Leave of Absence

I think it's traditional to let people know before taking a leave of absence, but as an untraditional person, I chose to let you all know after.  I'm just trying to keep things interesting.

The funny thing is, I accidentally spelled "absence" "absense" just now, and while the latter spelling is incorrect, it reflects much of my summer - absent of sense.  It was nuts! I thought I'd do a visual summary of my summer here and give you the highlights:

At the beginning of June, before the school year even ended, I took off to Grand Rapids for a summer job of sorts.  (When I was there in grad school at Kendall College of Art and Design, I'd been the grad assistant in their Continuing Studies program and did a lot of curriculum development.  The grad assistant who came after me didn't have a background in Art Education like I did, so the the CS director asked if I'd come back this summer to work as their Program Assistant and pick up where I left off.)

I worked here (the "Old Federal Building") all summer

This was my office space where I did curriculum
development for the program.

The Old Federal Building is historic and has
lots of cool architectural and historic features.
This room was once Gerald Ford's
Congressional office!  Groovy.

Grand Rapids skyline

 I had already committed to teaching a camp and other classes at home, so I had to travel back and forth to Grand Rapids a lot.  Thank heavens for audio books.  This is from one of my trips to GR:

I taught the same camp twice this summer  - Young Architects.  It's my favorite kids camp!  During the course of the week, I teach the kids (8-12 years old) the basics of architecture, and they design a number of different buildings, ultimately building a maquette (small model) of one of their designs.  I LOVED designing houses and rooms when I was a kid - I have clear memories of doing this in elementary school art - so you can see why this is a fun camp for me to teach!
This star student designed a house for Tony Stark (Iron Man) and it was AWESOME:

His house design

The maquette - each floor was built separately
and can be lifted off so you can see inside!
Note the bottom of the pop bottle covering
the balcony off the third floor.

The first time I taught the camp this summer (at home) it was awesome.  The second camp (in GR) was chaos.  Too many kids, too much noise, too much crazy.  I did, however, design and build a house for myself, which was fun:

Between camps and working in Grand Rapids, I did the Celtic Festival - my sixth year!  (I am chair of the Wee Folks Island - kids' activities.)  You'd think by now I'd have it down with no hiccups, but it changes from year to year, and this year was a nutty one.  But I still love it!!  I was also interviewed for an article in the paper, where my last name was spelled two different ways, neither of them correct. 

My domain - Wee Folks Island

Princess Merida came to the island this year!  This is her
with my sweet nieces and nephew.

Whenever I could, I rode my bike this summer.  I was sadly not very consistent, which I will feel on the 30-mile ride I'm doing in Detroit this Saturday (the Tour de Troit)...  But I love being on my bike and love Detroit, so hopefully it will be ok.  I'll just ache a lot on Sunday.

One of my favorite trails

I got caught in a rainstorm on my bike one day...

I also did a painting demo one Saturday while home at the Summerfest downtown: 

 Thankfully the craziness of driving back and forth across Michigan and doing so many things was peppered with great moments like these:

Saw my bestie Megan perform with her quartet in Saugatuck
The Tesla Quartet

My little sis and kids 

Historic Baseball at Greenfield Village

And with delicious food like this:

Chocolate covered bacon - I made it for an Independence
Day pig roast

Candied bacon chocolate chip cookies - also
made for the pig roast

A delicious meal from my favorite Grand Rapids restaurant...

The Electric Cheetah

 And with time spent in my favorite place in the world, Ludington, Michigan:

Ludington State Park Beach house 

Hamlin Lake sunsets from our cabin porch

River floating with the fam

My awesome parents at the Ludington lighthouse

With my nephew (his dad, my bro, was only up briefly this
year, so I don't have a good pic of him to go here, but I
had fun with him, too!)  :D

My sis and our nephews and niece

I had to scoop our ice cream at the bait & ice cream shop...
more on that story another time!

Thankfully the good memories are pushing out the more stressful ones, and fall was very welcome this year. Sadly there was no summer romance (don't we all wish for that, even a little?), but there's always winter's cold to inspire cuddling...!!


Stay tuned for the return of Lyrical Thursdays and much more...

Lyrical Thursdays, Illustrated

OK, so I missed yesterday...  To make up for it, I thought I'd share some "illustrations" I did for the haikus I wrote last week.  They're really not the best (the Doctor one is my favorite), but I had fun messing around in PhotoShop to make them.  Enjoy!!

