“My speech is imperfect. Not because I want to shine with words, but out of the impossibility of finding those words, I speak in images. With nothing else to express the words from the depths.” ― C.G. Jung
Below is a photograph of Katsura Finakoshi’s painted camphor wood and marble sculpture “Water without Sounds.” It can be found at the Museum Ludwig in Cologne, Germany. Mr. Finakoshi deserves more exposure as an artist than he is given.
“If there were a little more silence, if we all kept quiet…maybe we could understand something.” – Federico Fellini
“We all live in a house on fire, no fire department to call; no way out, just the upstairs window to look out of while the fire burns the house down with us trapped, locked in it.”
– Tennessee Williams
“I see myself forever and ever as the ridiculous man, the lonely soul, the wanderer, the restless frustrated artist, the man in love with love, always in search of the absolute, always seeking the unattainable”
– Henry Miller
“Of course I’ll hurt you. Of course you’ll hurt me. Of course we will hurt each other. But this is the very condition of existence. To become spring, means accepting the risk of winter. To become presence, means accepting the risk of absence.”
– Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Look closely and you will see a heart.
This Valentines day, as I contemplate love, fear, risk and all that spring and winter brings me, l’ll take Mr. Saint-Exupéry’s advice and accept (stay open to) them all.
she’d been identifying patterns I was unaware of—this tic, that tendency, like the way I’ve mastered the language of intimacy in order to conceal how I felt—
I knew I was in danger of being terribly understood.”
– Stephen Dunn
I love working with charcoals. Although I’ve been working more with acrylics and watercolors the last few years, charcoal is my very first love – it was the medium I found at age 12 or so and remains my favorite…like an old friend who understands me..
On three different occasions this week, with three different people, conversations led to thoughts on love, belonging, our past and what we keep from it, as well as the rational and irrational mind (the heart and the head that is.) After considering all the conversations combined and all the different opinions of those I’m close to, I decided that for me personally, it comes down simply to faith.
My own idea of faith doesn’t encompass religion either, and in fact I don’t believe in religion or the church and mostly organizations of any kind worry me. I do however, have a strong faith in humanity, in something greater than myself, in love and even in the irrational mind.
I had had the idea that I would write about the subject, but instead I sat and painted my depiction of faith, both in something greater, and something deeper than the rational mind might allow. The drawers of the chest represent all the little places and files we keep within our minds. Those places that challenge our faith.
“For God’s sake, let us be men not monkeys minding machines or sitting with our tails curled while the machine amuses us, the radio or film or gramophone.
Monkeys with a bland grin on our faces.”
– D. H Lawrence
I’ve loved design and architecture for the whole of my adult life. While a Fine Art major in college years ago, I had considered studying design instead of scientific illustration (I ended up with a degree in Literature and Writing in the end…go figure..)
There are many different types of architectural design I like, but none so dear to my heart as Midcentury Modern – Desert Modernism to be specific. Brought on by a mixture of both the International style and Bauhaus Movement, each building has function, style and a grace that makes my heart go pitter patter.
There is nowhere else in the world you can find more mid-century marvels than in Palm Springs, California. Recently the Art Museum of Palm Springs (a fantastic place to visit if given the opportunity) opened the Architecture and Design Center in the historic Santa Fe Federal Savings & Loan building designed by renowned modern architect E. Stewart Williams.
Palm Springs itself (one of my favorite places to visit in the United States) has managed to keep its Hollywood flare. It wasn’t a place stars like Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra and the likes went to bask on the beaches. It’s where they went to have dinner parties, lounge by private swimming pools like desert lizards. It’s where the cocktail hour was serious business…and still is.
I’ll not forget the residents of today though. They are as contemporary and modern as the architecture itself and I adore their flamboyancy. I’ll write about them in another post though. This post is strictly architecture and design.
I was salivating at the idea of the new museum so naturally this week I headed to Palm Springs.
Being a small city, I was able to walk to most places although I did rent a bike (a lovely city cruiser with a basket and bell) for three house early in the morning. This helped me cover more ground on my tour of homes. It was a sunny 75 degree and not a cloud in the sky. I had headed into the neighborhoods and downtown. I had wanted to view my favorite house – The Kaufmann Desert House. The Frey House II (designed by Albert Frey, another favorite of mine) sits on a hillside and is private so I was unable to see one of my other great loves..but oh well.
