Malaysia As Muse

Malaysia, my muse this season, has worked her magic, and now I hurry home to open my mind's eye, let the sights and sounds pour forth as a waterfall through the landscape of my memory, carrying the flow of tropical wonders into paint and clay, paper and silk.  The sights and sounds of the jungle, never far away in Malaysia, weave dense patterns in vine threads, tangles of ropey roots, hiding flashes of electric color, the buzzing, clicking, warbling living things watching me as I look, futilely, for them in the canopy that surrounds me. Air, pregnant with humidity, covers every surface of my skin, weighting my eyelids for sleep though I have just awoken.  Insects, seen and not, search for purchase, and some fortunate ones work their way through my shirt, my pants, the multiple applications of insect repellent.  Nothing to be done. I let my eyes rescue me.  I swipe my lids with the saturated wad of tissue balled up in my hand, and open them wide, to see the poetry in the undulating rhythms of palm forest, rubber plantation, pineapple fields, all whispering beneath a sky full of stories-high thunder clouds.

Ginger

In the canopy

From Bukit Genting, Penang

2000' (!) up Penang Hill

On the bridge in the canopy

Wild peacock at Bukit Genting, Penang

From 16 floors up at Batu Ferenghi

Holiday In Oregon or Recovering From An ArtFest

What a great day our friend Donna gave us today in and about Wilsonville, OR.  The Monday following an art festival is always our "hangover" day - sleeping off the effects of standing on our feet for 10-12 hours, chatting with prospective clients, smiling, smiling and more smiling.  The idea of course is to give the art festival goers the impression that we are completely relaxed, happy to be there, ready to explain our techniques and styles to the inquisitive, even if it's someone's five year old or a would-be artist wanting some info about tools, colors, how did you get this or that effect.  So, by Monday we are shot.  No two ways about it.  Mostly we don't have the energy to research the area we are showing in so we don't know that there is a terrific museum or a trail to a swimming hole or a collection of antique sculptures of miniature crab apples (just kidding - don't think I would go out of my way for that).  So, when we stay with Donna and she plans the Monday for us, makes omelets for breakfast, does the driving, AND takes us to wonderful places to just "be"with the natural beauty that is Oregon, it's pretty special.

Here is a place that was not only nature at its best but an artist at his best, as well.

 

Donna

This is Jim Barton's Pudding River Studios, Aurora, OR...but we didn't know that we were doing anything but walking down a forest path....until we began to come upon these beautiful wood sculptures, mostly done from fire damaged wood.  They stood as guardians of the forest, sentinels, plates of a sort of Buddhist armor on healthy trees, silent prayers of Quan Yin, invitations to wander further...and then there he was, standing at the edge of a large fork lift which held the rough beginnings of a long table bench, filling a small crack.  Tall and skinny, shaded by the canopy above him, he smiled and gestured for me to come closer so he could hear me.

The sculptures speak for themselves.

 Jim is open and sharing, at home with both trees and people. Read some more about him in this article from Conversations. From his property we walked on through his neighbor's (with her permission) only to be delighted by a different kind of nature - acres of mown pasture that was home to many sheep until a flash flood of the Pudding River p them.  No signs of the misfortune remain except the water line high up in the trees.  Today the pasture was alive with singing birds, dandelions, and about a half mile of wild blackberry bushes grown high above our heads.

 I think I picked (and ate) enough berries for a large pie!  There were no cell phones there, no iPads, no ear phones...just blackberries, sun, the river and a good friend who wanted to give us a special day.  Thanks, Donna.