Lyrical Thursdays: Warm Summer Sun

Here in Michigan, winter has held on like a baby to long hair - with a vice grip that can be painful at times.  (Is that a weird analogy?)  Today it was finally one of those spring days where all you want to do is sit outside in the warm sun in a t-shirt, shorts, and flip flops, even though it's only 55 degrees.  But come on, after 20-30 degree weather for weeks on end, 55 is practically tropical. 

To celebrate the day, I took a little road trip - to Hell, Michigan.  It's only about 25 miles or so from where I live, and not too much past Dexter, where my show is up currently.  Since I had to go fix a frame at the show, I thought I'd just keep going!  I'll write more about my trip to Hell in the next few days (for a preview, you can look at my tweets about it on the side of my blog), but both the warm sun and the metaphorical warmth of actual Hell (Hell, MI is still defrosting after this frigid winter) made me decide to choose this painting and poem for today.  Both are in the Dexter show (which you should go check out!).  I'll include below the blurb I have next to the painting as well as, of course, the poem.

Encaustic painting is the use of heated beeswax with colored pigments added.  When painting with the beeswax, it can become quite warm, as the wax has to be melted and reheated over and over to gain the desired effect.  All of this heat made me think of the warmth of the sun, and this poem by Mark Twain.  I tried to bring the tendrils of warm colors up through the cool blue to reach out to those who need it so much after the sharp, bitter cold of winter.

Warm Summer Sun

Mark Twain

Warm summer sun,

Shine kindly here,

Warm southern wind,

Blow softly here.

Green sod above,

Lie light, light light.

Good night, dear heart,

Good night, good night.

Warm Summer Sun by Moi
Encaustic on Panel

Lyrical Thursdays: This Is Just To Say

Today has been cold.  Really cold.  The kind of cold where you really want to be careful about sticking your tongue onto metal surfaces outdoors or you'll have a Christmas Story-esque experience.  (For the record, I think you might want to be careful about sticking your tongue onto metal surfaces outdoors like, any time of year.  Germs, man.  Germs.)  This image led me to start thinking about how, if your hand is wet when you reach in to get ice cubes from the freezer, the cubes stick to your fingers, which in turn got me thinking about ice boxes and sweet, cold plums eaten by someone sneaky, which is the basis of today's poem.

The poem, titled This Is Just To Say, is by William Carlos Williams and is also another I've used in a painting:

This Is Just To Say

I have eaten 

the plums

that were in

the ice box

and which

you were probably

saving

for breakfast

Forgive me

they were delicious

so sweet

and so cold

Painting by yours truly - oil & mixed media
on 8 x 8" panel

For this painting I knew I'd have purple (for the plums), and wanted to play around with complimentary colors so I put a yellow in the background.  I also used acrylic gel medium mixed with white sand to get a snowy, icy texture in the painting over the collaged words, with the purple plum shapes floating over and under.  (Click on the image above for a closer look.)  Part of me always wants to go back and keep reworking the painting (this is the case with all of my paintings...), but I also like it the way it is.  (I'm not the first to create a painting based on a poem by Williams, but more on that another Thursday!)

One of the things that I love about this poem is how simple it is.  Someone had delicious plums waiting for them in the ice box - maybe they were saving them for breakfast when they really would hit the spot - and someone else ate them.  I can almost picture the words of the poem written on a sticky note stuck to the counter, to be found by an irate roommate in the eater's absence:

Of course Williams may have had different, deeper meanings to the poem, but I enjoy its apparent simplicity, the cadence of the words, and the picture they paint (literally and figuratively).  Others have also been inspired by Williams' words, and I'll leave you with an example that had me laughing on Twitter last week:

Happy Thursday!

Lyrical Thursdays: Desert Places

Here in Michigan we got a few inches of snow the week after Christmas.  It was nice, really, since we barely got any snow last winter (though the winter before was a doozy).  While snow can be a pain to clean off cars and sidewalks and to drive in, there's still something so magical about it.  It's so peaceful as it falls, dampening the noise of the world and covering everything with the purest white blanket.

