Poppies on a Bowl

My mother recently gave me a bowl which was hand-painted with poppies floating down the sides and dripping over the edges. I have always loved poppies, but I'm not sure she knew that.

It just seems they have always been around. The modest yellow California ones filled the edges of Grandmother's garden and the big flamboyant red ones are a rare and exciting addition in family gardens or whenever I have spotted them (even when there are whole fields of them as in France!)

I don't know if it is the cheery sparkle of sunlight or the ruffled 'promness' surrounding the magical black-centers which touches me the most. I suspect it is the mystery of those luscious ones; the feeling that there's something about them I don't understand.

My painting of the windmills and the poppies has become a part of my permanent collection. It is one of our favorite paintings and was pronounced by Lucy as "art galleriable." Yet there are things in it which still surprise me.

Perhaps it is that magic which seems to separate the blooms from the foliage and makes them seem in competition whenever I paint stems and leaves under those resplendent shapes.

Perhaps it is because of the symbolism which is given by many cultures to such an ancient plant.

Perhaps it is simply that my Other Grandmother painted poppies on a bowl.

China bowl painted by AMS 1973
Anemos - 48 x 60 - oil/canvas - AAB

Text and images in BushStrokes (c) AAB
--

Along the Quarter Mile to the Mailbox

We watched across the landscape as a plume of dust marked the progress of a vehicle along the unpaved "big road." We knew it was the mail carrier and so we ran with bare feet toward the treasures of the mailbox, making our own dusty plumes on the dirt track between the cotton and watermelon fields.

It was the summer when I was eleven. It was my week to visit my cousins who had hard chores to do on a hard-scrabble farm, but who also had a stash of movie star magazines and wonderful RED shoes! It was a week of "girl" stuff with my glorious, serene and joyous cousins. We rarely saw their younger brother who, just a month older than I, was out hunting or plowing and we worried about their older brother who was away in Korea.

Rural mail carriers brought letters and bills, newspapers and packages and, on this day, the newspaper was a special edition. We ran back to the house with the exciting headlines sure that my oldest cousin would be coming home for Sunday Dinner. It was some time before he returned, but we celebrated on that day -- the Armistice in Korea on July 17, 1953.

This week, we celebrated the life of Cousin Billy in a tiny, quiet church on Iron Hill. I thought of the morning he came to our house in deep depression, how happy he was when he visited us - newly wed to the love of his life, how across the years he had changed from a difficult man to one who was at peace when he died. Others had their own memories and private thoughts.

This week, the North Koreans proposed a peace treaty to formally end the hostilities of the 1950s. . . . Others have their own memories and private thoughts.

That day, fifty seven years ago, plumes of dust floated up and dispersed and settled along the quarter mile to the mailbox.


Along the Quarter Mile to the Mailbox
BushStrokes text & photos (c) AAB

Quote of the Week: He Has Spread His Influence

I'm a secretive bastard. I would never let anybody watch me painting... it would be like somebody watching you have sex - painting is that personal to me.

(Andrew Wyeth, 1917-2009)

I did not intend to let the week go by without mentioning the loss of Andrew Wyeth. I thought this quote was a good one to consider for this week. Maybe we couldn't observe his process, but from him we have learned just how personal painting should be. We have watched his paintings for evidence of his work ethic, his abstractions, his unstated truths. And over us all he has spread his influence.


i-Phone Photo: The Old Kitchen in Late Afternoon
Quote: This and others from Wyeth at Robert Genn's excellent resource:

BushStrokes (c) AAB

My Voters

A few thoughts on Inauguration Day, elections and "my voters."
My retail manager husband always said that success starts with the way a customer is treated at the cash register. There is probably a little more to it, but I think it is the same with elections. Voter turnout has a lot to do with how the voter is treated where the vote is cast. As a precinct manager who is responsible for the satisfied voting of a few more than 2400 registered voters, I have become aware of what makes my voters leave the polling place with smiles and warm greetings. And I know that if they don't come to vote, elections don't work.

In November, when I arrived at 6 AM, to get ready for the day, there were already close to 100 lined up at the door. The number had doubled when we opened the polls at seven. Later, when someone asked if I had arranged for crowd control, I discovered a line of about 250 weaving its way through the parking lot. I asked if there was trouble; I thought maybe arguments or fighting. Oh no, I was told. "Everyone is visiting, laughing and talking. They're just in the way of cars!"

