Is US craft/art/whateveryouwannacallit going the way of the dinosaurs? After what I'm hearing this week, I'm beginning to wonder. As I mentioned, I'm at the Enamelist Society biannual conference, and we're eating our meals in the university cafeteria at those long dining tables filled with (to me, anyway) strangers. I'd MUCH rather stay in my room to read, write, and [...]
Icy fence [dropcap]So[/dropcap] you know I can’t pass up something as gorgeously photogenic as crackly, melting ice over snow in my backyard, right? Right. I can’t. And I didn’t. I thought about schlepping Darius-the-Nikon and all his gear out to the backyard for a shoot…but the “melting” part of the above description gave me pause: Darius is not [...]
My friend Becky's out for a few days, so I'm babysitting her gallery (do you call that gallerysitting?) and writing this between sales lulls. Becky and her husband Len are lovely folk; their gallery, Fireborne, is in downtown Portland near Pioneer Square.
I'm not often asked to be the muscle for somebody so when I am, it's kinda neat. And what could be more fun than hauling glass in Seattle? My friend Becky owns a gallery in downtown Portland (Fireborne, you should visit), which carries everything from little glass bugs to jewelry to big honkin' sculpture. She wanted to make some exchanges in Seattle. Somebody had to schlep boxes and hold doors for her... was I interested?
Boy. Monica Huggett sure strokes a mean fiddle. Mom and Dad and I went to hear her (and the rest of the Portland Baroque Orchestra) tonight, playing Mendelssohn. I have a soft spot for a good fiddler, having played violin in my youth. Well, I should qualify that: I massacred violin in my youth. Along about the fifth grade I took up the violin with ambitions of being first seat, first violin in the school orchestra.
Light and I have been in conversation as far back as I can remember. Most times, I just listen. Sometimes I get to talk back. Rarely--too rarely--we sing. And it's beginning to feel as though we'll sing, soon. When we sing, the light becomes a tangible thing, flowing like water, etching everything in its path, and I finally, blindingly, understand in my bones the definition of "illumination."
Boy. Them folks sure swing a mean bow. (Photo courtesy of Gigi the iPhone) Just got back from the Portland Baroque Orchestra’s version of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons concertos. As promised, it was really well-done. But wanna know the best part? They had fun with it. Really. They had fun. […]
The Bombay Sapphire folks are back with the finalists in this year’s international glass competition, asking designers and artists from around the world to come up with the best martini glass. Even if you’re not a martini fan, you’ve gotta see some of the designs. They make me want to head to the kitchen and throw out the Baccarat. (Yeah, [...]
“I hope,” I said with an apologetic smile, “that I’m not hurting anything? It’s a beautiful field and I just couldn’t resist.” I’d been driving past this wheatfield since early spring, on my way to work. I’d watched pale green sprouts shoot into sturdy green stalks, frowned as weeds invaded the waving tangles of grain and settled into a kind [...]
I was shooting the iris–great stuff–but the angry buzzing in the rhodies behind me was finally too distracting. Apparently wet rhododendron blossoms don’t lend themselves to easy nectar gathering. As I watched, bumblebees tumbled out of blossoms, righted themselves and headed back for more. They slid down the soggy petals, scrabbled for footholds, got stuck and buzzed themselves out. I [...]