The snow inspired me to post a couple of poems about, you guessed it...snow!  I'll post one this week and one next.  The poems are both by Robert Frost - apparently he was very affected by snow!  The first one is called Desert Places.  Like with Millay's Sorrow, I was inspired to do a small painting based on this poem:

These paintings I did based on poems were releases for me.  I did them in the midst of the chaos of my last year of grad school, when I was busy working on very detailed paintings that took most of my concentration to do.  When I needed a break, I'd turn to where I had a few small panels set up and let loose with color, with palette knives, and with various oil painting mediums.  Sometimes I liked the results, sometimes I really hated them!  I was usually aiming to capture the mood of the poem more than the actual image the poet was painting.

I'll let you decide whether this painting captured the poem or not.  Here it is:

Desert Places

Snow falling and night falling fast, oh, fast

In a field I looked into going past,

And the ground almost covered smooth in snow,

But a few weeds and stubble showing last.

The woods around it have it - it is theirs.

All animals are smothered in their lairs.

I am too absent-spirited to count;

The loneliness includes me unawares.

And lonely as it is that loneliness

Will be more lonely ere it will be less -

A blanker whiteness of benighted snow

With no expression, nothing to express.

They cannot scare me with their empty spaces

Between the stars - on stars where no human race is.

I have it in me so much nearer home

To scare myself with my own desert places.

Lyrical Thursdays: Sorrow

Today's poem is sort of the antithesis of the one I posted last week.  I had planned on posting it at some point, but wasn't sure when, since it's a bit of a downer.  However, it's also beautifully written, and phrases from the poem get stuck in my head from time to time, specifically the line: "All my thoughts are slow and brown."  Tired, gloomy days will find me with that line crawling around my sleepy brain!

After the tragic events in Newtown, Connecticut last week, this poem seemed the right choice for this Thursday.  Thankfully, few of us have ever or will ever feel sorrow like the families who lost loved ones in such a terrible way, but words can sometimes help us understand even the smallest part of what they are going through.  In this way we can be better prepared to "mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort" (Mosiah 18:9).

Sorrow can take many forms and be inspired by many different things.  When I was in grad school I lived alone, on the other side of the state from my family, burdened by the stresses of school, work, and church responsibilities, and some days I found it hard to even leave my apartment.  It's silly, really, in comparison to the deep sorrow so many feel, how trivial my own was.  But it was real to me and so I turned, as I often do, to poetry (and scripture) for comfort.

Once again, Edna St. Vincent Millay came to my aid, with this poem that in some ways fit what I was feeling, though is more pertinent to those who feel sorrow to a much deeper degree.  In an effort to express my feelings and thoughts about the poem through art, I created this painting (which was featured in my post a couple of weeks ago):

I collaged the words of the poem onto a board, and then worked over them with paint - rubbing it in with my fingers, or scraping it on with a palette knife.  The line in the poem, "I sit in my chair," was poignant to me, because sometimes that was all I felt I could do - sit in a chair, not having to face the world or the stress or all of the expectations weighing me down.  Getting out of that chair was at times the bravest thing I did that day.  So the chair became my focus, along with the color brown and the overwhelming, cramped, dark feeling we get when we feel sorrow of any kind.

I could go on about the painting, but it's time, I think, for the poem itself.  Here is Sorrow by Edna St. Vincent Millay:

Sorrow like a ceaseless rain

      Beats upon my heart.

People twist and scream in pain, —

Dawn will find them still again;

This has neither wax nor wane,

      Neither stop nor start.

People dress and go to town;

      I sit in my chair.

All my thoughts are slow and brown:

Standing up or sitting down

Little matters, or what gown

      Or what shoes I wear.

If this poem leaves you feeling too raw, please go back and reread last week's poem!  It's an instant peace restorer for me.  Or check out this video on my sister's blog of our niece dancing (link).  I'll also include here a quote from one of my favorite book series - the Mitford Series by Jan Karon.  In this particular book in the series, the main character, Father Tim, is suffering from depression, but learns to give thanks in even his darkest hour, referencing 1 Thessalonians 5:18 and saying,

"Father, I don't know why You're causing, or allowing, this hard thing to happen, but I'm going to give thanks in it because You ask me to.  I'm going to trust You to have a purpose for it that I can't know and may never know.  Bottom line, You're God, and that's good enough for me."  I second that emotion.

