Showing posts with label Art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Art. Show all posts

7.01.2009

Gallery Hop

Mom and I started new schools at the same time. I began kindergarten. She began college to study art. We went to plays and galleries together. I would bring my sketch book and markers. I cannot draw to save my life, but I loved being in an environment of artists with her. It helped me begin my own education by looking for and appreciating different art forms.


This documentary film Herb & Dorothy looks interestingly quirky to me:

HERB & DOROTHY Trailer from Herb & Dorothy on Vimeo.



Do you collect art? If so, what is your favorite piece? What makes you bring something home?

5.14.2009

More Inspiration Fodder

Since I have the journals out, and since we're all mourning the loss of Blueprint and Domino, here's some eye candy for you...

Cut out from House & Garden, this one inspired me to paint our bedroom cerulean blue when we lived in Georgia 8 years ago. Now I just settled for a door this color, but I still love it. It's like Greece, and England all in one.


I adore this house from Cottage Living, I think.


House & Garden. Love the tone on tone matching vase and the close bunching of the flowers.

Love this. I think it's a paint ad, but I just see the movement.

Good grief. So sweet. I think I found this in Working Mother. The story was something from a husband's perspective about his wife and how she was her happiest, most mellow with her children.


My sisters and I would cut out old magazine pages and paste them onto these coloring book style scrapbooks at our grandparent's house. This page I kept. Love the movement, the 1950s fashion, the simplicity of it.

In the foreground I've posted a quote from a famous fashion photographer about photographing people in O Magazine. In the background, I have pulled this page from the Garnet Hill catalogue (which always delivers for great copy) because I've been thinking of getting a lemon tree for the house.

When I went to the Vatican in December of 1998, the lemon trees had all been moved inside and lined a hallway. The smell was amazing and the light came through the french doors all along the corridor making them look like shiny jewels.


I believe this one came from H&G (House & Garden). When I pulled it, I was more interested in the color contrast of pink and black, the roundness of the boxes against the square books than anything else. Very French, no?


This appeared in some Cookie or Wondertime. Not sure. I just thought it was awesome that they took a wall, put in shelves, painted the background and voila! dollhouse wall.


This one was from Real Simple with a great quote about how it's best to be in a modest cottage with books, family and old friends.


I pulled this years before I knew I would be photographing weddings, but it is perfect bridal inspiration. Love the lines- chin, swoosh of hair, eye line. Got to be a Chanel ad. It's text book perfect.


This one inspired me to line up plastic clear containers for all of the brio trains, crayons and little people.

This may have been from Organize and inspired me to get wire baskets for the fridge. I'm still hunting for the perfect wire rimmed basket like Kate Capshaw's character uses to get mail in The Love Letter. Speaking of Kate Capshaw...

I could not love this portrait of her and her daughter any more than I do. J'adore times 12.
Super photography inspiration, my friends.
The Gap often has killer photography. I still think about their 2001 commercial with Carol King and her daughter Lois Goffin singing a medley of So Far Away {Carole King - Tapestry} and Love Makes The World Go Round. I love that ad. So much clean space, hardwood floors, a black piano, her daughter singing, "So far away. Doesn't anybody stay in one place anymore? It would be so fine to see your face at my door. It doesn't help to know your just time away," and Carol answering, "I can't stop believing love makes the world go round." I'm sure I rushed out to buy jeans as result. :)

But the most inspiring thing I have seen or heard in a long time was
from President Obama today speaking to graduates at Arizona State after the University chose not to award him with an honorary degree. He said, "I come to embrace the notion that I haven’t done enough in my life. I heartily concur. I come to confirm that one’s title, even a title like president of the United States, says very little about how well one’s life has been led — and that no matter how much you’ve done, or how successful you’ve been, there’s always more to do, always more to learn, and always more to achieve.”

So, enough with the pretty pictures. There's work to be done.


