Interconnections

Hello, from the frigid midwest! Wow, it's cold today....hard to believe that it is only November! Wanted to share these last three pieces with you before I got too busy and forgot! These are the latest from the Dust to Dust series, all of which can be found on my website under the artwork tab. This is an ongoing series, revealing itself slowly over time, a reflection of my readings about the land, not only here in my own locale, but over the entire earth. I am fascinated by the interconnected histories of the land and humanity and find myself delving into books related to geology, archaeology, sustainable farming practices, etc. etc. Everything is ultimately related and I find that the farther afield you cast your net, the more you can make connections to what you may have already come to understand. The picture gets larger and the possibilities are richer as you see the connection between things far, far below the surface. 

Dust to Dust no. 14

Dust to Dust no. 15

Dust to Dust no. 16

These pieces are all made with layers of drawing/painting with acrylic and ink on Ampersand cradled clayboard.....wonderful to surface to work on.....and the 8 x 8" size suits me perfectly.

Just got my copy of  Seth Apter's book The Mixed Media Artist this afternoon....can't wait to sit down with a cup of Lapsang Souchong (my favorite smoky afternoon tea) and peruse the book! 

See you soon....have a great week!

The Mixed Media Artist by Seth Apter

Hello everyone....please forgive what seems to be an unforgivable lapse of time since my last post. Everyone knows the juggling act that is modern life, I'm sure. My library job is taking a vast amount of my energy and what is left has been spent reading and a little precious time in the studio. I am thrilled today to announce that I am one of the Gallery 14 artists in Seth Apter's amazing new book on mixed media.

The Mixed Media Artist: Tips, Tricks, Secrets and Dreams from Over 40 Amazing Artists

Seth, the artist and blogger extraordinaire, is doing another amazing job of connecting artists with one another and with a wider audience. His blog post today on The Altered Page highlights this feature of the book. Other posts throughout October have highlighted other aspects of the book, which is now available, although the link above from Amazon shows it still as a pre-order until next week. If you are not familiar with Seth's blog and his amazing and infectious energy, you are in for a treat! He has many talents and gifts and is himself a gift to other artists throughout the world as they spend their time, often squirreled away in the their studios, creating because they must. 

Seth, thank you once again for the invitation to be part of your second book venture and for the kind and thoughtful words about my work on your blog post today!

By way of keeping everyone somewhat abreast of the latest work in the studio, these pieces below are the continuing saga of the research into the land and the layered history of the earth itself in my ongoing Dust to Dust series. I do have three more of these pieces (all 8x8" on cradled panel) that are just in the final tweaking stages. I should have them finished and photographed next week and will post them here before they go on my website. These pieces will soon be on my website as well!

Thanks for much, Friends....hope you are all well and enjoying a fine autumn!

 Dust to Dust no.11

Dust to Dust no.12

Dust to Dust no.13

Timeless Prairie

Hello again from the now the waning days of summer....do I detect a shift in the air and is there a sense that fall is around the corner? Except for the weeds, out of control in the front and just barely under control in the back, the garden beds are looking rather fine. We are in need of rain though and are looking to the skies for moisture coming our way. Tomatoes seem slow to ripen, but I think that seems to be the case everywhere in this area, given the late start to the season with all those winter storms until mid-May! My days are busy, as are yours I'm sure, between my life at the library and my life at home and in the studio. I've been concentrating much more on larger panel pieces, rather than work for my Etsy shops and have been listing the newest Dust to Dust works (8" x 8" on 1 1/2" deep cradled panels) over on my website. I'll show you the latest finished pieces here and hope you'll visit the website to see the rest. They all deal with the disappearance of the prairie in the westward expansion and the history of the land....the memories and artifacts that lay buried in strata that speak of time passing. Our histories too will become part of the earth....all these ideas about the trace of memory still fascinate me....always so much to explore.

Dust to Dust no.7

Dust to Dust no.8

Dust to Dust no.9

Still doing a lot of reading, watching ideas cross paths with each other as I explore several books at the same time....well, not in the same sitting! Here's what I'm currently reading:

Prairie: A Natural History by Candace Savage

Beautifully written, full of fascinating information and beautiful photographs, this is a must-have book for those interested in the prairie.

The Faraway Nearby by Rebecca Solnit

One of my favorite writers....all nonfiction, but her writing and the weaving of ideas will take your breath away.

Daily Rituals: How Artists Work by Mason Currey

Delightful reading....visual artists, writers, composers, etc.....so many ways to live the creative life!

Hope you are all enjoying the season, scanning the horizons for new and creative possibilities! 

Greetings in the First Days of Summer

Dust to Dust no.4

Dust to Dust no.5

Dust to Dust no.6

Hello! Hoping the summer season is finding everyone well. Here in South Dakota, the temperatures are turning warmer and more like summer every day. I'd say spring was mostly cooler than normal, but we've also had a fair amount of rain, which is a very good thing! Last year's severe drought is still on everyone's mind, so there is a grateful sigh of relief to have rain this year. The garden is thriving, including all manner of weeds. Time to get back out there and do some serious weeding! The irises and peonies have had their time of beautiful blooms and are now turning the stage over to the day lilies which are showing signs of flowering sprouts that grow what seems like inches each day.

Johntimothy and I had a much needed rejuvenating vacation in Washington, DC, where we immersed ourselves for days on end in museums surrounded by amazing works of art. We were there at the tail end of the Albrecht Durer exhibition at the National Gallery, which was a highlight especially for Johntimothy, the printmaker! We chanced upon a fascinating lecture on the Sunday afternoon we were at the National Gallery by author/historian Ross King who was discussing his new book Leonardo and the Last Supper. We now have a signed copy and I can't wait to read it! One of the surprise highlights of our trip though, was the exhibition at the Phillips Collection, Georges Braque and the Cubist Still Life. I had seen Braque's paintings before, but not a collection of them and somehow this time they hit us with their subtle power and for both of us, Braque's work stood out as much more interesting and nuanced than Picasso's. Interesting.

