currently reading

When I need a break from writing and learning new programs and screen time, I dip into Oudolf Hummelo and remember why I'm taking all this work on. I love looking at plants outside, huge grasses, huge agaves, black striped mesquite trees and creosote bushes. 

I just discovered one of Oudolf's inspirations. Mien Ruys (1904- 1999). Her garden is still open to the public in Dedemsvaart- the Mien Ruys Tuin. I've just added it to the long list of places to visit. 

I have been doing some free writing sessions for my thesis topic. Trying to wrangle it in to something manageable and absorbing. The focus will be on urban design- walking and idiosyncratic space. I realized I've been designing shade structures since I arrived in this program. I live in Albuquerque, the sun is so intense out here. There is so much opportunity to play with light and shadow here.

It's been a lonely time this fall, so interesting to be in my third year of the program. Three years of intense, absorbing work, both within Landscape Architecture, and my own art, life and yoga. I don't really have a social life- (not that I ever did, except for maybe the Philly years) but here, it has been interesting to spend so much time alone again. A huge relief in a way, and waiting it out in others. I talk to the J's at least weekly it seems, so that helps too. I feel sorry for them, a little, because they have to survive my torrent of ideas, observations and state of being... There's a Rumi line that keeps circling about loneliness. It keeps me in my studio, or in my writing.

Don't surrender your loneliness 
So quickly 
Let it cut more deep. Let it ferment and season you 
As few human 
Or even divine ingredients can 
Something missing in my heart tonight 
Has made my eyes so soft, 
My voice 
So tender, 
My need of God 
Absolutely 
Clear. 

"The trouble with you is you think you have time." Jack Kornfield. the trick is to keep everything in check, to let the stress roll off of me, not to hold it, not to let things affect my work/ vision and attitude. To take the long view, to be resiliant, deep like a well, so that if a pebble was dropped into it, it would fall silently with barely a ripple. (another zen poet, maybe suzuki roshi?)
Have a good day, poets lovers, Generals.

claim your ground

ink on paper part 1

2013

untitled (reverb)

The studio is sacred space

claim your stance- claim your ground. Some things should be off limits until you are ready for feed back or scrutiny. 

watch the timing

be careful what you ask for. (and when) 

If a careless person comes into your space, you have a couple of options.

...you can make them tea

...you can ask them to leave

...you can leave

the most important thing to remember is that it is your work, your process, your space, you. This process requires vulnerability, not everyone can be that generous at any given moment, and might say something that shifts the mood-- that beautiful and precarious tight rope that art making requires. Sometimes people forget how demanding that psychic space is, so part of the learning is to protect yourself. To demand respect. To surround yourself with allies, like Guston, like Brady, like Twombly and Deibenkorn. Like your own amazing work. Your drawings, your sculptures, the things that you love, that are home for you. That send you out. Get gone on the investigation. 

seduce 

cajole

praise

be generous

make tea

but by any means necessary, get yourself some solitary space. It took me a long time to understand that, to understand that it was a necessity for me. That the protective energy required in a shared space was never worth it. We are distracted /distracting enough on our own.  We should not have to fight for it with anyone else.

And one thing for the weekend:
aha moment

this is the life

"this is the life" my best friend said, as we sweated and cut and hacked away a bank full of brambles and vines. To be able to have time to work together, to make ceramics and drawings and bracelets is an amazing gift.
I am back in Pennsylvania for the summer, adjusting to the intense humidity after living in Albuquerque for 9 months. I had heat exhaution twice since coming back. But I think I am figuring it out now.

from the archives

..." what i really wanted was every kind of life. It's so effortless to let my lonliness defeat me, make me mold myself to whatever would (in some way- but not wholly) relieve it. I must never forget it... I want sensuality and sensitivity both... let me never deny that... I want to err on the side of violence and excess, rather than underfill my moments." Susan Sontag

Finalist for Marfa Housing Competition

I just got the news that Jackie and I were finalists in the Design Marfa housing competition. I posted the boards on my webpage- here. 

I have been going to or through Marfa since 2008. I was on a road trip to Colorado when I first passed through. I fell in love with the silence and light of that landscape. Now that I live in Albuquerque, I go down there every once in a while. (it's a seven hour drive.) But it's different than up here. There is something to the remoteness, you don't just show up there- you have to decide you're going there. I love the desert, I love the combination of art and space, and the people that go through there too. I feel so honored to have had my work in front of the jurors.
Good news is so motivating. Here is the first board

reading::drawing

The color studies that I started this Spring will continue  each season that I am here in abq.

the bosque

4th street landscape

el malpais
white sands

I am interested in space design, urban and natural landscapes and technology. This constitutes a research project, and investigation into the same concerns that pervades my drawings. Light, shadow, lines, arcs, ovals, triangles and the poetics of space in both mediums. The question remains, how to reduce structure to pattern-- what are dots and points --the point of departure from form to shadow

what does it mean to describe a somehow sublime but imprecise realm on the margins of iconic representation?

