Sculpting a creative life
Photo taken by Casey Paige
Anna Paige wrote an article about the current group show at Stapleton Gallery. She writes in her Facebook post:
"Show the Flag," an idea years in the making, opened in Billings on Thursday. It's a gift to be contemplative in this time. It's a gift to be able to reflect on what it means to be an American. Thank you to the artists whose provocations have made me a stronger citizen.
For thousands of years, prayer flags have been created and hung to promote peace, compassion, strength, and wisdom. Just as life moves on and is replaced by life - wind, weather and time tattered the flags Raymond and I brought home from Bhutan. The faded prayer cloth is gracing new artworks. The prayers continue with love and compassion. I appreciate the meditative space a recent new series with pieces of the prayer flags evokes in the group show “Show the Flag” at Stapleton Gallery. The artists’ various emotional responses to the American flag results in an evoking show (open for viewing by appointment and online). I chose prayer flags as a medium rather than the American flag - they are a reflective contrast. A large church pew sits in front of them.
Yesterday afternoon I visited the foundry to oversee the patina process for the new little bears. Each bear is painstakingly colored by hand using a process of heat and chemicals. The three buggers you see here will become “foundry proofs” - used as reference for future bears. Nearly four months after dropping off the original clay creations; I finally got to hold the little buggers in my hand. They feel good. Actually, it’s hard to put them down they feel so good - like a perfect stone or talisman that naturally fits in the palm of your hand. I can’t wait for you to feel them…!
How wonderfully serendipitous to have this beautiful bear ramble by the morning after I announced the NEW little palm-size bronzes on social media. See the new BEAR bronzes below:
Meet “Bear” - the NEW palm-size bronze. Shown here in clay, the sculpture was created at the beginning of the year (check earlier posts for photos of the initial lump of clay). My intention was to create a cub but my infatuation with a plump belly transformed the little cub into a more grown up bear - which I couldn’t resist yet the original idea to create a bear cub stuck tenaciously like honey. I grabbed another lump of clay to explore “cub-ness” - then another lump and another lump…
The cubs are siblings. They will be sold as a pair because I don’t have the heart to split them up. All three bears were delivered to the foundry in February. They have been "sheltering in place" just like the rest of us until last week when peeps were allowed to return to work.
I will see the first bronze bears in a few days which is rather fitting since Raymond and Tala saw a big pile of fresh bear poop while hiking near our cabin this morning.
Check out the “shop” to see more photos of the bear sculptures (preorders are happening right now).
Always with us…
Four years ago today I hiked the Loop at dawn (as I did every morning that spring) although I very specifically remember thinking that day as I navigated the steep downhill section near Cliff’s workshop that I should stop by his cabin to say hello before embarking on a busy Sunday full of plans. But time was short due to a commitment in Bozeman; the extra chore of loading my bike for a rather impromptu plan to ride up Hyalite that afternoon after the meditation retreat was over and yet another phone call to a Hospice nurse (momma care) before the retreat. Cliff wasn’t on his deck, where he often enjoyed morning coffee with the birds and squirrels he kept so well fed so I whispered a good morning hello as I strode by. Cliff died in his cabin that morning. I’m certain it was during those moments. I believe he didn’t want me to be the one to find his body (at least that is what I tell myself if guilt or the “what if’s” try to torture me). I do believe it was how Cliff would have orchestrated things - always to spare me if he could. This morning just after dawn, Tala and I hiked the Loop. She was concerned when I cried in the sunshine at the Sound of Music Meadow. I cried and I smiled. So. Much. Love. Cliff loved spring and he loved me. I felt his love on the hike four years ago and a zillion times since that spring morning - including today; yet also I felt something deeper: I felt my feet connected to earth and Cliff. Beneath my feet, fungi and trees are connected in an intricate vast network of nature mutually caring for each other. Cliff’s connection to me is part of a similar vast network which includes this mountain, these trees and worlds beyond us - mutually caring for each other. Still.
Original Works on paper will be offered for sale soon…
Seems like a good time to push my comfort zone by trying new media in my studio. Always experience moments of trepidation along with excitement when I embark with new materials - like a new dance partner - we have to figure out each other’s moves. Clumsy moments and a flash of grace and promise here and there. I’m excited to create more (and share more). Stay tuned (and be sure to watch social media updates on Instagram and Facebook as they happen more often than on my blog).
“Trademark” is the name of the sweet bunny bowl in my personal art collection. Created by LEM.
