Rainy Sunday

"For anything great to happen there needs to be a long obedience in the same direction."

I'm quoting Bono here, who is quoting Nietzsche.  
I'm not a real Nietzche fan.  I mean, I've never actually read anything by him,  just absorbed, sort of a mental osmosis a few nuggets here and there.  He was pretty negative about a lot of stuff, and a real misanthrope.  

But, every once in awhile you get these little nuggets, words, that are nice to pick up and put in your pocket, take out to look at once in awhile, hoping they become a part of your psyche.  If you can remember them, that is.

New Leaf?

I swore last week I would turn over a new leaf if I got into Smithsonian.....so of course I spent this whole week sort of cleaning my house.  Here's the thing - I really really suck at cleaning, so of course my house was/is (sort of) a disaster.  Which makes me dread cleaning even more.  But my dear friend pointed out we could no longer see out of any of the windows.  Dear Kit Kat helped me clean the windows but I had to do the dusting and vacuuming myself.  There is not enough Pledge in the world to deal with all the dust....
But today I'm getting into the studio.
The picture above is called "Julian Schnabel's house", a piece i made over a year ago, and sold before I could really even appreciate what it was all about.
I've had a strange couple of days in addition to the whole house cleaning thing.  People contacting me from my past.  It's made me really reflect on who I am.  But it's also put me in an alternative place in my mind.  Last night I actually drove my dear old newly rebuilt fragile car over a big curb (that came out of nowhere) and when I was looking underneath to see what damage I'd done, I locked the car with EVERTHING in it.....keys, money, phone.  fuck fuck fuck.  Another wake up call to the need for absolutely BEING HERE NOW.  Why do I keep pushing the snooze button?

Smithsonian?

Well, the Washington show went okay.....

And then just when once again I'm wondering what it's all about alfie, I got notice that I got into the Smithsonian Show!!  It's funny, because I was kind of (praying) saying to myself that if I just got in, I would turn a whole new leaf and start taking myself way too seriously, and then I opened my mail, and BOOM!

One Week Until the Washington Craft Show

Friday, November 6, 10 - 8

Saturday, November 7, 10 - 6

Sunday, November 8, 11 - 5

at the Washington Convention Center

Hope to see you there

Chestertown Spy Article

http://www.chestertownspy.com/2009/10/artists-schumann-wilson-at-adkins/

Emily Dickenson Doesn't live here any more.

BESIDES the autumn poets sing,
A few prosaic days
A little this side of the snow
And that side of the haze.
A few incisive mornings,	5
A few ascetic eves,—
Gone Mr. Bryant’s golden-rod,
And Mr. Thomson’s sheaves.
Still is the bustle in the brook,
Sealed are the spicy valves;	10
Mesmeric fingers softly touch
The eyes of many elves.
Perhaps a squirrel may remain,
My sentiments to share.
Grant me, O Lord, a sunny mind,	15
Thy windy will to bear! Good Old Emily.

Another week gone by

This has been a week of maintenance.  Getting the studio ready for the next onslaught of work, getting myself poised, re-cleaning the house (really TWICE in one month) etc.

So onward.

I'm feeling better about some things, although I really don't know how I'm (I should say most of us) are going to make it through the next couple of years.

Here goes, Mare

In making these pieces I hoped to capture a moment.  I guess that’s what we’re all really trying to do.  We can’t recreate the beauty of nature, we can only capture a moment in time that we were experiencing it.

These pieces are meant to be underfoot.  Not just because I want to keep making utilitarian objects, but to make a statement.  Instead of looking ahead, away from ourselves; how often do we take a moment to look down at where we’re standing.  Where we are now.  Be in the moment, and be a part of it.

To look down at where you’re standing is to be still, and stopped and in the here and now, no matter where you are.  To do so outside, in the woods, instead of looking at a myriad of trees, sometimes indistinct (at least to my own tired eyes), and hear a far off bird, or see the movement of leaves that tells of a small animal; look down.  You see the layers of leaves, like time that has passed.  They’ve left imprints of themselves on each other.  You see the moss and the grass and the small insects that we might not notice if we just go blithely on our way.  In the stillness, we don’t just hear the sounds of the forest, but we hear our own breathing and the beating of our hearts.

Ups and Downs and Ups

So having been on an UP after finishing the pieces for Adkins show, and feeling pretty good about them,
AND getting into all the ACC shows for next year (which is probably NBD because less people can afford to enter them), felt really let down when I dropped them off.  I looked at them through Howard, Mary and Mare's eyes and thought "yeah, okay, whatever" and just had this pall over me even through a lot of the U2 show, which was fabulous.  Woke up with a splitting headache (AGAIN), dealing with blown car engine (AGAIN) and the whole mortgage thing (AGAIN).....I just felt myself cycling down into the abyss.  But then my friend reminds me of how unimportant all of that is, really, and that everything is, after all, going to be alright.  But that may just be because HE believes in an afterlife.  Hm.

Trinity Session

Trinity

Mother, Sun, the Lightness of Being

Tulip Poplar (detail)

Actually, I had a pretty productive week.  Finished five pieces.  Got into ACC Baltimore, both wholesale and retail (I'm not sure whether I'll pony up the extra $700 for wholesale or not) and tried not to think........well, too much anyway.

Washington Craft Show

http://www.craftsamericashows.com/WASH_main.htm

Please come to the washington craft show and support the arts!

Palimpsest

So, thinking about the layers beneath.  The layers beneath the skin.  The meaning beneath the words.
The song beneath the silence.  When we look into the forest and see the mass of trees, and look under a log and find a civilization of insects.  When we look into each others eyes and see the love shining out.

Love

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjB1r77JljM




Actually I should've put this on Faitheism

Adkins Arboretum Show

Do Not Be Afraid

Do not be afraid.  I'm not sure whether this is the fatalistic thing, because whatever happens is going to happen, and it's all pre-written  OR  we have absolutely no control whatsoever on what scares us the most, OR we are insignificant specs in the universe and really, our worries don't amount to a hill of beans, OR be comforted, my dear because I love you no matter what.

Wednesday

So, usually, my motto is "why do it today, after all tomorrow is another day...."  a dictum usually viewed in the rather pessimistic way, that I'm procrastinating.  Rather than think of it as procrastinating, I would rather view this more optimistically, like I believe there will be tomorrow, and the idea of tomorrow fills me with hope.

Hm.  But, if I do wait until tomorrow, well we all know tomorrow never actually comes, in the buddhist/AA sense of TODAY being the all important thing.  Thus:

So, I'm starting this blog as a more serious blog, than my other blog, faitheism, which I will still update, but have that have more personal content, where this blog will follow my journey on trying to survive as an artist in the current economic times.

All that being said,  I am a self-taught mixed-media middle-aged in-recovery woman; living out in the sticks trying to make a living.  I'm not going to post long drawn out things, I'm not like that, but I'll try to intersperse work/thoughts with the whole "how do I make this work, while not sucking up and admitting I really SHOULD be working at burger king?"  sort of tools and explorations.

If any of this makes any sense at all, keep tuned in.

 Check out my website for more info too.
www.faithwilsonart.com