A Valentine Kiss From Cupid - or Klimt - or Dougie


Today I was greeted by a fairly large package on the kitchen table, wrapped in pages from yesterday's New York Times, and sporting a bright red envelope with my name on it. Hmmm ... it's Valentine's Day! I picked it up - rather, I tried to pick it up - but since I am walking with a cane these days (more about that some other time), it was way too heavy for me to carry. Dougie to the rescue. We headed to the family room where I would open this mystery package.


I confess, I was a little scared to open it. Dougie tends to be the extravagant one, while I am the worrier who thinks about things like paying the bills. I had a feeling this was going to be one of those gifts that caused me to worry!  I opened it and found I was looking at a large cardboard suitcase of sorts, imprinted with an intriguing piece of art by Gustav Klimt. Inside this case was a book - rather, a BOOK - like none I have ever seen. I spent about two seconds debating whether I was going to worry about the expense before I decided to give Cupid his due.


Wow! Gustav Klimt: The Complete Paintings, by Tobias Natter; produced by Taschen. This is a stunning, magnificent book! In fact, it is more like a museum; a 676-page, twenty pound museum!

Of course I haven't started any serious reading yet, but I can tell you of some highlights:

- fascinating images of early work,
- images which chronicle his experimentation with what became his iconic use of squares and swirls and triangles and gold,
- an extensive section on the Stocklet Frieze, which is an incredible mosaic built inside a Viennese villa, complete with amazing four-page wide fold outs and separate full size posters,
- a photo catalog of the complete list of Klimt's paintings
- 231 letters, cards, and other documents - all known Klimt correspondence - is included (good luck reading his handwriting),
- and, the women! The beautiful, rich, avant-garde women ... shown here in paintings as well as photographs. I am enamored of these women.


I must say, this is the most spectacular book I have ever held in my hands.  I'm planning on having a lot of fun with these images, not the least of which will be incorporating some of their elements into my little quilts.  When you think of all the many circles and squares that I've obsessively sewn over the years, you can probably understand why I am so excited by Klimt's work. Always have been, but my knowledge was so limited!  Now I'm going to become a Klimt Connoisseur, instead of just a Gustav Groupie.



CUPID

Time to Take Dreams Off Back Burner


I bought this ceramic tile when I lived in California, during the 1980s.  It definitely spoke to me and I keep it as a kind of a touchstone, to remind myself to stay (or get) focused on what is important to me.  Now, at the beginning of the year, when so many of us choose to assess the preceding 365 days, or predict the succeeding ones via our resolutions, I look to my touchstone and think about dreams. My hope for us all, in 2013, is that we will honor our dreams.
Penny Rug by Morna Crites-Moore

Newspaper Days


Long ago and far away, in a strange land called Poughkeepsie, I worked as a newspaper photographer. This photo was taken at a day care center. I don't remember why this boy had been crying, nor do I know his name. I loved photographing people; I loved being a photographer. When we moved to California, in 1980, I no longer had a darkroom and I let photography slide into the past. Now that we have digital cameras, I find myself getting more and more interested in returning to my photographer roots. I used to love darkroom work, but now I love Photoshop instead.

I have been doing major cleaning ... clearing away the cobwebs. I hope I find more of my old photos from when I worked at the Poughkeepsie Journal. If I do, I'll share them here. 

We had the exterior of our house painted this summer and I love how it turned out. However, it now seems that everything else is a wreck by comparison. I should heed Don Quixote's observation that all comparisons are odious. Otherwise I will go insane due to the following realization:

If I want the perfection that dances in my imagination,
I'll need to work on my home and garden,
pretty much constantly,
for the rest of my life.


Here I am photographing my sister, brother, mother ... and a doll, circa 1955. The photography bug got me at an early age.


What to do with my old basket quilt?


I have always loved quilts and I have some very special ones handed down through the family, but this is the first one I ever purchased with my own hard earned money. It was the late 1960s and I was a teenager out on a drive in the country, with my mother for company, in my little Triumph Herald convertible. I have no memory of where we were going that day but on the way we spotted a wonderful old barn with an "Antiques" sign above its door. We stopped, went in and browsed the many wonderful things that were there for sale. I spotted a marvelous Log Cabin quilt, in excellent colors, and then I spotted this striking basket quilt. I debated long and hard about which one to buy and the baskets won. The colors are so striking and it was a perfect graphic piece of graphic wall art for my room.


For the last decade or so, it has hung on a wall in my daughter's room. But that room is way overdue for a paint job and a new look. So, now I'm debating what to do with this quilt. It has completed its journey with me, of that I am sure. Should I sell it? It is such bad shape, I probably can only sell it as a cutter quilt, at a fairly low price. If someone else is going to cut it up, should I just cut it up myself and see what happens? That may seem like a logical approach but, considering its history with me, I'm not sure I actually want to cut it up. It might be better to let it go to its next owner, someone who will have a vision of what to do with it. 

Decisions, decisions, decisions ..... not my strong suit.