Here I sit on a quiet Sunday morning a few days before Winter Solstice, witnessing the sun (yes, the sun) crest over the edge of our hollow. It is a cold, but magnificent morning. A morning when the crises of the world, the dramas of intimate friends and family members and the typical aches and pains visiting this body seem to be a few frames away. I can contemplate a walk in a bit, the wheezing noises coming out of one of my cats (poor old Shotsi) and a bowl of red quinoa cooked in hemp milk with pears, spiced with vanilla from Chiapas and cinnamon. There's a gentleness about this day that is such a blessing, and it goes without saying, that I almost never take the riches of this current life for granted. My loved ones upstairs sleeping, the heat on, the water running, food in the larder....it is really the penultimate of success, but few folks seem to notice this . The clatter and clamor of so many others, running after carrots that are apparitions, sometimes creates static in my ears and dizzies my better self.
But I digress. After my walk I am off to the studio, a process that makes me simply happy - not deliriously so. My home studio is a tiny place where one stride takes me from one working station to another (there are impossibly three places to work in so tiny a space). Still I am making do, developing projects that assemble elsewhere into larger manifestations. Working with components that grow into something more substantial (kinda like seeds) has been my style for years now. Having this new studio in Tacoma is really going to be a fascinating shift...what happens when you have a mural sized wall to draw on, and a floor space where large sculptural forms can grow, where groups can sit at tables and develop a concept and build there in the space. Imagine that!
So my installation for VALISE is growing one hand-sewn seed packet at a time. Collaged models for story hives, too big for a doll house but definitely big enough for a sand box, are lined up on every surface, as are the seedling planter trays and dozens of seedling containers, half of them with a membrane made out of a photo of an eco-calamity. The others will be filled with dirt and native plant seedlings in good time. My desktop computer is filled with dozens of digital collages of surreal versions of myco and phyto remediation. I'll post a few soon. The show's title is Reframing Eden: Phase #2 - Gathering Pollen, and I'll need two rocking chairs and a digital recorder to make the gathering of stories possible (of course some gardeners/farmers willing to spill their beans would be useful, too). I posted my need on Vashon All and received over a half dozen rocking chairs - the digital recorder should be delivered by the Generous Goddess of the Solstice...we will see.
I'll be in the Tacoma studio for a few days before the 7th, drawing proposals for the 3rd iteration of Eden Reframed. It will be an initiation of the Tacoma space as a creative one. I'm really looking forward to it. Better bring my smudging supplies, given how much toxic energy has moved through there. The 3rd version of Eden Reframed is being proposed for the Burton Skate Park on Vashon. I am hopeful that we will build a demonstration garden and sit spot that will inspire many more eco-art projects at that site. It needs a lot of work.
More soon.