By mid-morning, our lines were down and only a few at the time waited by the door. They moved through the process quickly and, twelve hours later, fewer than 500 had passed up their chance to help make the decisions of the day. My voters come from two very different socio-economic precincts, one which is heavily Democratic and the other which is Republican. My oldest voter is a tiny little lady in her mid-90s; the youngest, just old enough to vote for the first time. Who they vote for is not my job. That they are able to vote is.

At close of polls, the decisions have been made -- the votes just need to be counted. The road to Inauguration Day begins and ends with my voters.


Photos:
November Tree
My Voters -- by Rainier Ehrhardt - Augusta Chronicle - December 4, 2008

BushStrokes (c) AAB

At the Back of My Brain

My daughter put a slide show widget on my computer and, as it scrolls through my photo files, this photo of Boomie and her babies pops up. For a long time, whenever I saw it, something familiar registered in the back of my brain and it was NOT of cats on my dining room floor. I just didn't know what. There just seemed to be something about those stretched out cats, the muted color, the je ne sais quoi. . . . At last, there was no 'aha' moment, I just began to feel the connection, almost like a tiny fizz of electrical current.

It seemed to open a window of memory into the Cave at Niaux in the South of France. There, in the black rotunda, we stood where the animals were randomly, yet purposefully, drawn. There, in hand-held light, we took in the mystery of the tumble of horses and bison on the rough walls. There, deep in the mountain, we watched the minutes rush by and knew there would not be enough time before we had to return to the 21st Century. It was a powerful experience and I do not understand why the images of a puddle of kittens should unlock that memory.

Yet there it is; that fizz of recognition. It escapes explanation; perhaps it doesn't need one. How often does this happen when I don't make the connection? Is this what is meant by "letting your past inform your creativity?" Are there edges and marks and words which I don't quite recognize, but when used, would give layers of meaning to a simple creation?

Or is this just a glitch in the files at the back of my brain?

AAB

Note: Although other caves are more well-known, many are closed and have created exact replicas for visitors. Niaux is still open and numbers of visitors and length of times for each tour are tightly controlled.
For more on Niaux, go here.
For a description of my visit there, see my blog entry for April 19.

Quote of the Week

It’s also looking back at who you are as an individual . . . . You’re not just this person who’s from your own specific experiences, but the collective experience of what makes you who you are because of time.

Julie Mehretu

I'm not sure I quite understand this quote, but I thought it seemed appropriate to follow my last entry. It seemed to fit this fall tree as well. And it seemed to need sharing.

It comes from an article by Hilarie Sheets in the November 11, 2007, New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/11/arts/design/11shee.html?ref=arts

AAB

Street Talk -- Sunset Walk

The street where I live has historic roots. It was named for General Nathanial Greene of American Revolutionary fame. Come walk with us.

It is the address of the Municipal Building which houses our consolidated City and County governments and the headquarters library of our regional system.

Its Signers' monument marks the burial site of two of Georgia's three signers of The Declaration of Independence. (No one really knows where the third one was buried after a tiny little duel.)










In just thirteen of its blocks, there are two magnificent old textile mills which are now being developed for mixed use, an unbelievable 'deconsecrated' church which is now a community cultural center, a snaggled-toothed array of churches, historic homes, office buildings, empty lots, and 'modern' eyesores along with the Salvation Army and the Bus Station. . . and my neighborhood.





Lucy and I walked the wide green space down the middle of the street just at sunset this week. We only walked four of the long blocks, but we stopped along the way to speak with neighbors, lost a stroller wheel, checked out the monuments and watched a few clouds.

Lucy's Mamma wondered where we were and called.


We were busy taking these pictures with the iPHone.

Rediscovering Bits of Yourself - Part V

My sisters and I joke that we are three 'only' children. Our parents were the same yet distinctly different when each of us was born. Our personalities and interests reflect both their levels of maturity and our age differences.

But this past weekend, we pulled ourselves together to share in the preparations for middle sister's role as 'mother of the bride.'

The wedding was planned for a white-framed country church where our great-grandparents are buried in the cemetery and where our mother attended as a toddler. The bride had requested that the reception have 'none of that wedding food stuff;' she asked for just cake and ice cream with a little punch. Oh my! It had to be simple, yet elegant.

In the church, just a few ferns and palms formed a back drop for an arrangement of mixed flowers created by the groom's mother. Light glowed through simple stained glass windows to set the mood for piano and flute. In this place, the sacrament of marriage did not need to be long.

In the church reception hall, family hand-crocheted table cloths covered pristine floor-length cloths. Cut glass punch bowls were brought out from the bottoms of closets and filled with either ice cream or punch. Colorful depression glass held the ice cream toppings and sauces. A large ice sculpture, a gift of sculptor friends, added more coolness and sparkle. Magnolia leaves from our mother, eucalyptus branches from the mother of the bride and dozens of my green and blue late-summer hydrangea blossoms were everywhere.

