With only a few weeks left of 2016, it’s time to consider how you’ll document and organize your upcoming year. On Friday, December 9th, SALT Gallery invites the public to join them in celebrating artist Eric Anfinson and the release of his 7th annual calendar of paintings from 6pm – 8 pm at their location on 830 Fleming Street. A curated selection of the artist’s work from the year prior allow collectors and fans and a chance to live with one of his paintings every month of the year for the affordable cost of a calendar.

“It’s a good reason to have a party,” he jests, admitting he never meant to annually produce the calendar.

But after creating the first in 2009 and not producing one the following year, he was met with some heckling, and decided to make the annual effort.

This year’s calendar features thirteen original oil paintings that showcase Anfinson’s distinct figurative style. Anfinson and designer Kim Narenkivicius, who have collaborated on Anfinson’s print designs for more than a decade, selected the images from more than two hundred paintings completed in the last year, based on their “synchronicity and rhythm,” he says.

He also notes that this year’s collection is different because of the medium on which the images were originally created— oil on archival paper.

“It might not mean much to the viewers,” he says, “but as an artist, there’s a looser feel to the application. The painting itself is a little different.”

Amid the dozen intimate portraits representing each month is a centerfold containing a poem from poet Anne Tammel’s book “Endless: A Literate Passion” and a painting Anfinson did for its cover. Anfinson describes the painting’s inner landscape, giving viewers a portal to his perspective:

“…The balcony, the space of their relationship, is surrounded by beauty and perils…,” he writes of “Anais & Henry,” the painting entitled after the name of the poem.

The marriage between his work and poetry is natural, as his paintings have a lyrical power that inspire inquiry and reveal our own sensual longings. Each month’s portrait suggests something beyond a façade, with curves, blooms, and penetrating glances. Like a good poem, we feel the undercurrent beneath the brush strokes.

And like any calendar worth its salt, famous artists’ birthdays and the cycles of the moon are once again included.

The collectable, high-quality print calendar will be available for purchase for $24.99 at SALT Gallery or online at EricAnfinson.com, with special discounts available for multiple purchases. For more information, call 305.896.2980 or visit SaltIslandProvisions.com.