Giving A Hand To A Friend

Meet my friend, Pam Creamer.  The picture is not the "real" Pam.  It's Pam With Lyme's Disease.  The "real" Pam is a talented painter, lover of animals, vivacious, energetic, loving, generous, independent, gracious, FUN, loyal....and....painfully ill with Lyme's Disease.  She has fought it for years, handling it on her own (with her partner, Anita) until all of their income and savings, including their business, is gone.  But here's the thing...she has begun a series of IV treatments in NYC because her friends have opened a website  to help raise funds for this staggeringly expensive treatment.  There have been so many, many donations and she is moving through the treatment protocol like the champion she is - it is very painful and debilitating, but it is working!  This is an ugly disease that takes a horrible tole on the body, not to mention the mind and the spirit!  But Pam is a fighter!  We believe she will conquer this and be able to paint again - and painting is how she has always made her living and paid her bills.

The thing is, and why you are seeing this on my blog, is that we have stalled out on the donations, and we have a little ways more to go to finish the treatments.  So, I am asking all of you reading this, all of you who have loved my work, supported me with your purchases, taken classes from me, been inspired by my work or my words, to please show that today by clicking Pam's picture, and making a donation to this wonderful team effort to get Pam well.  I know we all get asked all the time to donate, donate, donate.  But, if you will make a donation of $10 to Pam, I will send you a packet of greeting cards with pictures of my gourd sculptures as a huge thank you for joining our team (that's a $20 value for your donation of $10 - not a bad deal).  Just leave a comment here on my post or email me through my website and I will get the cards in the mail to you.

Think of this as paying it forward, of being an angel, of sending some love like a pebble thrown in the pond - making ripples that go on forever.

Thanks for your help!

 

http://www.gofundme.com/o36z4

Maya Angelou & Inspiration For A Painting

(This is a re-post from last year.  The painting is hanging at the Celebration of Fine Art, Scottsdale, AZ until Mar 25, and is available for purchase.)

Inspiration is a full and varied thing, sometimes young and twitching, other times a vibrational note struck on a crystal glass.  It is a muse dancing in your dreams, a wood nymph catching your eye from behind the twilight lit forest.  It is shattered light from a glass clad urban high rise tossing itself across the candy apple red of your car hood.  It may be a grand philosophical book, read in fits and starts, embedding something unforgettable in your brain, or something inconsequential – a scrap of paper caught on the breeze, landing in your lap like a message from a parallel world.

Last fall I was reading Maya Angelou’s poem, I Know Why the Cage Bird Sings.  I had, at the time, been struggling with unresolved ideas for a series of large paintings about women and the patterns of their lives.  The original idea was not coming clear for me.   About to abandon the whole concept and taking a few days to get away from what I was feeling was a stuck spot, I closed the jars of paint, cleaned my tools and left the studio.  Landing on the sofa with a pile of books, I settled in for some quiet time.  Maya showed up. 

The measure of a good metaphor is how well it connects to the human condition.  The caged bird seems nearly limitless, as does the meaning of “singing” or voicing what is within.  The voice of inspiration nearly deafened me.  Books fell from the sofa in my rush to the studio.

Who knows why the Universe graces us with taps on the shoulder?  Not I.  But I do know, after 30 odd years of being an artist, that these gracious or raucous or accidental taps are better acknowledged and noted than ignored.

                                                                     **

Begin.  The surface lies before me – the caged bird sings of freedom -  I scoop texture paste onto the board and with the largest trowel I have, spread it in quick broad strokes, leaving trepidation behind – the free bird leaps on the back of the wind – trails and rivers, paths and raindrops show up under the tool, taking me somewhere, bringing someone to me – I feel a door opening – light? Quickly I mix a wash in creamy pale yellow – pour it on, catching it in the river/paths/raindrops – the free bird thinks of another breeze – and warm lemon curd yellow floats into my world.  Are you there?

Waiting.  Slow drying, but surprises appear.  I tape the poem to the wall, print big enough to make out as I work.  So many images surface in my mind’s eye, call to me, then drift only to be replaced, crowded out by others.  Returning to my work, I see a delicate head wrap, in tiny pattern, and then a sleeve, richly embroidered.  She’s here.  Waiting for me to give her voice.  Where is the window from which you watch?  A swallow brings you an offering of berries.  You gaze at me, Madonna of the Swallows.  I hear your voice.