This day will be a treasured memory for many of the guests. One of the cousins said, "This looks like Aunt Agnes planned it." ('Aunt Agnes' was my grandmother who died in 1992.)
Perhaps she did have a hand in it. She instilled in each of us a love of simplicity and quiet elegance, an understanding of working to get things right and the joy in being with family and friends.

She came from a long line of women who knew this . . . . and the line continues.

The Farm

It's the land of red dirt, red pick-up trucks and red barbecue sauce.
It has been family land since 1793 or 94. Its three hundred acres are shaded by tall pines, scrub oaks and old pecans. It has seen its share of cotton, corn and watermelons and now is home to quail, pheasant and deer.

There have always been things to do at the farm whether for a day or a week . This year the family reunion there was only a little different. Now there is a lovely covered pavilion and a pretty fancy skeet range. (I found my aim at the clay pigeon to be better with the camera than the gun.) The "hayride" minus the hay but with cushy seats is pulled by a tractor. There is a new coat of paint on the old house and horses and new puppies at the barn. The children played and got muddy in a welcome rain, the teenagers rambled on golf carts and on foot, the twenty somethings had their own agenda, the older folks did a little of everything and sometimes age didn't matter. Maybe it wasn't that different.

Some would say there is a special feeling about a place with red dirt. Perhaps so. There is evidence that the family's ancestors moved through five states, stopping along the way to establish homesteads where ever there was land with red earth, tall pines and scrub oaks. Whatever it is, these acres welcome this family home.

Most of the people who were there on Sunday remember names only as far back as Ma Belle and Daddy Henry, the grandparents of the senior members of the group. We are counting the days now until next week's arrival of another Belle (or Henry) who will continue the tradition of hugging cousins, eating good food and catching up on family news "at The Farm."

Knowing Who Shares the Path

Mamma said family had just gathered for two other occasions and would be together again for the cousins' graduations and that we didn't need a big Mother's Day dinner this year. So she came to our house where, although there were just five of us, there were four generations around our table for Sunday dinner.

In our family, we are aware of generations. And even when we don't see them often, we care about the cousins who fill the countryside. Occasionally, we gather on hot porches in summer and warm rooms in winter to welcome newlyweds and new babies who have the family nose or hair color or long legs. We visit cemeteries and pause to read headstones from the past and to remember the long deceased and their influences on the family. We return to church "homecomings" for dinner on the grounds and catch up on latest family news. We have no doubt that those who share this path are both who we are and who we will become.

As artists, we forget to look at our own "history." We don't understand how we got where we are or even how each piece connects to create a " body of work." In answering questions about influences, we blithely name one or two well-known names, but we don't really know what the influence is. In thinking about experiences, we realize that we have not let them into our work. In wondering about other artists, we forget about bits of their techniques which creep into our own. In searching for our own identities, we need to be reminded of the generations around us.

Finding a personal path as an artist is sometimes as simple and as obscure as this -- knowing who shares the path -- the influences, the experiences and the shared bits of artistic DNA. Then we will have no doubt about both who we are and who we can become.

-0-0-0-0-0-
A note about today's photos: (LaLa top left; Lucy, lower right) In April at "Homecoming," my grandchild explored the small country church which my mother joined more than 80 years ago. She touched the windows, the altar and the organ very carefully as if marking her place in history.

Chance Remarks

It was one of those phone calls which comes after a strange number shows up on the caller ID with no message, then a message with no real identification, just a guess on my part of who "Fred" is, and finally a real connection and a lovely time of catching up.

Fred was a high school student with my daughters more than 20 years ago. He had a little backyard frame shop and he assembled the chops I ordered from my wholesaler. It was a good deal for me and for him.

Now Fred has been painting. In spite of some teachers and a few family members who were discouraging, he travels and sells his work across the South in weekend festivals. He says he has a couple of my small paintings hanging in his house as a reminder that I was the first person to tell him that he could do anything he wanted to do. He seems happy.

Chance remarks of encouragement echoing through decades. Oh, my!

What chance remark will echo with Lucy for the next twenty years?

Construction Sites

Sometime in April, a freaky wind smashed the top of the trellis. Its bones were left hanging precariously in the almost bare vines of the Lady Banksia rose. I had built it some years ago with the boards from a temporary wheel chair ramp which my neighbors had constructed for my husband to use for a few weeks before he died. I probably didn't do a very good job, but it worked. I dreaded the chore of repairing it; I had repaired it once before when a car ran into it.

