Places in the Heart

Looking back on a long, and, I think, interesting life as I approach the age of 64, I am fortunate to have been able to travel, to see different parts of the world, and different parts of this country. Although not born here, the moments I feel most American are when I am traveling the open road. There's no real way to describe that feeling, especially when traveling the great West.
Here then, are a few places that feel magical to me, that have left a deep imprint in my memory and my soul. I have used only family photos so that rather than show a perfect glossy professional view of each location, I remember it as it was on that particular day.

Victoria Falls, Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe)-1954. And that's my Dad. This always makes me recall my African childhood in a long ago time, when I felt like a child of the world.

 Cape Town, South Africa, 1957- A view of Table Mountain from our ship as we left the continent forever, bound for England, and then the U.S.

 Yellowstone National Park, Old Faithful- 1958. Everyone should visit here.

New Orleans, 2001-An iconic city. I have been here numerous times but have not returned since Hurricane Katrina. We ate on the balcony here on Royal Street.

 Big Bend National Park, 1994. This place has an ancient magic, to me. Maybe it's the wildness of the borderlands, looking to Mexico across the Rio Grande.

 San Francisco, 1992- Julie and I at the Golden Gate Bridge on a foggy day. Another iconic city. Nothing like it.

 Paladuro Canyon, 2011- Only two hours away lies "the little Grand Canyon". Driving across the flatness of the Texas panhandle and seeing the earth suddenly open up is astonishing every single time.

 Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, 2003- Top of the world, Ma! One of those take-your-breath-away places.

 Fallingwater, Pennsylvania, 1981- I have been inside many Frank Lloyd Wright houses, including the Robie House in Chicago, and Taliesen West in Scottsdale, Arizona, but this is the one that looks most perfect in its environment.

 Monument Valley, 2005- The classic view. The American West of the American Western.

 Teotihuacan, Mexico, 2007- atop the Pyramid of the Sun, looking at the Pyramid of the Moon. A place of ancient blood and ritual sacrifice now covered in sunburnt tourists.

 Montreal, Canada,the old town, 2008- European charm,Western energy, great food.

 Santa Fe, New Mexico, 2013- Probably my 10th trip here. Another city unique unto itself.

 Somewhere near Taos, New Mexico-2011. The northern New Mexico landscape always calls me. And I will be back there in June.

Black and White

I have an affinity for black and white, whether it's old classic films, especially Film Noir, or crisp black and white photography, which renders even the most realistic of subjects a beautiful design of positive and negative space. There is a simplicity and yet and a complex undertone in stripping the world of colour. The brutality of the past is both softened by the lack of colour, where blood is merely rendered a dark shape, and yet becomes all the more stark by reducing it to a place in the imagination. Consider the bleak, Depression era photography of Dorothea Lange and her poor, struggling subjects. Also please Google Kathe Kollwitz and her haunting and haunted subject matter. And take another look at Picasso's "Guernica".  And the silent film, "Nosferatu". Black and white can often render horror much more intensely than the richness of colour. Even in modern film, black and white often makes a statement even more unsettling than the world we see around us. Check out "Pi"  (my computer won't make the symbol for Pi) by Darron Aronofsky. Unless you just want to curl up with a nice cozy murder mystery. As I often do.

I have used the limitations of black and white before in artwork and in my sketchbooks. My series Absolutely Your Zen adhered to these rules by following each letter of the alphabet and only rendering each letter in black and white. Artists do indeed need rules. They also need chaos. It's that whole dichotomy thing.

Anyway, I bought a new Moleskine sketchbook and decided to keep it black and white.  Doodle doodle doodle. Well, artists also know when to violate rules. Even the rules of art. Yes, Art does have rules. And one of those is that all rules are meant to be broken. I only have a few pages done but already I have strayed and introduced neutral beige and a shot of bronze metallic paint. Those artists. So unpredictable! This is why we could never serve in the military. All that questioning, all that outside the box-ness, all that independent thinking......

We all play our part in this world.

Let's Have Another Cup

I'm starting to like this "let's have an art show" mood. Aside from planning one at my house with friends this upcoming May, I am just wrapping up a month-long show at my local caffeine hangout, J&B Coffee. It was unbelievably easy. I just walked up to the manager and asked her if they wanted to hang my artwork there for the next First Friday Art Trail.
Done!
Made some postcards and sent them out. I'm getting this promotion thing down.

 Then I made a big billboard sign to put on their easel:

The back room was a little dark, almost like a grotto, but we made it work. (I sold that big quilt to a friend later, plus a few other small prints and drawings)

 

 A better image of "Three Cups" done in acrylic.

My daughter also showed some of her photography of the Flatlands Dance Theatre.

The actual Flatlands dancers performed:

And friends turned out to wish me well. (Ellen on left)

Oddly enough, one of the most popular items there was a slapped together "art journal" I had made over the previous weeks. Ellen had given me, for Christmas, a little inexpensive Smash scrapbook targeted for teenage girls. By spreading gesso on the pages to fortify and prep them I used it to experiment with some of my hand carved stamps of coffee cups, as well as collage with clippings, abandoned art projects, random sketches, and found ephemera, all based around the theme of coffee. I laid it out on one of the tables and just let visitors flip through it. Nothing fancy, just making a big art mess. Journals should be free of judgment and just loaded with fun.

I can't believe I used to angst over my art and be fearful of showing it to anyone. Now I realize it's not all brilliant and I will never hang in a museum (unless I personally bungee jump over a balcony) but it is always such a joy and pleasure to create. My soul is satisfied.

The Winter Beach

On The Winter Beach

I walk on the winter beach
from here to there
and beyond where the beach ends
past indifferent sea gulls
over beached kelps
over bleached sea shells
to the sound of crushing waves
to the call of ebbing memories
I walk on the winter beach
I shall go
I must go
alone
beyond where the beach ends

Suchoon Mo

Glenn and I recently returned from visiting his sisters, cousin, and niece, at a seaside house on Crystal Beach, east of Galveston. I love the beach in winter, the sand clean and bare, the air cool and bracing, and the sun casting diamonds on the pewter ocean.

 Carol brought their new dog, Wiley, along, a frisky adolescent standard poodle, who could chase a ball forever.

 There were even cows in the field next door.

We took the ferry to Galveston and back one afternoon, and I loved standing on the bow of the boat, rather than sitting in the rows of cars on the deck. It recalled my childhood travels on ocean liners, even if only for a 20 minute hop across the bay surrounded by departing cruise ships and hard working tugboats pushing barges as long as a football field.

Meanwhile there was fresh red snapper to be grilled:

And many rounds of Skip Bo to be played:

And selfies to be taken:

And thanks to Becky Cooper-Rezek for reminding me of this poem.

As if the Sea should part by Emily Dickinson

As if the Sea should part
And show a further Sea --
And that -- a further -- and the Three
But a presumption be --

Of Periods of Seas --
Unvisited of Shores --
Themselves the Verge of Seas to be --
Eternity -- is Those --