I used to hide bright pink Peeps bunnies all over Cliff’s cabin every Easter - soft little love notes (except the ones that took months to find which weren’t soft but light, airy and hard as nails). Cliff either loved or tolerated the tradition of hardly edible but zany pink bunnies ‘tho I imagine wether he chuckled or pinched the corner of his mouth (Cliffs version of rolling his eyes), he felt at least a snippet of my vast love for him each time he found a bunny. This month I’ve become vigilant about calling a different friend each day. Certainly it’s easier to text; especially since I have an exceptionally low tolerance for talking on the phone (always have - except for a few of my teen talking years when I’d “hide”in a closet to talk on the phone and yes phones had cords then so “hide” is relative) but point is, more-often-than-not I have to muster my gumption to call but wether the call lasts five minutes or an hour, I’m always glad I made the effort. Yesterday at the end of a lovely long conversation with an exceptionally self-sufficient, competent wise woman friend a few decades older than me, Annie confessed that she’d felt “somewhat grumpy and out of sorts.” She had no idea just how much she needed our connection until we had it. She felt eons better. Me too. Texts are kinda like the marshmallow bunnies - sweet and fun but nothing like a voice-to-voice conversation. My phone no longer has a cord. I have the luxury of talking most anytime/anywhere. Zoom and FaceTime add to my ability to spend quality time. Honestly it is an effort each time to rally myself (is that just me?). Frankly it takes more energy and vulnerability to talk than text but the gift given and received is ten-fold.
The goat skulls were given to me awhile back. They spent a few years in Cliff’s freezer and then another year or two in Raymond’s freezer before I found the right peeps with beetles to clean the skulls (and had the money to get them cleaned). Last spring I began the series, using the beautiful prayer flags we’d brought from Bhutan. The flags were hung on poles made with dead trees and displayed in front of my studio for several years. We harvested them just before the winds and nature took the tatters. Commissioned work interrupted completion of the series until now. I’m happy with the results (more photos will be shared in the near future).
Nearly four years have zipped by since Raymond and I wed. The honeymoon just hadn’t happened despite the fact that it was a wedding gift from Raymond’s sister and her husband. The fact that they gifted us some cash for plane tickets this past Christmas seemed like more-than-a hint; perhaps we should figure a honeymoon into 2020. One dark evening in February while digging my truck out of an impossibly long and deep snowdrift during a full-on blizzard - I decided perhaps it was time to go on a honeymoon; one week in paradise at a resort complete with beach and jungle. Two weeks later Raymond and I enjoyed a purely relaxing magical week together - literally just moments before the whole Covid-19 implications changed all of our worlds. What a blessing….!
Been a good many years since I’ve downhill skied. We had a blast…!
Between sketchy backcountry roads and avalanche danger threatening many ice climbs; my super sweet climbing partner (dear friend Supy) treated me to a stellar fantastically fun blue bird ski day at Bridger Bowl for my birthday. Delicious home-made-with-love-by-my-mother-in-law German Chocolate Cake packed in a carrier was our pre-ski and apres-ski snack. Candlelight claw foot tub soak with wine and appetizers prepared by Raymond. The rest of the cozy-at-home birthday date night with my husband was dreamy. Still smiling from the inside out with gratitude and awe. Damn I’m lucky.
Mom was giddy. Those first years after cancer took Dad, Mom stepped out with sweet eager curiosity and newfound freedom. She wanted her hair short (something Dad didn’t encourage). She was keen to embrace life, love and be seen. Alzheimer’s had moved into her mind years earlier. Our response to its hunger and greed during this short bright chapter (before it gobbled voraciously) was to seek out and soak up the bright moments sparkling in the simplest things - like the photo booth at a Tart Gallery Valentine’s party eight years ago. Today was a somewhat rare domestic day for me. I cleaned our home and baked cookies. A few simple kitchen gestures are linked directly to Mom (fluff the flour with a spoon, flip the spoon to make chopping motions on the flour in the measuring cup before dispensing the excess to make a perfect measurement). Mom ground her own flour (the gluten-free almond flour I use a distant cousin). I felt Mom in my kitchen today. A smile rides alongside my tears as the last batch of cookies bake in the oven. Happy Valentines Mom. I love you.
First twenty minutes or so into the NEW little palm-size bronze sculpture…
“You are not a drop in the ocean, you are the entire ocean in a drop.” -Rumi
I’m looking forward to the opportunity to share the epic story of my project carving for the king of Bhutan
There us ab all-day-all-night gentleness to southern California
I actually hesitated back in September when I was first invited to be a resident artist at SBCAST in Santa Barbara. Honestly, it was old programming for me to assume that my life couldn’t handle a 3-6 week commitment to be away from home somewhat suddenly. But then it snowed the next day. So here I am. Snoopy-dancing happy. I would say “pinch-me” happy but truthfully, everything about being here feels right. The timing, the peeps, the place the project. No pinching needed. Just belief and gratitude.
Crazy but fun afternoon with unexpected twists and turns - a wonderful and long story full of luck (both good and bad but mostly magically good luck). I retreated from social media during five weeks in the studio while focused on a commissioned project. The day after the sculptures were loaded on a trailer, I loaded my truck with tent and bike and headed for Sedona.