I did what I usually do it situations like this. I procrastinated. After all, it would soon be time for the rose to bloom and then it would need to be pruned and . . . .

So, now it has bloomed.
It was spectacular.

I have cut away much of the dead growth and have begun to trim as little as possible to keep from totally destroying the main growth, but enough to reconstruct the supports from beneath. It will not be easy, but this time I will have the help of two daughters and Lucy.

I will use Patrick Dougherty's sculpture as inspiration.




It promises to be spectacular again next spring,






Dome of Sculpture at Bluffton, SC. More about Daugherty's sculpture at The Stolen Day-- Part II -- April 2007 archive

What Is It Like To Be an Artist?

Last week, in spite of my coughing and hacking, I was interviewed by a middle school art student. She had to ask questions, visit my studio, complete a painting in "my style" and make a report on "her" artist. I really didn't feel up to it, croaking answers to her questions, but I thought back to a report my daughter had written in the fifth grade and the impact it had on her and "her artist." (She had selected my friend, Georg Shook, and declared, "After all, he is famous, Mom." Georg was genuinely pleased when she gave him a copy.) Somehow, I found the energy and made the effort to meet with Jordan.

Her questions were interesting ones but sometimes we veered away from the topic. I had forgotten that her parents had brought her in a stroller to a neighborhood party at my house; she had forgotten that she had come. Her grandmother had recently become a member of our family; we were both at the wedding. She had been to the opening or two of my latest work; I had forgotten the quiet teenager.


But this was about art and there were those questions about being an artist which needed answers. . . .

Good questions to ask any artist!
--When did you know you were an artist?
--Do you have a formal art education?
--Did your family encourage you?
--Which artists have influenced you the most?
--What are the most interesting things which have happened to you as an artist?

It was a long project and one which required time, preparation and thought. I applaud her creative and caring teacher. I thank Jordan for making me think about what it's like to be an artist.

Influencing the Influence

When I research artists for my BioGem pages, I am often surprised at the influences which turn an artist toward one direction or another. Sometimes it is on a personal level; others times it happens to whole bunches of us at once. In art, sometimes it is even hard to tell which is the influence and which is the influencee.

Yesterday, I had a conversation with a friend who said, "I had to get back to what I do best; my work had gotten too crafty; I was adding too much junk." I knew what she meant; I had judged a show and was surprised to find her name attached to one of the collaged entries. We both wondered why she had gone in that direction.

The 20th C was filled with artists who invented new ways of expressing themselves. We thought they were in a class by themselves. Today, I see a whole realm of creative impulses out there which seem to be influencing the making of art. There are admonitions as non-specific as to "follow your muse" and "dream with color," to instructions to "take a bit of this, add a little of that, tear an edge, glaze over, try some texture, float in an old photograph, make a line with these new markers. . . ." And I am beginning to see a fading of that fine line between abstraction, altered books, contemporary painting, collage, assemblage, and scrapbooking.

Is this a good thing? Gotta think about this.

Robert Indiana was influenced by signs and LOVE.

Unlikely Connections

Yesterday, daughter Susan and I made our weekly trip with my mother to her old family farm. We have been clearing away debris from a tenant of fifty years! Although my grandmother has not lived there since 1947, it has been amazing to find things which actually belonged to her or which she had made. I am well into my Grandmother Narratives and have completed the painting which represents her, but the painting and the findings match -- the old metal dipper, the crocheted bowl covers and the remnants of her flower beds. They have the spirit of Agnes.

This week, we worked in the kitchen and found an old wooden spoon. It was one which I had painted with strawberries and daisies some time in the 70s and had given to our tenant who was also our friend. Perhaps I need to paint a self-portrait in The Grandmother Narratives.

How does a mentor find a mentor?

I have been exchanging emails over the last few weeks with an old student and friend. We've mostly been catching up, but she mentioned some things from "The Bush League Painters" days. I remember when I recognized her interest in birds and animals and suggested them as subject instead of secondary focus in her work. I told her to get someone else to create a brochure, a logo, a BRAND, even though she is a graphic designer. I pushed her to participate in a women's cooperative gallery even though she had a full-time job. She called me a mentor.

Judy Brand has moved a couple of times over the last ten years. She has recently created some energy in her new hometown with ideas from our old days together. It is nice to see. Judy's work can be seen here. www.yessy.com/jdybrand


(The BLP were my students who were really artists who wanted a little instruction and some conversation, group shows and art trips.)