It is such pure joy to fix myself a cup of morning coffee, shuffle across the yard and open the door to my waiting work space. It smells so good in there to me, when I first open the door. Is it the smell of solitude and intention? I cannot hear the phone ring, or access my computer screen. I build a fire, put on some music or a podcast and work in my down vest and wool slippers until the fire heats up the room. By 11 am I am usually in a tank top with the door cracked a bit. The routines and rituals that spring from my new work place feel almost holy to me. Wadding pages from last week's Weekly to start the fire, turning on the little electric kettle for a cup of tea, sweeping the bare wooden floor, stoking the fire, moving from sewing machine to ironing table to hand stitching in the rocking chair. I imagine time lapse footage of my work movements. What shapes am I making across the wooden floor? I hope one day there will be worn paths in the soft fir planks.
the beautiful brain
My daughter is currently participating in a study that requested she do an MRI scan. When I picked her up from the UO lab last week she handed me this photocopy. It made me a little whoozy and substantially awed, like starring through the lense of a powerfultelescope aimed at some vast unreachable spanse of stellar bodies. I can't read these pictures in any real data collection terms. I don't speak brain anatomy, but I am an artist, and the patterns, pathways, and beautiful symmetry of these images stun me. Like I am just now meeting a hidden part of this human being I so love and admire.
Other People Making Great Art...
This is such a LOVE love poem. I should have shared it two weeks ago but I'm a late bloomer.
work by Ila Rose
After selling a larger piece of work this week, I took the sensible path and reinvested some of my earnings into more art. I went down to Tsunami Books, where I have been pining over this particular painting and now Ila Rose's "Moment of Distinction" is a part of our daily existence. I love love this painting. It is both clinical and magical. Every time I look at it I have new questions. The precision and details thrill me. It is as if, by hanging this art on my living room wall, I have installed a window into a new realm. What a reasonably priced home renovation!
Palm Roots
These are photos I took last year in El Yunque National Park in Puerto Rico. The trees looked as though they might scurry about on these odd root clusters when the humans aren't looking. I read that Palm Trees are more closely related to grasses than they are to their other towering counterparts. They do not grow rings as they age, they simply grow taller, and Palms lack the tree like ability to "seal off" a damaged area in order to resist diseases or death. These root images certainly bring to mind the stubborn clumps of shrub grass I pull from my garden each spring.
what the root does...
As I sew tiny white beads to the crotches of cloth roots, I can't help but marvel at the miracle of the real thing. Roots are the patient relentless hand of the plant, holding it securely to it's place in the soil. They are the mouth, drinking in water, taking in minerals and nutrients. They are a sort of reproductive system, sending out brave tendrils that urge new green shoots from the soil. Roots are hidden treasure food for foragers willing to sniff them out and dig them up. Roots hold the surface of our planet in place, keep it from washing into rivers and onto ocean floors. Over time, roots break up thick pavement crusts and crumble massive buildings. I am a great admirer, perhaps a worshiper of roots.
the sounds I make...
with the help of others. Thank you Jonathan Bilenki and Dawn Cianculli.