After my long ride, I showered, changed and set out on foot to the museum. First I stopped by the Art Museum to do some Christmas Shopping and see the exhibits. I then headed to The Architecture and Design Museum – saving the best for last.
Deep sigh….
It was quiet inside as it was mid-day and everyone else was having lunch or just waking from the last nights partying (they party a lot there.)
I was in heaven. The current exhibit, An Eloquent Modernist: E. Stewart Williams, Architect, showcases Williams’, as well as his sons, dedication to both good city planning and even better modern architecture.
With regards to my favorite Kaufmann Desert House, I was hoping the house, designed by Richard Neutra (http://www.ncmodernist.org/neutra.htm) would be open to the public in February during Modernism Week (February 12-22nd) but I believe it wont be (insert sad face here.) I will, however, be viewing the Frey House II (insert happy face here.)
Below are a few photos I took while on my cruiser. I’ve chosen not to convert them to black and white as I believe the desert colors are quite lovely. I hope you enjoy them as much as I have.
Every great architect is – necessarily – a great poet. He must be a great original interpreter of his time, his day, his age.
-Frank Lloyd Wright
“I have often wondered whether especially those days when we are forced to remain idle are not precisely the days spend in the most profound activity. Whether our actions themselves, even if they do not take place until later, are nothing more than the last reverberations of a vast movement that occurs within us during idle days.
In any case, it is very important to be idle with confidence, with devotion, possibly even with joy. The days when even our hands do not stir are so exceptionally quiet that it is hardly possible to raise them without hearing a whole lot.” – Rainer Maria Rilke
She had blue skin, And so did he. He kept it hid And so did she. They searched for blue Their whole life through, Then passed right by – And never knew. -Shel Silverstein
“Woman on a Bed,” 1963 (plaster and metal) by George Segal, Seattle Art Museum – Photo by Jennifer Allison
“Now we will count to twelve and we will all keep still.
For once on the face of the earth let’s not speak in any language, let’s stop for one second, and not move our arms so much.
It would be an exotic moment without rush, without engines, we would all be together in a sudden strangeness.
Fishermen in the cold sea would not harm whales and the man gathering salt would look at his hurt hands.
Those who prepare green wars, wars with gas, wars with fire, victory with no survivors, would put on clean clothes and walk about with their brothers in the shade, doing nothing.
What I want should not be confused with total inactivity. Life is what it is about; I want no truck with death.
If we were not so single-minded about keeping our lives moving, and for once could do nothing, perhaps a huge silence might interrupt this sadness of never understanding ourselves and of threatening ourselves with death. Perhaps the earth can teach us as when everything seems dead and later proves to be alive.
Now I’ll count up to twelve and you keep quiet and I will go.” – Pablo Neruda
“We worship perfection because we can’t have it; if we had it, we would reject it. Perfection is inhuman, because humanity is imperfect.” ― Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet
While an art student many years ago my professor told me that none of my pieces were ever quite finished. That if I wanted them to be perfect, I’d have to finish them. I would explain that I was indeed “finished” and had no more to give to the piece, much to his frustration and dismay. On the occasion that I would return to a piece and try to make it “perfect” for him I would end up disliking it. Although there are some paintings that I take months to work on and continue to go back to, it isn’t to make them “perfect” – on the contrary, it’s just because I’m not done and still have something to contribute to it that is quite real. I have considered that I am simply not a perfectionist, although maybe I just find beauty in the imperfect things.
“I’ve dreamed a lot. I’m tired now from dreaming but not tired of dreaming. No one tires of dreaming, because to dream is to forget, and forgetting does not weigh on us, it is a dreamless sleep throughout which we remain awake. In dreams I have achieved everything.” – Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet
“There were always in me, two women at least, one woman desperate and bewildered, who felt she was drowning and another who would leap into a scene, as upon a stage, conceal her true emotions because they were weaknesses, helplessness, despair, and present to the world only a smile, an eagerness, curiosity, enthusiasm, interest.” ― Anaïs Nin
I’ve spent the last several days working on a series of paintings using new mediums, techniques and colors. It’s been unseasonably warm and sunny the last week or so here in the Northwest. Not wanting to forgo painting, I’ve spent a great deal of time in front of the open window, trying to get the best of both worlds – the outdoors and indoors…
Autumn is my favorite time of the year. Originally this painting was to be my representation of the Red-Light district in Frankfurt, Germany. Although for some odd reason it morphed into a painting of fall, or autumn, with all of the reds, yellows and browns – which I happened to finish on the first day of Spring. Odd..
