musings from the studio and beyond ~
dawn chandler’s reflections on art and life. . . .
letting go of home
Wednesday, June 19, 2019 would have been my parents’ 65th wedding anniversary.
It’s also the day that I learned my childhood home has been destroyed.
My home of 42 years.
My tiny bedroom with the astonishing bookshelves wrapping around two walls and concealing a secret passage into another room, all meticulously handcrafted by my father. How many hours of labor and love he put into those each evening after returning home from the hospital. How many weekends were spent hauling boards up two flights of stairs from his workshop in the basement to my little room at the end of the hall.
The study, where my father spent many a night peering into his microscope and dictating into a tape-recorder. Where he planned Appalachian Trail adventures for family, friends and Scouts and later, tandem bicycle excursions with his beloved across the back roads of New Jersey, New England, France. Where, if they ever had anything serious to discuss, my parents retired to converse in private. I never, ever heard them raise their voices to each other — in that room or any other.
Every hallway… every bedroom…every bathroom, lined with books. Books. Books. Everywhere, books.
The large screened-in porch off the dining room and kitchen, where we supped every meal from May to September. Where Thanksgiving leftovers were kept in cold storage. Where the best naps in the world were had lounging on the long glider. Where my mother would sit at the long table my father had built, always in the chair to the left, closest to the kitchen’s Dutch door. Here she read the paper each summer morning, her tea turning cold as she became absorbed in a story while scratching the ear of a beloved dog sitting dotingly beside her.
The living-room with its enormous stone fireplace and stone mantel — as long as my father was tall and surely ten times as heavy. Where my brothers and I learned to build a dependable fire and then, by its warmth, know the pleasure of conversation by flamelight.
The dining room where lively conversation sparkled among wine glasses and beer steins, mugs of cider and impossibly strong black coffee and Red Rose tea. Where on winter weekends pages of the Sunday New York Times were made sticky with maple syrup from my father’s “justly famous” sourdough pancakes.
The kitchen.
All those apple pies… loaves of breads… Tollhouse cookies.
Those dozen rooms vibrating over four decades with symphonies and sonatas, cantatas and operas, vespers and bluegrass, rock and roll and folk, all from speakers wired throughout the house.
The root cellar transformed into wine cellar, pungent of earth and must, curtained in cobwebs, its dirt floor covered with corks and bottle leads from hundreds of dark green bottles from France.
The fieldstone front stoop where my mother would sip her afternoon tea and sort through mail while she waited for us to walk home from the school bus.
Fragrant paths that lead to hidden forts, hidden hideaways.
The goat barn, where my mother’s natural gift of animal whispering came to life as she assisted my brother with his small herd of French Alpines.
My father’s near acre of vegetable garden.
The old stone wall.
The tractor trail where we spent snow days sledding, Surely it was a mile long!
The berm that became a firing range, where my brothers and I learned to respect firearms.
The daffodils. The lilac. The forsythia.
The Lily of the Valley.
Mint for iced tea…..and gin and tonics.
The sandpile under the crabapple.
The chestnut trees. The dogwood. The willow.
The magnolia. The birch. The maple. The sycamore.
The hemlocks.
The holly.
The Christmas trees.
Four decades of Christmas trees planted each year in the early days of January, in holes dug in late autumn in anticipation of another addition to the arboretum of our yard. By the time the house was sold in 2006, our Christmas tree from 1965 — our first year in the house — soared with so many others high above the attic roof.
The pool where my brothers and I and any number of our friends learned to swim. Where we had nighttime games of Marco Polo, bats skimming our heads. And where, in my college years, I became lusciously acquainted with the sensuousness of midnight solo skinnydips.
All gone.
We knew this was coming. With my mother’s breast cancer and my father’s leukemia (which at that point was still asymptomatic and more of a nuisance than a daily worry) my parents had come to the realization that the house and property were just too much for them to manage by themselves anymore. That the time had come for them to sell the house and move into a nearby retirement community.
The man who bought the property just before the market tanked in 2008 had plans to “develop” it. And with its perfect proximity to New York and Philadelphia — each about an hour’s drive in opposite directions — you could pretty much bet that they were going to be McMansions.
But for twelve years after it sold, the house sat as it had pretty much always been, shaded by majestic trees, set back from the main road, with various families renting it here and there.
And I guess I wanted to believe that it would always remain there that way in the shade.
That maybe the developer would by some astounding miracle have a change of heart, and let this house that was such a beautifully tapestried home and haven continue to stand in perpetuity as a testament to lives well lived and a deeply happy and respectful marriage.