Madonna of the Swallows

48" x 84"

                                                                     **

The universe sends Muse and Inspiration to whisper in your ear that there are fantastic things for you to do – soulful songs to write, luscious colors to mix into unpredictable combinations, elements and molecules to construct the never before seen.  There are birds to be let free and voices to hear calling.  

Sculpture finds perfect home!

This is so exciting for me to post!  Check our this ArtPrize sculpture by my friend Bryce Petit!  I have loved Bryce's work ever since he joined us at the Celebration of Fine Art in Scottsdale many years ago.  And this piece is so much who Bryce is as a person - I hope you'll come to the show and meet him - he's just the best!  Congrats Bryce!

Recommended Reading

I want to take a minute to suggest a site for thoughtful and gently provocative reading - William Kenower at authormagazine.org.  I am very unclear as to why his name isn't readily obvious on the posts or the home page of the site, but in any event, when you click on the Twitter button on the site, it will lead you to him.  Follow him on Twitter.  Follow the mag.  He is skilled and if you are a writer, he will stimulate your brain.  If you are a reader, he will soothe you, lead you, open you by opening himself without sentimentality.  Look through the archives for June and find Gift of the Night - remember and go forth into your day refreshed.

Maya Angelou and Inspiration for Madonna of the Swallows

Inspiration is a full and varied thing, sometimes young and twitching, other times a vibrational note struck on a crystal glass.  It is a muse dancing in your dreams, a wood nymph catching your eye from behind the twilight lit forest.  It is shattered light from a glass clad urban high rise tossing itself across the candy apple red of your car hood.  It may be a grand philosophical book, read in fits and starts, embedding something unforgettable in your brain, or something inconsequential – a scrap of paper caught on the breeze, landing in your lap like a message from a parallel world.

Last fall I was reading Maya Angelou’s poem, I Know Why the Cage Bird Sings.  I had, at the time, been struggling with unresolved ideas for a series of large paintings about women and the patterns of their lives.  The original idea was not coming clear for me.   About to abandon the whole concept and taking a few days to get away from what I was feeling was a stuck spot, I closed the jars of paint, cleaned my tools and left the studio.  Landing on the sofa with a pile of books, I settled in for some quiet time.  Maya showed up. 

The measure of a good metaphor is how well it connects to the human condition.  The caged bird seems nearly limitless, as does the meaning of “singing” or voicing what is within.  The voice of inspiration nearly deafened me.  Books fell from the sofa in my rush to the studio.

Who knows why the Universe graces us with taps on the shoulder?  Not I.  But I do know, after 30 odd years of being an artist, that these gracious or raucous or accidental taps are better acknowledged and noted than ignored.

                                                                     **

Begin.  The surface lies before me – the caged bird sings of freedom -  I scoop texture paste onto the board and with the largest trowel I have, spread it in quick broad strokes, leaving trepidation behind – the free bird leaps on the back of the wind – trails and rivers, paths and raindrops show up under the tool, taking me somewhere, bringing someone to me – I feel a door opening – light? Quickly I mix a wash in creamy pale yellow – pour it on, catching it in the river/paths/raindrops – the free bird thinks of another breeze – and warm lemon curd yellow floats into my world.  Are you there?

Waiting.  Slow drying, but surprises appear.  I tape the poem to the wall, print big enough to make out as I work.  So many images surface in my mind’s eye, call to me, then drift only to be replaced, crowded out by others.  Returning to my work, I see a delicate head wrap, in tiny pattern, and then a sleeve, richly embroidered.  She’s here.  Waiting for me to give her voice.  Where is the window from which you watch?  A swallow brings you an offering of berries.  You gaze at me, Madonna of the Swallows.  I hear your voice.

