BirchLane.net
May 08
(notes for later)
Tuesday 13.
Isabella.
From my Sunday/Mother's Day Art Opening/Event/Performance: "We Are Holyoke."
One of 35+ family portraits taken during the afternoon at the Wistariahurst Museum in Holyoke, Massachusetts.This morning the following message was waiting for me:
Monday 12
Ally & Eva.
From my Art Opening/Event/Performance yesterday: "We Are Holyoke."
One of 35+ family portraits taken during the afternoon at the Wistariahurst Museum in Holyoke, Massachusetts.Sunday 11
Mother's Day. I hardly slept. And when I did I dreamed. (drive to exhibit; dennis/debbie; dano/daryl; john/laura; ben; zigy/laura; those who did not visit)
Saturday 10
Getting Ready.
Friday 09
Nadine Takes Her First Walk Outside.
Thursday 08
Studio 19.
Wednesday 07
Open Square. Will Open Square make it? Will it work? I saw a beautiful space there--perfect for a studio and art gallery. The people, cdeVision, who designed Bruce Barone have an office there.
From today's Wall Street Journal:
In Chateaubriand's 1801 novel, "Atala," a character describes Niagara Falls: "As it strikes the shuddering rock, the water bounds back in foaming whirlpools, which drift up over the forest like the smoke of some vast conflagration. The scene is ornate with pine and wild walnut trees and rocks carved out in weird shapes. Eagles, drawn by the air currents, spiral down into the depths of the chasm, and wolverines dangle by their supple tails from the ends of low-hanging branches, snatching the shattered corpses of elk and bears out of the abyss."
Claudia Moscovici writes in "Hybridity and Ethics in Chateaubriand's Atala;" asking what kind of human being is best prepared to represent an ethical attitude toward cultural difference? In raising this issue, Atala challenges the emerging Romantic view, popularized by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, that Western and native American cultures are ethical opposites.
Tuesday 06
A Beautiful Space.
Monday 05
Posted in the display case an updated artist statement.
Sunday 04
Saturday 03
Back to the Gallery.
Friday 02
Hanging the Exhibition.
Thursday 01
Beauty.
St Anne Shrine, Voltive Chapel
"If I was not sustained by love of Him and the love of my fellow-men, for whom He sent me back into the world, I should die of misery. Nevertheless, it is infinite comfort to me to know that I suffer what I do suffer: it is through suffering that I shall enjoy a more sublime vision of God. For this reason alone, my tribulations do not weigh on me; in fact they bring comfort to my soul, as you and the others who are with me can witness daily."
Catherine of Siena (d. 1380). The mystic and visionary C. was born in 1347, the umpteenth daughter of a Sienese wool-dyer and his wife. A professed virgin since childhood, she became a Dominican tertiary at the age of eighteen, living very ascetically and engaging in acts of charity to the sick and the poor. In 1370 she received a series of visions that impelled her to enter public life. C. then carried on a lengthy correspondence with pope Gregory XI, touching on many matters and urging church reform. In 1375 C. received the Holy Stigmata. In 1376 she was in Avignon and from 1378 until her death she lived at Rome. C. is buried in her order's church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva. She has a very impressive Vita (BHL 1702) by her confessor, Bl. Raymond of Capua.
As that painting might indicate, C. was the subject of an immediately posthumous cult. She was canonized in 1461 by her fellow Sienese, Pius II.
While we are on the subject, outside early this morning:
"Hope" is the thing with feathers --
That perches in the soul --
And sings the tune without the words --
And never stops -- at all --
And sweetest -- in the Gale -- is heard --
And sore must be the storm --
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm --
I've heard it in the chillest land --
And on the strangest Sea --
Yet, never, in Extremity,
It asked a crumb -- of Me.In this poem, Emily Dickinson examines the abstract idea of hope in the free spirit of a bird. She shows how nature, hope, religion correlate. It is not just a bird but a spirit or inspiration that sits in the souls of us all. It is small in that we often cannot see it, but it is huge because it guides and inspires us. Hope rests in our soul the way a bird rests on a perch. Deeply analyzed, Hope could represent Christ. He is always in your soul, the singing never stops, the beauty is always there, within.
