You Don't Want to Miss This

 

May 2 through May 11, Tuesday-Saturday, 2-4 p.m. Those are the hours you may view this very special multimedia, multigenerational

 exhibit at the Northport Arts Association 

(NAA) building on 3rd Street 

(just west off Mill Street). 

"Origin and Echo," brainchild of Northport art teacher Jenny Evans, paired student artists, from nursery school through high school, with adult artists in the community. The adults were asked to create a work "responding" to the work of a particular student--I think (I need to double-check this) without knowing the identity of the student. Paired student and adult artists met for the first time at Thursday afternoon's opening of the show.

There is no way my brief introduction  and a few photographs can begin to do justice to this show. You need plenty of time to go through at a slow, leisurely pace, looking closely and carefully, because each individual piece, all the "origins and echoes," as well as artists' statements 

are endlessly fascinating. 

Making my way from one part of the exhibit to the next, I was thoroughly engaged, 

mentally and aesthetically, 

and I could not stop smiling.

So give yourself a big helping of joy: Immerse yourself in beauty made by Northport students and adult community members. Do not miss the opportunity!

A couple buildings in Tucumcari, New Mexico

 

"The Tucumcari landmark Rock Island-Southern Pacific depot opened in 1927, when Tucumcari was enjoying the rise of auto traffic on old Route 66. Built in the Spanish Mission-style, this depot is massively long, encompassing both a large passenger area and a significant freight area under one roof."

(https://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WMM9TE_Rock_Island_Southern_Pacific_RR_Depot_Tucumcari_NM)

The second building highlighted here today (of many, many noteworthy architectural/historic buildings in Tucumcari) is the home of the Bowen Electric Corporation, with not simply one mural wall but all walls of the complicated building decorated with brightly colored, stylized Southwestern images. 

Downtown Sculpture in Safford, Arizona -- Snow Higher Up

On a recent trip up to Safford in Graham County, this sculpture caught our attention, and we circled back so I could photograph it. I imagine the boy and girl as brother and sister, and I love the way they have been captured sharing a book and reading together. The sculpture is charming from any angle, as you can see. 

The artist is Max Turner — and you could have the same sculpture in your downtown or garden!

Across the street is the stately Graham County Court House.

Shifting slightly and zooming, then, I can show you Mount Graham with fresh snow at its north slope peak on Tuesday, March 27. 

From south on Hwy. 191, here is a different view of Mt. Graham. Its elevation in the Pinaleño Mountains is in excess of 10,000 feet above sea level. 

Organization

The younger of my two younger sisters says wryly that if she ever has a tombstone it should read: “She was organized to a fault.” Mine, should I ever have one, could not live up to that inscription. I’m not the least but certainly far from the most organized person I know.

Still, the other day a friend and I were talking about beauty and what it is in a landscape that makes us recognize it as beautiful, that is, as something to be captured somehow by art (he thought it required a clearing), and I remarked that my husband has a couple Leelanau County views he loves but says neither allows itself to be organized into a painting. Some kind of organization, I said, seems to be necessary. (What this has to say about Jackson Pollock, I leave for others to decide.) Responding to our friend’s thought about clearings, I agree that I do love fields, whether in crops or wild, and I particularly them when bordered by dark trees and interrupted by a curving road.

This morning as Sarah and I were out taking our morning exercise and fresh air, it occurred to me that one of the reason paintings of flowers are so generally satisfying is that nature has already organized each flower. A horizon line very clearly organizes the world of a painting or photograph. The image below is a very ordinary morning scene -- rien de spécial -- but the line separating Lake Michigan from the sky tells you where you are. We are creatures who seek meaning, who make meaning, and for that it is important that we organize our world view.

Paintings by my husband, David Grath, are now on exhibit through September 9 at the Dennos Museum Center in Traverse City. David is well known for his interpretations of beautiful landscape, and admission is free this week during the Traverse City Film Festival.

Just plain grass is beautiful to me.

Is It Italy? No, It's Leelanau!

Circa Estate Winery on Horn Road offers excellent wines and elegant ambience. David Grath will be having a one-man show of new paintings at Circa opening on Sunday, October 3. The work will remain up through the month.