Lyrical Thursdays

Last weekend some friends of mine allowed me to turn their apartment into a very awesome gallery space.  I hung around 30 paintings as well as a few old prints and a drawing.  It turned out really well!  My sister took a few panoramic shots as we finished setting things up for the evening:

It was really nice to look at paintings I hadn't looked at in a while - that have been sitting in plastic waiting for me to do something with them.  But really the best part of the evening was being able to talk to people about my work.  

As an artist, there is a process I go through with each painting, and it's different for each one.  Some are simply paintings of a beautiful or familiar thing.  But for many of my paintings, there's more to it: emotions I was feeling at the time, emotional attachments to a place/object/person I am painting, a concept I'm trying to get across, capturing a piece of history, etc.  I know that that is happening in each painting, but the viewer might not.

I truly love to find out what other people are thinking when they look at a painting I've done. While I might have all of the things mentioned above going through my head, knowing my history behind it, other people bring their own experiences into each painting and reflect their lives onto them.  A painting I created to express sadness and melancholy, for example, might evoke completely different emotions in someone else.  The visual language of a painting is translated into words spoken about it, and that enriches me every time!

A lot of my work deals with words in different ways and forms.  Some ways are obvious:

And others are a little more subtle:

This love of words starts in literature, threads through poetry and music and ends up splashed on a canvas (OK, let's be real, it ends up meticulously painted on a canvas) in ways that celebrate language - spoken, written, and visual language.  

In talking to attendees of my exhibit last weekend (titled "Tangentials" - since I had a lot of tangents going there...) about the above painting with the brown chair in it, I got to talking a lot about poetry and how it's influenced me and my work.  The more I talked, the more I wished I had a way to share my favorite poems in ways other than subtly included in a painting.  

And then I realized...I have a blog!

So, today is born the first of (hopefully many) Lyrical Thursdays, where I share with you my favorite poems (and go exploring for new ones!).  I may have something to say about the poem, or I may just share it and leave saying things up to you!  

Since this post is already long, I'll share a very short poem with you by one of my favorite poets, Edna St. Vincent Millay (I may post more about this poem at another time):

First Fig

My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light! 

Happy Thursday!

Wood Shop Skills

When I was in 8th grade, I took the coolest class in school: Wood Shop.  After being terrified by stories of sawn-off fingers and hair being caught in drills, I proceeded (with caution) to make a CD rack, a penguin puzzle, a jewelry box, and a few other little wooden cut-outs.  I felt pretty awesome.  

In later years, I would put these skills to use once more as an artist, building cradled panels to paint on and making frames for my paintings.  Not as cool, but still highly useful.

This past summer I had a chance to bring my woodworking skills to a higher level, thanks to a local festival for which I'm one of the organizers.  I'm in charge of the little kids' activities, which take place on an island in the park.  I wanted to step things up a notch this year, so designed a bridge/castle entrance, a turret, and a dragon.  After getting most of the materials donated by one of our sponsors, I was ready to go!  

Mostly.  I knew how to use woodworking tools on a smaller scale, but needed to learn the ways of the larger tools.  Thankfully, I am blessed with a dad who has every tool imaginable and mad skills with all of these tools.  My dad showed me how to use the tools I needed on the castle parts, and I took off on my own for the dragon.  These photos tell the rest of the story:

My Dad, showing me the ways of the saber saw (and an
awesome shadow of an imposing drill)

You can't see it well, but the dragon is
drawn out on the plywood here.

Safety first!!

In process

The dragon all cut out - I decided to make it
into a corn hole bag game as well as a
decoration - the kids had to "defeat the
dragon!"   

In the midst of making the dragon and castle, I went on
an African Safari!!!  ...In Ohio.  This is my favorite photo
from the trip of my favorite animal.
Just thought I'd share.

Blue and yellow make...the perfect color for a dragon!

The castle parts and the dragon in process 

Dragon completed!

The castle completed after using a plastic bag
to make it look more three-dimensional
(and awesome).

My initial sketches next to the completed and installed
 entrance

Dragon on the left and turret on the right on the island

Castle entrance and the dragon at the end
of the bridge on the island

The new additions to the island were a big hit!!  I even received the Spirit Award for my enthusiasm for the festival!  (I was nominated by other organizers of the festival.)  I'd like to thank my wood shop teacher, my dad...it's truly an honor just to be nominated...