“Zu keinem anderen Zeitpunkt (als Herbst) bewegt sich die Erde lassen sich eingeatmet werden in einem Geruch, der Reife Erde; in der Geruch ist in keiner Weise eine Verschlechterung an den Geruch des Meeres, bitter wo grenzt es an Geschmack und vieles mehr süss wie Honig, wo sie das Gefühl haben, dass sie den ersten Tönen. Mit Tiefe in sich, Dunkelheit, etwas von der schweren fast.”
“At no other time (than autumn) does the earth let itself be inhaled in one smell, the ripe earth; in a smell that is in no way inferior to the smell of the sea, bitter where it borders on taste, and more honeysweet where you feel it touching the first sounds. Containing depth within itself, darkness, something of the grave almost.” – Rainer Maria Rilke
“GEOLOGY, n. The science of the earth’s crust –to which, doubtless, will be added that of its interior whenever a man shall come up garrulous out of a well. The geological formations of the globe already noted are catalogued thus: The Primary, or lower one, consists of rocks, bones or mired mules, gas-pipes, miners’ tools, antique statues minus the nose, Spanish doubloons and ancestors. The Secondary is largely made up of red worms and moles. The Tertiary comprises railway tracks, patent pavements, grass, snakes, mouldy boots, beer bottles, tomato cans, intoxicated citizens, garbage, anarchists, snap-dogs and fools.” – Ambrose Bierce
“Sensual and spiritual are not easy words to use; that there are, perhaps, not two Aphrodites, but one Aphrodite with a Janus face.” – E.M. Forster, The Longest Journey
I am preparing for my first one-woman art exhibit in June at a local gallery. This particular watercolor painting is rather large in size for me, but was always one of my favorite little sketches. I tend to paint and draw sensuality as exhibited here in “Janus.” With this show preparation comes an opening of insecurities, moods of every shade and a sweet time of self-reflection.
“The light of love, the purity of grace, The mind, the Music breathing from her face, The heart whose softness harmonised the whole — And, oh! That eye was in itself a Soul!” – George Gordon Byron
I have very few regrets in life, although I have had many blunders. The one I do have is related to a purchase of all things. A purchase I put off, thinking I would return and find it still….
For a few years I would visit Rome every three or four months or so. I didn’t stay in the touristy places, but outside of them, in a neighborhood in which I often found myself lost – the only English speaker. Near this neighborhood (I wish I could remember the exact area name) there was a flea market. The gypsy’s and bric-a-brac vendors would sell their wears. Three times I visited the same antique booth and three times I coveted a large alabaster statue of The Three Graces. It was beautiful. The woman selling the piece wanted 120 Euros for it and I never had the funds to spare. All of my money was spent either on travel or on entertainment while I was there and even then, entertainment often consisted of low-budget stuff.
Each time I saw it I’d tell myself that it was overpriced and the next time I’d return to Rome, have the money, and maybe, just maybe, the woman would lower the price. The very last time I visited Rome over a year and a half ago my intuition told me to just buy the damn thing…although it would have taken all of my money for the week…so again I told myself, “Next time.”
There was never a next time as it turns out. I’ve come across many statues since then of the three graces, but none as lovely as the one in Rome. I’d like to think I’ll find it again someday, if not in Rome, then another flea market somewhere far away…
“All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning. Great works are often born on a street corner or in a restaurant’s revolving door.”
-Albert CamusStreet Art, New Orleans – Jennifer Allison
“Sometimes by a woodland stream he watched the water rush over the pebbled bed, its tiny modulations of bounce and flow. A woman’s body was like that. If you watched it carefully enough you could see how it moved to the rhythm of the world, the deep rhythm, the music below the music, the truth below the truth. He believed in this hidden truth the way other men believed in God or love, believed that truth was in fact always hidden, that the apparent, the overt, was invariably a kind of lie.”
– Salman Rushdie, The Enchantress of Florence
“The beautiful lady opened wide her arms, Embraced my head, and plunged me underneath, Where I was forced to swallow of the water.”
– Purg. XXXI, Dante Alighieri
One Street Shy 