Madonna of the Swallows
48" x 84"

                                                                     **

The universe sends Muse and Inspiration to whisper in your ear that there are fantastic things for you to do – soulful songs to write, luscious colors to mix into unpredictable combinations, elements and molecules to construct the never before seen.  There are birds to be let free and voices to hear calling.  

Anniversaries and Other Reminders

Happy anniversary.  People say it every day, I suppose.  An anniversary - something memorable - a time to be marked, to be celebrated, to be counted as a measure of commitment or love or perseverance.  And sometimes it's a measure of strength and survival.

I have friends who celebrate their wedding anniversaries with much symbolism, sometimes elaborate gifts and surprises, trips, jewelry, getaways at romantic places, and some ways which are too private to disclose. I wonder what that means.  Is it like a birthday?  A cultural event? An occasion for gift giving and getting? Is it sometimes inspired but often merely the habit to do the socially prescribed?

I don't know the answer to these questions because Syed and I have almost never celebrated our wedding anniversary in the usual ways.  We've been married for almost 23 years.  We work and play together and always have.  We travel happily, laugh a lot, love many of the same things, and are what any psychologist would call "happily married."  So, why do we not celebrate our anniversary?

We used to laugh at ourselves and how weird we were to have forgotten, only to be reminded by our friend, Frank, who "gave me away", when he would unfailingly call to wish us the "Happy Anniversary!" that we had let slip by.  Early on, I would wonder what our forgetfulness really meant.  There must be some reason, some psychologically imperative reason, because, after all, didn't everyone who was happily married remember their anniversary for pete's sake?

Every spring, in March, I silently "celebrate" an anniversary.  One I never forget though it never appears on my calendar.  It is an anniversary that resides in my bone marrow.  In my heart.  In my soul.  In the pit of my gut from which the memory rose, in the early years, in a kind of bile, threatening to swamp me, bursting out of my body in sweat and shaking and voiceless sobs.  As the anniversaries passed of my mother's death, when I was fifteen, the joyous Springs of chubby hyacinths, pregnant with sunburst perfume, of daffodils and tulips shouting candy reds and yellows against the last whites of winter passed me by.  So lost was I in the anguish of not being able to bring forth her face, the pain of waking from the dream of her voice, that Spring was a lingering dark void.

An anniversary, not happy - but a remembrance, a marking.  Even now, fifty-three years later, an undeniable seasonal sadness flutters on my shoulders.  It no longer settles there.  Life, if one chooses it, actually chooses it in all it's vagaries and surprises, brings gifts of allowance - allowance for others to choose their own path, allowance for sadness as well as happiness, allowance for anger to pass and something like grace to enter in, allowance for pain and for loss.  And then, Life brings you the balance of itself.  It brings you views of horizons you didn't know were there, opportunities to love, to imagine, and then to create.

This Spring, the remembrance of the time of my Mother's passing will be somehow sweetened, imagining her at my shoulder as I greet my newest grandbaby.  Quietly I will say, Mom, here we all are - we have survived, we love, we choose Life.  Know that we love you.

And my wedding anniversaries?  I think that Syed and I don't mark them on a certain day because our days pass lovingly, filled with simple happiness, long philosophical talks, good music, comfortable silences, lots of laughter, busy creativity.  No trauma jars my memory of these nearly 23 years.  I choose him each day and believe he chooses me each day.  No need to send a card.

Thank you, Daisy, for your blog at http://bit.ly/evQGg7.  May your silent time be filled with grace.

Just the Beginning...

Good Morning Everyone, and a gorgeous morning it is here in Scottsdale, AZ!  The Celebration of Fine Art opened its doors last night for the opening night party and, though all the artists were breathing hard from the four days of fourteen hours constructing their studios and getting their work hung, the guests seemed only to marvel at the result (and enjoy the delectable offerings of Cafe Laredo).  Seeing old friends/clients who are always interested to see each artist's new work is food for the artists, and the appreciation feels like a real pat on the back for the efforts we make.

