Teapot Ballad

Something a little different today.

All things up

Still looking up. A week of gray rainy days. Realized today how much I miss living in the country. Rain, even winter rain is a completely different creature in the country; in the country it cleans, refreshes, space deepens and widens, fields become vast, but in the city it contains us, directs our path and cautions. This week, looking up allows me lose the sense of confinement of the streets and houses, perhaps after my mother died my soul settled into that of a bird. It's true between showers as the flocks of birds alternately rest themselves and careen through the sky I feel kinship. I've yet to catch them through my viewfinder, but as their wings beat against the invisible and then clasp against their bodies to plummet my breath catches, and my mind strains to remember the shape and movement of their bodies and flock formations.

Today when it began sprinkling I stepped out my door and began to walk, determined to recover a sense of freedom walking in the rain had when I roamed cowfields as a girl. Deliberately remembered to accept the cold and wet walk erect shoulders back, knowing that home promises warmth and dry clothes and watch the world, up. The wind pushes the treetops that stubbornly hold leaves year round. A sycamore dressed in the beards of spanish moss waves solemnly. A crossroad, I choose the direction under the trees. Harder rain relax against it, water streams into my fleece sweater, and travels up my pantlegs. Lightning strikes near and hesitation stops my steps looking at all the telephone and power lines above me trees thrashing above them, wiping my eyes to see above me and continue. My shoes soak slowly and the water sucked from my lips is sweeter than any other. Finally fully soaked I gleefully stomp in puddles, rounding the corner to home just as the rain begins to settle into drizzle. My skin feels icy but not painful, clean. Sorely needed after a rough start to 2008.

Almost all of these were taken from inside my Grandparent's yard after my Grandfather's funeral last Tuesday.

It's a week of new beginnings, though small; I've changed my banner.

White Sky and Bare Trees

I'm still waiting to actually work in my studio for a sustained period of time, life keeps interrupting (some of it good and most of it not at all), and so I am turning to more immediate ways of producing work, namely my sx-70 polaroid camera (acquired a few months ago). The immediacy and physicality of that little rectangle of film is so satisfying. I've been so tentative with using the camera because the film is pricey and I have to order it online, which all make it too precious for me to feel comfortable, until I discovered how to use 600 film bought at my local drugstore using the filter from my used up blend film. So here I am snapping away.

Today found me with some free time, and I wandered to the damp outdoors.Looking up, a white sky marked by lines waving and streaking through. The saturation of the world taken away, and the colors on film are so so subtle, hints of pale blue. Winter has finally set in, but the robins are already beginning their annual pilgrimage north chattering noisily as they bath in puddles. A recent cold snap led most of the trees to finally abandon their leaves making room for winter clothes as spanish moss grows in leaps and bounds to cover their nakedness. The moss in its exuberance lavishes attention on power lines and fences as well. Florida, even in the middle of winter, is fecund. Yet today I am interested in the subdued drawings I find above me.

crape myrtle

winged elm

Discovery of the disappearing line trick. I particularly favor these two:

a few hours later as the sun sets the clouds dissippate

Wood King

Resisting the urge to update everyone on my holidays and instead just post simply.

Visited my dad's house this weekend and was able to take a couple of polaroids. My dad and mother built the house together and it's the house that I was raised in. The stove has a name, can you see it?

The dragon foot above was created by my dad to adorn our old claw foot bathtub. The window behind it, was salvaged from an old hospital, and now overlooks a cow pasture where my younger brother and I used to run wild, finding cow bones, picking blackberries from the bushes and then thorns from our legs.

I hope your holidays were beautiful and the brand new year promising.

Daily Collages Galore. . .More?

Still most excited by December 14th and 15th, and plan to return to some of those techniques but had to abandon them during the rush of holidays.
December14

December15

December 16

December17

December 18

December 19