Excellent Abe. You have a real talent - and you're not afraid of hard work either.
Mount your own exhibition in a hired hall and invite the art editors of the local press to come ogle your work (have wine and cocktail sausages ready for this assortment of long-haired scribblers).
And then, after they have gone away to write up fulsome and flattering praise of your prodigious talents - rehire the hall a month or so later for a second exhibition of your work.
But
this time, and without inviting the press - have price-tags attached to each of your paintings enough to pay the federal budget for a 5-year plan of reconstruction of New Orleans...

Rip 'em off right down to their cotton socks... Those art gallery aficionados and patrons just love nothing more than the feeling of being financially raped for art's sake. Show no mercy.
If sold under a famous name - your first painting here could easily be auctioned off at Sotheby's for a cool ... er, what shall we say... $525,000.... ?
Go get 'em abe... (and don't forget your friends when you're rich 'n famous...

)