I hope to do something a bit different this year with my blog, posting each day about what's happening at the show, but particularly to acquaint you with our artists.  This is my fourteenth year at the show and I have seen so much remarkable work that I wish I had told more people about - now I have this great vehicle to do so.

For now, I'm off to our first official day and to shoot some pics for an overview to share with you tonight!

Christmas of Thanksgiving

Everyone has strong memories this time of year. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Chanukah, and the more ancient memories of winter solstice, deep in our cells. Memory is who we are and where we came from.  Sometimes it’s where we’re going.

Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday, detached as it is for most of us, from religious trappings.  It’s easy for me to take my place at the laden table, surrounded by family and friends, clasp hands and say what I am grateful for.  I don’t mind that God summoned up is a laden table itself.  I’m willing to listen to Him or Her or It, the Universe, the Source, the Ancestor, the Creator, the Holy of Holies, the Mother Earth, Father Sky, be called upon to listen to our gratitudes large and small.  The pressure to Believe, the need to be right, doesn’t seem to be there on Thanksgiving.  Everyone seems to be content with just the moment  in which to be grateful.  Memories of turkeys cooked frozen with their parts still wrapped in paper buried inside the bird, the oyster stuffing everyone hated, the absolute must of three cranberry relishes – out of the can, orange-cranberry with port wine, and Mama Stemberg’s Pepto-Bismol pink, memories of grandparents now gone and of the unborn baby keeping me far from the table so that much gravy ended up on my stomach.  We express gratitude for all of those memories by gathering with others to create more.  We are our memories.

The other holidays are locked in my memory with burdens.  Christmas and Easter particularly so since they carry both religious and secular weight.  Perhaps that confusion adds to the encumbrance.  After all, how can making the list of things we want lie comfortably with charity and gifts of selflessness for the Baby Jesus?  And how does the enquiring mind justify counting packages under the tree with having to give up toys from last year for the poor kids.  Who were these poor kids anyway?  Every Christmas, before I could make out my list, I had to select several items to give away from my personal collection of toys, and they had to be good enough to give.  Obviously if they were “good enough to give”, I hadn’t been playing with them very much.  But I was a selfish little brat and with the call to give, came the louder voice from within, “NO! That’s my favorite toy!”  Though I was given several days to make this selection, it never got easier.  Those toys that had gotten pushed to the back of my closet, lying in the darkened corner, unopened even, were too shiny to pass on without a fight.  As I fought, I grew uglier, being reminded by adults that if I were not acting lovingly on the inside, it would surely begin to show on the outside. Pretty is as pretty does.  Beauty on the inside is the only beauty that counts.  Do ugly, be ugly. Standing on my “tall girl” stool, checking in the bathroom mirror, I was certain I could see ugly warts growing on my nose, bad teeth coming in, my hair falling out.  I trudged to the closet and yanked my new favorite toy out, slamming it on the bed, now hating the very item I wanted most to possess.

If giving was burdensome way back in my childhood, it grew to be something of a yoke around my neck in later years.  In my twenties and thirties, having gone back to the earth, so to speak, to raise my family on a farm, it was only natural to make every gift by hand.  The list of people to gft (having finally gotten that giving is more fun than getting) increased each year, until the making took most of my free time from June to Dec. 25, about 3 a.m.  Often times the gifts failed to cross the threshold of the “store bought” look.  My jams were tasty but I never got the knack of the packaging.  My cloth covered lids always looked common.  I needed Martha, but Martha wasn’t yet.  Now, I wouldn’t have Martha.  But, that’s what happens on the route from hand-made in the 70’s to artist-made in the 10’s - the mass market makes everything common.  Nevertheless, the gifts piled up – sweaters and mittens, socks and purses, handwoven pillows and throws.  The dollhouse with furniture, curtains and bedcovers kept me up till 3.  I should have gotten a real job at the North Pole.