7.19.2008

Instant Karma


Check out this album of Lennon covers put together by the Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. Everybody is on this album: U2, Regina Spektor, R.E.M., Lenny Kravitz, Jack Johnson, Corinne Bailey Rae, and so on. Highlights include Ben Harper's cover of Beautiful Boy, which reminds me of this post from artist Faye Christian Phillips. Enjoy.

4.01.2008

31 Flavors

To kick off my 31st year, and this Blogiversary, here are some of the 31 things inspiring me today....

1. I adore Darondo. I first heard about him on this NPR piece. The music is amazing, but what I love MOST is the details in the liner notes of his album, Let My People Go.

He was opening for James Brown, cruising around San Francisco in a Rolls Royce, with a career on the verge of really taking off when he left everything to travel. When he finally returned to California after meeting his wife in the Fiji Islands, he became a physical therapist and helped treat people with music.

He writes, "I used to incorporate the music with the therapy," he says. “I'm very versatile so I'd sing everything to them; pop, country and western, jazz, etc. I worked with head trauma cases, amputees and folks like that. I'd bring my guitar in and watch miracles happen. Once, I told a patient of mine, who was in some serious shape, that she's going to be dancing by Halloween if she just listen to me and do what I say during therapy. The director and I fought about what I told her, but three months down the road she got up out of her wheelchair, did her little dance and lip-synched a Madonna tune, and then walked back over to her chair and sat down. That thrilled me so much and put so much love in my heart."

My favorite song on the album is Didn't I which you can hear if you click this link.

It will quickly become your favorite windows-rolled-down song for spring.

2. The coolest dollhouse ever.



3. My favorite author Jhumpa Lahiri's new book was released today!



4. Cinematic Orchestra makes me want to go take photographs.



5. Anthony Minghella's work continues to inspire me. What a tremendous loss. I think we own every one of his films and the accompanying soundtracks. The Charlie Rose site has some nice interviews with him available.

6. Hope for a more perfect union.

7. Artist studios like this one.

8. Writing out loud in every color of the rainbow with my favorite pen.

9. Weird Beard Weil's vitamin advisor. It's free. You answer questions and he tells you what you should be taking. Turns out, B complex is life changing for me. Who knew.

10. Pureology hair care. So worth it. And my Rite Aid started carrying it as well. My daughter says it smells like Candy Cams. This stuff, Aveda Hang Straight, is the greatest too.

11. Can lip-gloss really inspire? Hell yes. Especially if it's created by Goose's wife. (You know, Anthony Edwards. Top Gun. Goose? Work with me).

12. Romantic comedies like The Love Letter. Books, boats, coffee, lovin', jokes. What more do you need. And the porch. Good God, that porch. And Blythe Danner, who I adore.



13. Artist Moms like this one.

14. Dwell for Target. I picked up pink tulip decals and a matching night-light for my daughter and had to make myself stop there. So cute.

15. Spring clothes in yellow and kelly green.

16. Jonathon Adler's line
for Barnes & Noble.

17. I've been listening to Nina Simone since 1993 when they used her album as a plot point in Point of No Return. It has been a staple in my record collection.
But at a recent Michael Buble show, (I'm still adjusting to the fact that the kids now call them "shows" and not "concerts") he did an amazing cover of Simone's Feeling Good that has reminded my why I love her and had me humming this song throughout the day ever since.

It's a new dawn,
it's a new day,
it's a new life for me,
and I'm feelin' good.

18-31 to come....

3.23.2008

Unlikely Inspiration


I found these post-it style vocabulary cards on the bargain table of a local bookstore in both French and Italian.


The graphics, fonts and color combinations are really great.


I've had these awkwardly shaped frames from Target without anything to go in them..until now.


It's a fresh summer day just passing them in the hall.

3.18.2008

Heaven=art+books+music+the beach

Painter Faye Christian Phillips told me about Karin Jurick's work featured in this slideshow below.

