the perspective that his childhood drawings provide. Houser developed a style combining words, phrases and existential story fragments with crisp, colorful paintings on surfaces ranging from canvas to walls to skateboards and more. Houser forces us to re-examine these often wellworn words and discover their lost, faded and even alternate meanings amidst visions of ten gallon hats, snaggletooth snakes, preternatural beigns and visualized natural elements. Jim Houser is a Philadelphia-based artist who was a founding member of the collective Space 1026 and an avid skateboarder who designs skate decks for Toy Machine.

Vocational course taking declined between 1982 and 1992, with especially large enrollment decreases occurring in general labor market preparation and consumer/homemaking education. Only a small proportion of 1992 high school graduates specialized in vocational education (VE). Among occupationally specific VE programs, business, and trade and industry had the highest enrollments. Special populations tended to participate more heavily in VE than did other high school graduates in 1992. A recent study established that vocational course taking and National Assessment of Educational Progress math scores have an unexplained inverse relationship. In 1991, public school vocational teachers served fewer students than did nonvocational teachers. In 1990, postsecondary vocational students accounted for approximately one-third of all undergraduates and one-half of all nonbaccalaureate students. At the postsecondary level, business was the most common major for vocational students, and community colleges had the largest vocational student enrollment. Vocational completers were more likely to be employers than were other individuals who do not participate in postsecondary education, and employment in fields related to postsecondary vocational completers' concentration was associated with higher earnings. Nonbaccalaureate students of low socioeconomic status (SES) were more likely to be vocational majors than were students with high SES. (Contains 13 figures/tables.) (MN)

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