What is giving now?  I wonder how much laughter, how many tears, how many memories people will have now that the holidays are so much about getting great deals from ever larger and more generic stores.  Does lining up in front of Best Buy at 2 a.m on Black Friday make Thanksgiving more memorable?  I try to connect the dots of Thanksgiving and Black Friday, but the dots form no lasting string of memory for me.  I just know that if you want to be in that line at 2 a.m., you don’t feel like playing Charades or Monopoly, or even Wii, with the kids while you get ready for the second round of turkey and pie.  Where are we going with memories of big box stores and cheap goods from overseas?

         In these trying financial times, memories of fatter days can ask you who you really are.  I used to sigh with the sadness of wanting more than I had.  When my kids were little I wanted to get the best and biggest of the toys plus everything else they had on their lists.  I never could.  I often felt that I had failed them somehow.  It took me such a very long time to understand that my desire to fill their world with things was nothing more than me trying to fill the unfillable void left by the death of my mother and the breakup of my family.  I could not see that my children were the gifts  given to me to fill the void.  The memories of Christmases past are burdened by that endless struggle to have enough.  When would I ever have enough?  Not in time to relieve my daughter of the same burden.  Our memories are who we are and sometimes who our children are as well.  Sometimes it’s good to be selective about which memories we carry with us.

         I have packed my burdensome memories in a Lucite box so that I may see them, acknowledge that they are mine, but I place them on a shelf in my mind where I need not go unless I choose to, a shelf lit by the light of transparency but high up so children and grandchildren cannot be tripped or tumbled by them.

         This year, as I held hands around the Thanksgiving table and listened to the gratitudes, small and large, being spoken by all in turn, I was filled with the memory of last Christmas season.  My children and grandchildren traveled all the way to North Carolina to spend the week with my husband and myself.  We don’t celebrate a religious Christmas.  Nor is it exactly a secular Christmas.  Rather it is a Christmas of Thanksgiving.  My husband and I are not Christians but a neighbor gave us a tree with lights, for the children he said, and we all spent days making paper stars, cranberry and popcorn strings, and cookie angels.  As we sat around the kitchen table we told stories of other Christmases and that was when I realized that all those Christmases of sighs, of being afraid that what I did wasn’t enough – well, it was only my memory.  Just mine.  The kids remembered joy and fun and wonderful times – riding in the bucket of the old red tractor to cut firewood in the forest, tramping out in the field to cut three straggly trees to wire into one whole Christmas tree that would be too tall and have to be cut down to fit our house, carols and baking cookies, and decorating with paper chains and, oh yes, the yearly gingerbread house, to be decimated on New Year’s Day.  Full and loving Christmases.  Memories of love.  And, of course we all know…"love is all there really is."


Syed and I send our love to you all in this season of Love.

THERE IS NO MOVEMENT WITHOUT RHYTHM

Thanks, Richard, for posting this on FB - makes for much thought in this time of electronic everything - ppl missing out on the joy of their own rhythms and the making of them through the satisfaction of work and play. I am always so grateful that I've been able to walk the path of the artist, creating with my imagination, and manifesting through problem solving thought, then experiencing the excitement and love of making it all physical with my own hands. Watching this video is watching every piece of medical advice charged high fees for in the "civilized" world, come to pass in the day-to-day existence of people living their lives with simplicity, exercise, joy, in community, with commitment. In some ways, the old ways will always work better - not in all ways, but in many. It seems to me, that the balance is what we have failed to develop. Let's make some music today without plugging anything in. Let's gather in the kitchen to create a feast with only our laughter and stories. Let's rest in the evening, happy in the day we shared.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVPLIuBy9CY

Momix Bothanica _ Taormina Arte 21 July 2009

When you feel dull or trampled on, when you can't see grace or hope or beauty, watch this group in any of their videos.  Immerse yourself in what art can do, indeed, what it does to you while you experience this performance.  If you question what you can do to help the state of the world, watch Momix, open to Momix, allow what they create to wash through you, and the wave that they create, if you allow it to, will go out from you in energy soaring in the Universe.