The music, I believe, is by Stan Getz who is played so often in our house, I feel like he lives with us. The work is great, but the presentation is even better. It feels like a rainy Sunday afternoon.
ps- my favorites are The Sari and Refresher Course...and Boston Books too!
**per request, the song featured is "Tonight I Shall Sleep with a Smile on My Face" which can be found on this record, Getz/Gilberto #2 Recorded Live at Carnegie Hall.

3.08.2008

Photo Logo

Thanks to the creative genius at Pixel By Pixel, my little photography business has a new logo.

I'm so excited. The graphic artist came up with several delightful designs. I wanted something very simple and clean though because I'm still defining the scope of the business. I wanted something reflective of newspaper print because I prefer photojournalism. They did a beautiful job. If you are starting your own business, I would highly recommend one of their small business packages.

3.05.2008

If you missed it,

The Henri Cartier-Bresson documentary The Impassioned Eye will run again on Sundance at the following times:

Wednesday March 5 at Midnight
Monday March 10 at 6PM
Friday March 28 at 12:15PM

The photos are striking, but watching his thoughts slowly float down about photography is the real value of watching. Plus, he speaks so slowly, you'll feel like a French speaking genius. He's elderly, and his steps are deliberate now, but he is not fragile in spirit. He is almost boyish at times, still excited about art, the city, humanity and music.

He leafs through the pages of a book that kept him company in a prison camp and shows a water color, reading from the back, "a watercolor done to keep me calm while waiting for my papers in Lyon."

Watching is like visiting with a family member as they go through a box of family photos. You get the sense that we're all in his family.

Here are some of my favorite quotes from the documentary.

"I've always had a passion for painting. When I was a child, I painted Thursdays and Saturdays. The rest of the time I dreamt about it."

"To question by looking and a sense of form. People think, think, think. In all directions, but they think."

"What counts is geometry and structure. Everything where it should be. To me geometry is the foundation. Everybody has feelings."

"My God, how I miss Mexico. The intensity of passion."

"Portraits are the most difficult. Everything is so fleeting."

"Africa made a great impression on me and against colonialism. It's atrocious."

"Basically, you just have to make people forget the camera. It's no different for you."

"So many memories on these pieces of paper. An accumulation of things. "

"A photo is like the stab of a knife. Painting is meditation."

Queen For A Day

I discovered the greatest loves of my life in England. It's where I met my husband, and cadbury chocolate. It's where I found healing in afternoon tea, and trips to the Tate. A quick stop into Marks & Spencer for new black pants and to Boots for sparkly Rimmel eyeshadow and it's time to head out. Ooooh, and to pop into Waterstones to pick up a new Tatler, stationary and Helen Fielding's latest or anything new from Faber & Faber before getting on the train with a scone. I adore England. Rain and all.

The below video reminds me why I love both photography and England, both women in the arts and women in politics.

Last week, I was honored to photograph a longtime mentor of mine. The photos are being used for a stately portrait. I'm comforted to see a pro like Annie struggle with the same questions I had about how to portray a woman of great power and beauty in a world that is intimidated by both.

2.28.2008

Snow Water

Yesterday's snowflake reminded me of a Michael Longley poem called Snow Water. In the poem Longley, a "fastidious brewer of tea, a tea Connoiseur as well as a poet, " asks the reader to bring him the gift of snow water to make his tea on his 60th birthday.

You can listen to him read it here. I love the quietness of the poem, like the gorgeous camera work in Snow Falling on Cedars of melting water droplets from leaves and pine needles.

We heard Longley read this poem in Sligo on his 64th birthday. The next day he gave an interview and talked about how his writing is changing as he ages:

"...I'm interested in getting simpler. I think that's the real challenge: to be polite and graceful and simple. The drift is towards being less and less “artistic” and simpler, and rising to, you know, the directness of the late self-portraits of Rembrandt or the last string quartets of Beethoven. I don't mean to say they aren't complex, in their conception and execution, but the effect is direct and simple."

This poem is great too about a family retreat home. "Home is a hollow between the waves..." is my favorite part.