inspiration and year in review

I wanted to share some of my inspiration looking back... and next post will lay out the work for the year ahead.
It's a double whammy for me because I'm a New Years baby. I love resolutions and the feeling of a fresh start-- a clean slate. I just got back to abq after 3 weeks in the East with my family and friends. I've been slowly making my lists, and thinking about the year to come. I have decided to work on monthly and quarterly goals this year. It feels more doable, easier to recalibrate. This article is so inspiring. I hope you enjoy it too. And remember, it can be really simple.

http://www.brainpickings.org/2015/01/05/resolutions/

I took some much needed time off from the intensity of the Fall. The semester was challenging on many levels. It has led to some new research topics though, so I'm excited to head back into school, setting up reading lists...  Here's a little break down of my year--because I rarely look at my accomplishments. But this year was pretty epic now that I think about it.

Spring Semester- I started my second semester in Landscape Architecture and one of the highlights was an independent study with Bill Gilbert, he started Land Arts of the American West with Chris Taylor, and the Art and Ecology program at UNM. Every week or so we met at my studio to look at drawings and talk about work and research. This program was a huge part of why I chose UNM to study. The main question that emerged is how or if I integrate my art practice with Landscape Architecture. I can't imagine that I will ever give up a studio practice. I'm okay with a parallel practice, I'm okay with a non- traditional landscape practice. There is time to sort it out.

My research assistantship was with Story of Place Institute in support of a plaza design for the International District in Albuquerque. Every week I would meet Christy Snyder, a cultural Anthropologist, and we would walk the district, meeting people and getting to know the neighborhood.

In March a great friend came out to New Mexico to show art work in Albuquerque and go skiing in Taos. Willi Singleton is an amazing potter.  He has work at the Weyrich Gallery and an annual show there. His friends in Taos are tea Masters. (Urasenke trained) We went up to Taos together and I hung out at the house with Cathy, and watched a tea lesson, and shared the matcha from one of Willi's bowls.

My drawings were selected for an emerging artist exhibition in Albuquerque. Surface at the Harwood Art Center. This included a workshop that ran on Saturday after the opening. We got to meet writers, curators and gallery owners from Albuquerque. It was an excellent introduction into the art scene here. There are young artists and curators that are choosing to live and work here. There is great energy. Central Features and West Bund West are two of my favorites.



Summer Session: I stayed to participate in a class that focused on a design charrette for a festival in the International District. Buster Simpson came in for a week to work with us. It was a great opportunity to work with Alf Simon, Katya Crawford and Michaele Pride, as well as my peers from architecture and L.A.

July and August: I went home to Lancaster County and started clearing out a ceramics studio that I had at my parents place. It was the first medium for me. So many hours of practice and learning were spent there. It was amazing to be back there, taking it down. I was able to give 2 of my students a kiln and about a ton of clay to take to their new studio in Philadelphia. I have been incredibly fortunate in my life as an artist, this field is so generous. It felt significant to pass it on.

I have not stopped working with clay, but it is no longer my central practice. I do have an iron clay body that I love, a Rob Barnard recipe. It is finicky and fine grained-- you cannot get away with anything, I mean, if you just look away for a second it cracks. But it does amazing things in a long wood firing. I got to make some cups out of it this summer that rival the best that I have ever pulled out of a kiln. The balance in the cups and the color in the clay was incredible. Every summer for the past 10 years I have spent at least 2 weeks in August firing with Joy Brown up at Still Mountain Center. This firing was shoehorned in. I also got to spend a day with Christine Owen in New Haven, looking at artwork, visiting Yale's campus. The Maya Linn sculpture was a highlight. As was the day with Chris, talking about our own work, and struggle for balance with teaching and making good work. Christine is part of a fabulous performance team called the Bridge Club. She also makes ceramic sculpture and pottery. Like me, she has many things in play. It's rare and not rare, but so great to talk to a fellow practitioner.

Fall Semester: This semester focuses on systems and a more regional look at design. Because we worked on two Urban projects simultaneously, I'm not sure that I got to pull out as far as I had hoped. Construction drawings studio was great, we did detail drawings for documents. I have a lot of ideas about how I would like to use them in the future. CAD was interesting and challenging-- barely scratching the surface of this program.

My drawings were selected for a solo exhibition at the Bechechi Open Space, Bernallilo County. It is a beautiful building designed by a local architect.  The exhibition opened in October.

Design Marfa  held a competition that I entered with Jackie Bryan, a duel architect/la masters candidate at UNM. We will find out the results in February. It was my first LA competition. It was great to collaborate on this design. Our faculty were so supportive with feed back. I'm so curious to see how we did.


Finally, I revamped my website, and have my drawings and current studio work up. I will be posting my public work from Philadelphia as well as the L A studio work semester by semester.  I had considered archiving this page and using the blog on square space, but I like this space. Here's to another great year.