Recent Journal Excerpt

Mom, this one is for you. Double click on image to enlarge and read...

SNEAK PEEK ;0

Here's a SNEAK PEEK of what I have been doing in my spare time besides BLOGGING!  I have a little space set up at an antique mall I call it the Black Curio.  I sell old, quirky curiosities. My taste lends itself towards festive, exotic, worldly, bohemian and feminine. I want my shoppers to have a feeling of there's a party going on some place far away and cool. A time machine literally to a blast from the past. I know I am claiming a lot, by saying all that but hey you got to start somewhere.  Please take a look at what is soon to come, my line of earthy relics, jewelry. My purpose here in blog world is to set up a blog to give my viewers more of a closer up image of who I am as an artist.  Eventually I intend to have links to my etsy sight. For now I am a tidbit hung up on the technical side of things. This is my cross to bare but sooner or later I will get there and revel in my ciber domain. I'll admit it's all a bit self indulgent, but for all my flaws I might as well exult on what I've got artistic talent. 

The guns by the way are toy cap guns, they use to be my brother in laws from when he was a little whippersnapper!

Behold the Power of Peonies

Years ago, when my sister and I were a lot younger my sister purchased her first home. It was what I would call the perfect fixer upper, a granny house. Faded powdery blue walls  held the sooted outlines of where former pictures hung. The canary yellow kitchen still had a pie in the oven, neglected and long forgotten.  Outside rows of peonies proudly came up every May, gracing her front walkway. We would marvel every spring at the colors and the soft cool touch of their petals. Taking in the distinct scent of peonies( like a rose but yet not quite.)  A couple of giddy girls we were,  burying  our faces in  huge puffy bouquets of peonies  laughing all the way, glad that it was spring.  In this starter home she would marry and a baby named Lucy would be born,  a cat named Pumpkin would be buried  in the back yard. Walls would be painted and appliances purchased. After all was said and done the house was bought for a song and then later sold for a large profit.

When my sister moved she took some of the peonies with her, peonies are great like that, a few rhizomes and you're good to go. When she had to move yet again she once again took a few with her and set them in the ground, so as you can see these peonies have made their rounds.  When my sister moved yet another time but this time to Colorado she couldn't bare not taking any peonies with her. At the time she thought they wouldn't fair in the Colorado climate. She asked me to take some of her peonies with me.  Delighted to carry on the legacy of my sisters peonies I accepted. This is only the third year for them  here, but today a bouquet has been picked and I am rivaling in the thrill of it all.  The memories runs deep with these curious ant loving blooms, the olfactory triggers a kinder gentler time a link to the pass.  Where farmers planted rows for their wives, neighbors swapped with each other, Mothers and daughters join hands around the dinner table with a centerpiece of peonies.

Just a smattering of my art

The Quilt

A few years ago, I was feeling particularly overwhelmed. I had recently gotten married and my life was changing all around me. Let's just say I hadn't acclimated yet.  I decided to go see a friend of mine, Avis the art therapist .  After pouring my soul out to her about my artist angst ridden ways, she said to me.

 " You know Marcy life is like a great big quilt and all the patches represents different parts of your life. You're focusing on one patch right now. Focus on the whole quilt and all the beauty within it."  So now when I get myself in a twit I think about quilts and I wrap my self  up in the beauty of them, it's a comforting thing.

When in Rome

I must confess I have a love affair with Italy, it's in my breed. My grandfather was Italian, when he passed away I inherited his key chain. Yes, a small trinket he brought back as a youngster from the Vatican in Rome. I carry this key chain with me everyday as a reminder  of what a great man he was. A small man, a cobbler by trade.  Hard working, he "never borrowed a dime." He embraced  the American dream of the early 20th century. He came from nothing and made something for himself and his family.  I think there is a lot of honor in that however humble it may be. Because of this key chain I have developed an obsession for  tarnished old religious metals . To me each one of them is full of history and carries a certain mystique. Enamored, I must go on and tell you of my treasures and how blessed I am to hold, cherish and work with such lovely things.  Here is a shot of the St Cristoforo Medal of my grandfathers on the other side is the Vatican.  I embellished   the key chain with some other bobbles and a walking fish.  The walking fish is african and is  a symbol of where I believe we came from the ocean. The walking fish, Darwin and the whole evolution thing will maybe have to come at a later date for now I will humbly try to attempt to express my obsession with metals.  From a sculptural stand point they really are tiny works of art, dedicated to the women and men of our past. The great benevolent people that went before us and who left  a profound impact on  mankind. When researching the Saints, almost always it is said what a simple and modest life they lead.  I wish at times I had more of a simple modest life, with less distractions, a life that doesn't put such an emphasis on the  material world.  In my heart of hearts I truly believe I would see the world differently and with more clarity. I would realize that LOVE is the most powerful thing of all. But for now, I will grub around gathering up metals and making pretty things  out of them:)  