Of course all of that does still remain — if only in our hearts and memories.
And maybe that’s enough.
It has to be.
. . . painted wednesday evening, 19 june 2019 . . .
.
.
.
___________________________________________________________
Still bossy after 50+ years, Dawn Chandler is an artist and avid outdoorswoman who celebrates life and her love of nature via her writing, photography and most especially through her traditional & abstract landscape paintings. She feels blessed every day to live in New Mexico, the Land of Enchantment. Learn more about Dawn, her art and her story on her website at taosdawn.com. Or simply go here for a quick link to shop her art.
georgia o’keeffe & me
My first time visiting the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum was in 1997, soon after they opened.
Yesterday was my first time back.
Did I mention the Georgia O’Keeffe museum is two miles from my house?
Yet it took me twenty-two years to walk through the doors again.
Two decades!
Yes. I’m pretty embarrassed by that. And really, I can’t tell you why it took me so long. There’s a list of poor excuses. Part of the blame may be because my first visit there — right when they opened — I was unimpressed.
With the arrogant air of a freshly minted MFA student who had experienced the massive 1988 O’Keeffe retrospective in a real museum in a real city, I was oh so quick to judge. This Santa Fe building? This museum? This was…. oh so quaint….
And, well…. I just never made it back. Which is kind of shameful for one who loves museums.
It wasn’t a decision not to go back.
It just didn’t ever happen. Part of that was the Truth that we so often don’t visit the sites in our own town. Why that is, I don’t know, but it’s likely because we figure we have all the time in the world to go, but then never make the point of going!
Then there’s lazy stinginess: If I’m going to pay $2 to park downtown, well, I have more urgent priorities ( like, ummm…. going here… here…. here…. and here ).
Then there’s the fact that somewhere in the middle of those two decades I read a biography of O’Keeffe that left me with a sour impression. I got the sense that the woman was kind of unpleasant. Really though, that probably reveals more about me at the time of my reading that particular bio than it says about her. Or maybe it says more about the tone of the biographer than of O’keeffe’s essence.
But mostly I hadn’t made it back to the O’Keeffe Museum because I felt I already knew a lot about her and was already familiar with her work. Seemed like everywhere you looked there was her art featured on a poster….
So I didn’t feel a particular need to see more of it in person any time soon.
Yet please don’t think these “negatives” mean I disliked her work. Quite the contrary, I had always rather admired her work. In fact, there was a time about a decade ago when, on the other side of the globe in an autumnal European City, Georgia O’Keeffe carried me back home to New Mexico.
Still, I didn’t go to the O’Keeffe museum.
Till yesterday. Yesterday I went.
It was splendid.
And I’m kicking myself for taking so long to get back there. Indeed, my sophomoric dismissal of the museum 22 years ago says a whole lot more about me and my snooty attitude than it served as a worthy critique of the fledgling museum.
Now, in the two decades since, the museum and its collection has grown into a marvelous center for viewing and exploring creativity in general and of one of the great artists of the 20th century in particular.
Walking into the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum was like walking into the salon of a friend — a sister. A compatriot. Simpatica.
I felt like she was speaking to me — directly to me — through her paintings, her sketches, her collections of brushes, tubes of paints and sticks of color; her desert bones.
Through her work she was saying to me It’s OK — what you’re doing with your work is OK — it’s all OK.
OK meaning perfect.
OK meaning just right.
For here is what struck me particularly, what I wrote in my journal there in the last gallery of the museum late yesterday afternoon:
OK meaning keep doing what you’re doing.
OK meaning keep on looking, keep on listening, keep on noting, keep on painting.
I was struck by the fact that she didn’t seem to be haunted by critics pushing her to choose between styles and interests. That she painted her version of “traditional” landscapes with just as much studied interest as she painted her abstractions. If those critical voices tried to haunt her, she left them like bones to dry out in the desert.
OK meaning keep on with your “traditional” “representational” landscapes.
OK meaning keep on with your abstractions.
OK meaning keep on loving and painting and celebrating your cranes. Your clouds. Your skies. Your words. Your sketches. Your hearts. Your everything.
OK meaning just keep on keeping on.
And, while you’re at it, sanctify your blessed, creative solitude, your focus. Turn off the phone.
Carry a sketchbook.
Always.
Honor your creativity. Your vision.
And Be.
Present.
psssst: To my Tuesday Dawnings subscribers — keep an eye out for my next edition for some O’Keeffe-inspired sketchbook musings!
Not yet signed up for Tuesday Dawnings? Go here for more info.
___________________________________________________________
Thank you for reading my blog and appreciating my musings.