2.16.2008

Though Distance & Duties Divide Us

Photojojo is a great resource. Yesterday, they posted about another blog 3191: A Year of Evenings that is so enchanting. Two friends now live 3191 miles apart, so every night, each friend takes a photo and they post them side-by-side in a shared blog. Check it out here 2.15.08.

1.13.2008

Flickr Favorites: Inspiring Images

Click on the image to enlarge


See more of these amazing photographers at Flickr.com or here:
1. Card catalog., 2. Felt Mushroom Cottages, 3. Devotion, 4. new love, 5. Wednesday breakfast, 6. you are one with the burden of lost dreams, 7. Afternoon tea @ St. Mark's Square, Venice, 8. first day of winter, 9. llibreria - bookstore - Amsterdam, 10. Hydrangea Still Life 2, 11. Tell me the truth about Love, 12. Gelato, 13. 20060516 P5165407 Italian icecream (gelato) shop, Florence, Italy, 14. Tea & Tintin, 15. colorbands2, 16. tips, 17. new book, new mug, new yarn, 18. Pearly, 19. Vintage Pink Royal Typewriter Ad, 20. visions of Gracie danced in her head, 21. ballet class, 22. a slow morning at the beach, 23. Kawaii Kitchen, 24. The Tea Cubby, 25. realism, 26. green tea, lavender, and honey cupcake bombe, 27. cherry-vanilla cupcakes, 28. basil cream filled cupcakes with raspberry mousse frosting, 29. cupcakes, 30. scooping frosting

You can search for images by any description. I looked for photos tagged books, gelato, sails, tea rooms, coffee, prayer beads, lily pads, cafes, pubs, rivers, typewriters, pearls and so on.

Many of the photographers are not pros. Just like you and me, they are capturing moments in their lives, things they want to share.
**I made this mosaic using Big Huge Labs mosaic maker.

1.02.2008

Pages For You

I begin each year with new music, blank pages, and more stories in my head than I can get on a page.

I've noticed my daughter always starts drawing on a completely blank sheet. If there is even one stray mark on a page when she finds it, she turns the page: clean, fresh paper for her little fingers to transform. Both of her grandmothers are painters and I'm always interested to watch her put colors together. No two drawings are the same.

My husband said of someone the other day, "he just needs to be given permission to be someone different than who he has been in the past." Damn. He's so so right.

We all need that.

Permission to change. To heal. To be better or just different. To find pages without stray marks. To decide which colors to use and where the center will be.

Happy New Journal. New Journey. New Year.

11.20.2007

I heart Etsy

Twice this month, I found something for my daughter for the holidays that was promptly recalled because of lead paint (a Curious George tool bench and a Fisher Price Medical Kit). This has me thinking about a trip I took to Munich in December and how all of the toys sold in the square seemed like they were made in Santa's workshop: wooden parts, hand-painted without chemicals. If you ever get the chance to go to Munich during their Christmas market, GO!






Photos courtesy of the Munich Christmas market site. I'll try to post some of my own closer to Christmas.

So, in search of thoughtful, hand-made goods that support artists, I've found some beautiful, affordable things for her at Etsy.

For example, at this lovely little Etsy boutique called Robin's Egg Pink (how sweet is that) I found these pretend cupcakes...



...and a precious apron


to go with the wooden pastel kitchen that Santa has indicated he will be bringing. I bought them late Friday night and they were at my door in the most adorable robin's egg blue and brown decorative box with pink ribbons on Monday morning. I just love it. I may have to go back to her shop to get one of her toddler afternoon tea jackets.



Etsy has gifts for everyone. Where else can you get a shirt like this?



I keep an Etsy link in the right hand column of this blog year-round to search for items by color which is so much fun. This time of year, searches like "mittens" "christmas cards" and "scarf" yield great results. Happy searching!

11.11.2007

Speaking of Tea Worthy


Check out this painting-a-day painter who has done a series of beautiful tea cups. I love it! Many of the pieces are for sale starting at $100 on ebay too.