So, back at home now, fully immersed in the chaos of daily life and work. Trying to reestablish rhythms and continuing my reading explorations. Just finished a fabulous book by a local author, Jerry Wilson, Waiting for Coyote's Call: An Eco-Memoir From The Missouri River Bluff. The book is beautifully written and centers around the building of his home and the restoration of much of the land to native grasses. It is labeled an eco-memoir and it is definitely that, but more.....a inspiration for living a thoughtful life connected to place and learning to find the wisdom found in nature and within. Highly recommended!

Somehow in recent weeks I finished these pieces from the Dust to Dust series. I believe I showed them to you while in progress, but now I call them finished. I didn't take any shots of the sides which have drawing on them as well, but they are on 1 1/2" cradled clayboard....they hover somewhere between painting and drawing, but lean more toward drawing with layers of acrylic paint and acrylic ink. I'm still haunted by notions of the buried history in the land....time and memory, the lost traces of our collective lives.

And now....it's a beautiful Sunday and Johntimothy and I will take a drive over across the river to Wynot, Nebraska to the St. James Marketplace crossing our fingers all the while that there will be at least one homemade blueberry pie for us to bring home!  See you soon....enjoy the day!

Works in Progress

Hi, everyone! I feel as if I should be apologizing to you, as it feels as if I've abandoned all my friends here. It's been a time of replenishing the stores with reading and working outside in the garden beds....at long last!! My last post was almost a month ago and I was reminded of that photo I took of one of the many snowstorms we had in April....but that one wasn't the last of it....we had several more between then and the last one on May 1st. But....at long last spring has taken hold and I want to spend every minute outside in the fresh air....digging in the weeds, planting or just sitting on the porch with a book and a glass of wine! If you'd been here this winter (and many of you endured a long, hard winter as well, I know!) you'd certainly want to do the same.

I have been making some new work in the studio, but it's going slowly....mostly because I'm so distracted with my spring fever! I've included a few quick shots of the three pieces in progress....a continuation of the Dust to Dust series I started a couple of months ago. These are all on 8x8" clay coated Ampersand cradled panels. They are evolving in connection to the reading I've been doing about the land and its history...a wide scope of events including the gradual loss of the prairie and the bittersweet stories of the peoples who have passed through these parts. It is a complex, yet fascinating piece of history, still unfolding, and the way I can come to terms with it all is through making the work that I make. These pieces seem to be more about drawing than painting, but I think the next panels will move in another direction....but we'll just have to see, as I don't seem to be in control of how they evolve! Here are the three in progress on my rather messy desk and details of each individually.

Above is a short found text poem made a few weeks ago....I used to make these regularly and kind of missed the process, so have been making them here and there. This one fits nicely with the ideas I've been working with and I thought I'd share it here.

My other last piece of exciting news is that I just received my advance copy of 500 Paper Objects to be published in the next month by Lark Books. Two of my pieces were selected for the book and it's exciting to see them in print! It's doubly exciting around here lately, as my husband Johntimothy, who is a printmaker, is represented in another publication that just came out, 500 Prints on Clay!

Well, I have missed you all and hope everyone is having a fine spring or autumn, depending on your locale. I've just seen some of the pictures of the devastation from tornado in Oklahoma....I know there have been many others and my heart goes out to all those who have been in the paths of those tornados. Frighteningly powerful and heartbreaking to see the damage.

Best wishes to everyone and I will try to get back here much sooner next time! 

Dust To Dust

The endless winter continues....each week there is at least one storm, dumping rain, snow, ice, sleet or any combination thereof. The several inches of mounting snow this afternoon is due to a visit from Zeus....clearly the last of the winter storms. But, I've said that before and been completely wrong.

I've been continuing my reading investigations into this land where I live, coming to terms with a sense of place. I am still fascinated by the prairie....well, what was the prairie and the history of the land in this part of the country. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I read Grassland, by Richard Manning, which I found fascinating and which inspired a new direction in my work. I was reminded in my reading of the deep history of the land and have always held the idea of the land as a keeper of memory. This is true in a metaphoric sense, but also in a very real and tangible way, as the pottery shards and remnants of past cultures lay buried in the earth. 

I began experimenting with these small cradled clayboard panels, which I have found are a wonderful surface for drawing and painting. These new pieces are part of a series I'm calling Dust to Dust. Since I didn't know just what size I would be most comfortable with, I bought three different sizes to experiment with. So....these are the first pieces from the series, no.1, no.2 and no.3, which are sized 4x4", 6x6", 8x8" respectively. I like working on the 8"x8" so the series is now moving forward in a slightly different way, in that size....please stay tuned!

Dust to Dust no.1

Dust to Dust no.1 (side detail)

Dust to Dust no.2

Dust to Dust no.3

I'm now happily immersed in another wonderful book, Not Just Any Land by John Price. I was happy to lay my hands on it at our library, but it's another one of those books I'll buy because I want it in my library. 

I've finished another piece in the Celadon Suite series as well...now posted on my website, no.6. I wish I was a better photographer....this is just so washed out!

Celadon Suite no.6

While we are complaining about the winter weather here, I am aware of the heartache and misery of those folks along the Mississippi River with it's rising flood waters. The waters here on the Missouri River are quite low, so they are no doubt holding back water releases from the dams upriver. Mother Nature is a powerful force, that's for sure. 

Well, this is the end of my "weekend" and the work week begins tomorrow. Hope you all are doing well....investigating the questions and the curiosities of life, making new discoveries. Cheers!