the sea and the mountain

always provides perspective and inspiration for how to live and make work...

I just got back from a week of traveling, some down time, some ocean time, and some time in the deep woods of ct and vermont. Sand is still spilling out of sheets and pillow cases...

So beautiful and green, I was at Stone Harbor for the first time w/ jay and new friends, it was overcast the first day, but a perfect excuse to play wiffle ball. On Monday morning a whole pack of us went to the point to look for shells and walk. It was raining pretty hard by the time we got back. So cool.

I was given a ticket to Wanderlust Festival, a yoga and music festival at Stratton Mountain. I am still absorbing 3 class days, (thats 3 yoga classes) lectures, incredible music and so much rain. I used that as an excuse to stop off at Still Mountain Center to hang out with Joy, Jimmy and Ryo for the day. I was able to make some pots in the studio monday night, then joy and I went to see her exhibition at the Billy Morris Gallery in south Kent Ct. The work looks fabulous! check it out if you are in the area.

I got to Stratton Mountain around dusk, glad to land. I stayed in a cabin off site with a bunch of cool people and spent most of my time at the festival taking a variety of classes (some anasura, ashtanga and vinyasa). So interesting, so spacious and intense. I was kind of fine with all that rain, b/c the energy was so high to begin with. It was good to meet new people, I was inspired by the ease and sense of protection the mountain offered. I didn't get to go on hikes or get outside enough b/c of the rain, but loved being inside watching it all happen.

please check out:

Jeff Haynes

http://jeffhaynesmusic.com/

and

todd Boston

http://www.toddboston.com/

drawing workshop at Nabarts

i finally signed up for a workshop that i have been contemplating for years. the time was never right, or something. I am so happy that it worked out this time. 3 days of looking at things, trying out new materials, looking at books... I am incredibly inspired by the experience. I found out that i actually like charcoal (compressed) and adding wax to the mix can create areas of translucency, opacity, density and atmosphere.

I worked with Tim Hawkesworth and Lala. Slipping open books into my studio of artists, aerial views or looking at work with me. It was such a generous exchange. I'll be thinking about this for a long time. Reminding me again how necessary it is to be in the studio. in silence, attentive observation.

check it out:

http://drawingworkshops.com/

let them think twice

these pools, that, though in forest, still reflect

the total sky almost without defect,

and like the flowers beside them, chill and shiver,

will like the flowers beside them soon be gone,

and yet not out by any brook or river,

but up by roots to bring dark foliage on.

the trees that have it in their pent up buds,

to darken nature and be summer woods-

let them think twice

before they use their powers

to blot out and drink up and sweep away

these flowery waters and these watery flowers

from snow that melted only yesterday.

spring pools

Robert Frost

spring has been so rainy and changeable here, we started installing the mural about 2 weeks ago, but the weather has been cold/hot/rainy and windy. yesterday Mike and I started mixing color. I love going through the mixing phase. It is always interesting to see what the internal response is- and how non verbal it is. Looking at gallons of pure color is really exciting. And I always remember going to fabric stores in Lancaster, laying color over color to find the combinations of dull and sharp to make into quilts. My color sensibility has definitely been influenced by the family quilts, handed down. Muted, dusty, worn but sophisticated, instinctive responses to unusual color combinations and dye lot changes.

I also planted some radishes, arugula and herbs in the garden that I am sharing with friends. so excited for greens and things. A couple of drawings.

For Japan

http://www.savethechildren.org.au/

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2011/03/13/japan_earthquake_tsunami_relief_efforts

even a small donation will help the relief effort.

Noren in Naoshima

wall painting in Naoshima

Go'o Shrine by Hiroshi Sugimoto, Naoshima

Seto Inland Sea, Japan

what you sing to comes.

i woke up last night around four, thinking about all of the work that i have been making, and planning my day. My early thoughts are always intertwined with students (i finished teaching at 9:30 last night.) - things I should've said, things I wish I had said... and always hoping to be better, more clear and insightful and articulate.

I am balancing many streams at the moment, cups in the studio, a big mosaic/mural, small drawings, small sculptures wanting to be made. I was leafing through a sketchbook from about 4 years ago, I can't believe how many of the thoughts, drawings and ideas have found their way into the world. I thought I couldn't draw then, I was so hard on myself, I have been putting the time in, and can feel the effects, like any practice. Honing, honing... I have always written or drawn in some form, keeping a record. It still amazes me to find things that I have tracked, and followed and dreamed about have a way of appearing, sneaking up on me. Reminding me to be careful what you ask for. Be prepared to receive it.

lucid maps of stillness

"Words begin as description. They are prismatic, vehicles of hidden, deeper shades of thought. You can hold them up at different angles until the light bursts through in an unexpected color." Susan Brind Morrow

"Winter on the Colorado Plateau has not been arduous, only a thin cold without storms, a lucid map of stillness. Caught in the abrupt instant of its rising, our faces take the tangerine sun, our backs dissolve to silhouette in the brilliant dazzle of its incandescent beam. The nights come less as a smooth pause than as a steep, enduring purity of eye-blind dark. The mesas creak and stain in the frigid air audible only if I lay my ear to them. The colors in their flanks-- terra cotta, blood-red, salmon, vermilion-- bear the temperament of iron."

from "the Anthropology of Turquoise." by Ellen Meloy

I remember reading this to a friend while we were sitting in a truck in Philadelphia. This week I flew into and out of and back into snow covered landscapes, and thought of it again.

research phase

r long, chinati foundation

odessa shed

ice flow maroon bells

sun shadow photo from http://3.bp.blogspot.com

Girl on boulder photo from http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net

all i want to do today is stay home and read books...

early january work piling up- lots of things cooking, new design work, a new semester to get ready for, and a 90 day yoga session to start. I love January, it always feels like the time to hunker down and get some thinking done... here are some of the things that I am looking at and thinking about.