Happy Creepy Friday

Paul and I spent the day in NY yesterday, professional conference day for him, total day of fun for me. Beautiful sunny day, smell of leaves, soft light and the Gerhard Richter show at the Drawing Center. Had to go to NY Central Art Supply and buy paper immediately following. Today we're finishing up some photos for Mole Hollow, I'm drawing, then finishing my grandson's little gory Halloween costume. He decided to be zombie this year. Couldn't talk him out of it. I asked him a few questions about how he envisioned the costume. Could he be a cute zombie? "No" A Ronald MacDonald zombie? "Absolutely no". Let's work on the back story, then. How did you become a zombie? How did the zombies turn you into one? "Mippy all this talk about zombies is scaring me. Just make the costume, ok"? I'll finish the costume tomorrow and then hide the mirrors.

I love going to cemeteries. They are always so life affirming and make you stop and remember you're alive. Try it when you're sad or not pausing enough in life. Turns things around pretty quickly. Here are a few pics of my favorite cemetery in Paris, Pere Lachaise. Some lucky folks who nap there? Sarah Bernhardt, Gertrude Stein, Balzac, Maria Callas, Issadora Duncan, Jim Morrison but Oscar Wild wins for most kisses. Beautiful images are from Chris Turner's photo essay-

 

 

 

 

 

 

Peter Pan Would Love These

Light Bulb by Melissa Borrel

Rippled Table by Stephen Holl

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shadow Chair by Chris Duffy

Art Best Performed in the Dark

I was a little afraid of the dark (okay a lot) when I was a girl. Actually, mostly the hidden aliens. Watching ten minutes of Invasion of the Pod People convinced me they were there. Under my bed. My strategy was to always face the wall letting the hall light catch any invaders in shadow as they pounced. While I waited to be eaten alive I would make shadow animals, to calm myself. Because I'm an actor always waiting for my light and had a few decades of Pod People patrol, I'm pretty good at it. Shadowgraphy, or the art of Ombromi, made famous by french entertainer, Felicien Trewey, reached it's peek around the end of the 19th century. The cause of it's demise? Mostly the household light bulb. And movies made it a lot less exciting, too. It seems like a miracle to all of us in this century. To distract yourself from the goblins this weekend you can go here and learn a few moves. This is a link to the You Tube video of unusualist, Aussie Raymond Crowe performing It's A Wonderful World.

Slice of Baby Boo, Wee-Be-Little, or Red Warty Pie

Paul and I got to produce and shoot a video recently for an ad agency in Providence, Duffy and Shanley. The asked us to create a fall feast in a 100 year old structure, Smith Barn in Peabody, MA. 50 paper lanterns hung above a thirty foot long table. For me it was one long blank canvas and I had a ball. Pumpkin and ghord shopping was at the top of my list. I visited my friends at Walker Farm stand in Tiverton and Andrew Orr in Westport. The colors, warts, grooves, bumps, and roly poly bums of these funny veggies made me grin. Here are a few examples of the beauties I brought home.

Thank you Haunted Bay for the great pumpkin and ghord education.

From the top left- Jarrahdale, We Be Little, Howden, Long Island Cheese,

Baby Boo, Cinderella, Cross-Polinated, One Too Many, Pump Ke Mon

Zucca Rotondo, Red Hubbard, and Grey Hubbard.

Poem for Monday

 A Noiseless Patient Spider

A noiseless, patient spider,
I mark'd, where, on a little promontory, it stood, isolated;
Mark'd how, to explore the vacant, vast surrounding,
It launch'd forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself;
Ever unreeling them--ever tirelessly speeding them.

And you, O my Soul, where you stand,
Surrounded, surrounded, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing,--seeking the spheres, to
connect them;
Till the bridge you will need, be form'd--till the ductile anchor
hold;
Till the gossamer thread you fling, catch somewhere, O my Soul.

-Walt Whitman

Lovely Victorian style silhouette on etsy by Mad Barking Arts