Art and the Gypsy Garden

This wonderful birdbath was made for me and my husband as a wedding present by my artist friend Teri Rule. We call ourselves the happy go lucky artists. I know that sounds like a oxymoron  but that's probably why we like it. The bird bath sits low to the ground and every now and then my cat wanders by to get a sip of fresh water from it. 

 THE GYPSY GARDEN

A few years ago  my friend Julie and I came up with the phrase Gypsy Garden.  Maybe we weren't the first to say it and we'll probably not be the last, but we sure have had a lot of fun with it. Julie owns a really fun shoppe called Gardenology, this is where we have Gypsy Garden Festivals. We dress  gypsy chic and sell all kinds of handmade repurposed garden ornaments and jewelry, using things around the house.To me Gypsy Garden represents freedom of creativity on fertile grounds.  A place full of whimsy and beauty with out the highbrow stigma or price. I've  always had a little bit of gypsy or Bohemian taste in me it seems to fit my lifestyle. I guess you could say I am not a very formal person. I never have been one for stuffy pretenses.   I try to carry this throughout my own garden, art,teachings,  clothes and home. It's an aesthetic, earthy, exotic and sensual. 

Here is a photo of the potting bench compliments of Gardenology (I traded Julie a homemade mosaic bird bath for it) Julie made the GYPSY GARDEN stone for me I embellished it.

Memories

Recently my mother in law Helen passed away. I had great admiration for her and always looked up to her and her thoughtful ways. She was a  big believer in family and lived her life loving those closest to her.  She always made her home  warm, open and  worth coming home to. During the special times like the holidays  she  seemed to do  things effortlessly, motivated always by love.  Some people would say she was the glue that held us all together. She loved to cook and bake, kept herself busy making quilts and blankets for the people she cared for. She was an avid gardener, I always felt we had that in common.  More then once she mentioned while fondly pointing to a blossom " there has to be a God to create something as beautiful as this." After she passed away  I went over to her small, lovingly cared for yard and dug up samplings to bring home to my own garden. Being the sentimentalist that I am I thought this would be a great way to have something still living as a remembrance of her.   There, in her garden I thought to myself this is  where she married and and raised three boys and a girl and then watched her grandchildren have children. Standing there fenced in,  I  found a contained world of beauty. Outside the chaotic world raged on but here in the garden things just made more sense to me . Good for the soul I see the columbine, pods full of willing seeds lingering amongst the peace rose .  Purple and pink phlox seem promising to me, red poppies with their paper red petals are sure to wave in the summer wind once again. Peonies and hyacinth are part of the cyclical nature of spring that titillate the senses after a long winters end. Here in the garden lies the Daffodils, candy tuff and Oriental lilies representing a beautiful lady and a life about gathering love.   Perhaps the most striking of all is the bleeding heart, is it the name or the the actual shape that draws me to her rosy pink hearts? Hanging like jewels on a necklace, conjuring  up lockets of sorrow and love lost. Full of romance and nostalgia the bleeding heart or "lady in the bathtub" takes me back to another time and place, deep within my psyche full of fantasies and fairy tales. 

I have my work cut out for me, an old neighbor helped me dig up various plants from Helen's yard. We worked and talked reminiscing about the years of toil, laughter and kids.   Together we gathered up what would be a small truck load. I hurried to get them in the ground, we were due for a early spring snow storm of 5-6"  Exhausted I got every plant back in the ground into the warm earth of their new home, relieved to have the work behind me and thankful for the help of a friendly neighbor.  Happy to know that the memories of sweet Helen still live on.

Greetings Earthlings

Greetings fellow earthlings, and a big hellooo00O.

Glad to finally be out here in the great big blog world.  I hope to post some amazing things and share what I believe to be beautiful, daring humble discoveries.  It's a daunting task to start this but I do believe in my heart of art there could be some exciting adventures a head of me.

Here's to never losing your sense of wonder and enjoying the journey of life.