If you enjoy my posts and know others who might enjoy them too, please feel free to share this.
~ Dawn Chandler
You can find more of my stories, insights and art here on my website, www.taosdawn.com, as well as on Instagram and Facebook. Peruse and shop for my art here, and sign up for Tuesday Dawnings weekly deep breath of uplift & insight here.
___________________________________________________________
working & walking in the new mexico mud
I had in mind an altogether different blog post for this installment.
But then something happened to me today.
On my early morning run through my neighborhood I noticed a sign….
I like labyrinths. In fact I’ve even written about labyrinths before on this blog, about ten years ago.
But as far as labyrinths go, I admit that I’ve always thought the dried mud one at my local park to be a sorry excuse for one. Twenty years old it’s rarely used (that I’ve noticed). Neglected, dusty and weedy, it looks forlorn. I’ve gone by it nearly every day for five years, but rarely have I been tempted to walk it; it’s just never seemed appealing there in the dirt. I’ve hardly even photographed it — and that tells you something.
And yet … sometimes when the sun is low an the earth is aglow, the labyrinth transforms into something nearly beautiful. Kind of like Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree.
And the peace flags that hang in the simple, rugged awning… Well, they beckon me with my camera frequently.
So when I saw that sign this morning as I ran by I thought, Maybe I should go help them… Maybe if I work on the labyrinth, I’ll care more about it.
Ohhhhhhh, But…. I had so many things to do today… My long list included painting, and computer work and painting and household chores and painting and errands and painting.
Yes. But, I don’t get out and volunteer nearly enough.
And I don’t really know my Santa Fe community very well.
This would be such a great chance to be involved, to help out, to be a good neighbor.
BUT…. I finally had a day in which I could paint ALL MORNING! Something I was planning on and VERY eager to do!
So NO. I would stay home and work in my studio as I had planned and as I had looked forward to doing.
First though I needed to get out of my running clothes and take a shower.
And then one of those better-angel-voices in my head chimed in: Before you change out of those smelly fitness clothes and get cleaned up, why not just run down to the park and just help them out for a little while. 30 minutes! An hour MAX! THEN come back and clean up. THEN paint.
I filled my thermos with coffee, grabbed a water bottle and work gloves and drove back over to the park.
.
..
…
….
I returned home four hours later.
Worn out. Satisfied. Blissful.
And with a new appreciation for our beautiful earthen labyrinth.
What had I done during those 4 hours?
I shoveled dirt.
I hauled water.
I tamped mud
— all to the vibrant rhythm of a live and joyous marimba band.
And most important of all, I met and worked side by side with my neighbors.
And when we were finished with our labor, I gathered with them in a circle around an earthen heart shaped by caring hands, and with a wish for peace joined them in lining the heart with stones.
We then nourished ourselves with conversation over a potluck picnic.
And at 1:00pm, as three harpists under a nearby cottonwood tree strummed magic from their strings….
and as our fellow labyrinth walkers in the Midwest of our country were winding down their silent walk, we joined thousands of others across the mountain states in walking in silence.
And when we concluded our walk, sojourners on the west coast stepped out together on their own paths.
For it turns out today — the first Saturday in May — is World Labyrinth Day. And when we walked the circuitous path in silence together, we joined thousands of other labyrinth walkers across the Earth, walking for peace.
On this day we are united
with past pilgrims,
current sojourners,
and future seekers.
We invite this labyrinth walk
to un-strange us from ourselves,
un-alienate us from one another here,
and un-wall us from fellow pilgrims far away:
let all who truly seek
truly join.
From “Meeting the World in My Walk”
by Mary Ann Wamhoff of Santa Fe.
I learned today that this labyrinth revival & walk in my local park was sponsored by the Labyrinth Resource Group of Santa Fe who encourage the creation and use of labyrinths as a path of healing, inspiration, and peace — a community I wasn’t even aware of!
Oh, but I am now. And so very grateful to be.
May the Fourth be with you!
Want to walk a labyrinth? Find one near you here.
___________________________________________________________
Thank you for reading my blog and appreciating my musings.
If you enjoy my posts and know others who might enjoy them too, please feel free to share this.
~ Dawn Chandler
You can find more of my stories, insights and art here on my website, www.taosdawn.com, as well as on Instagram and Facebook. Peruse and shop for my art here, and sign up for Tuesday Dawnings weekly deep breath of uplift & insight here.
celebrating grace: the art of migrating home
Last week at this time I was sipping coffee while looking out across the early morning light glittering off a tributary of the Potomac River. I’d gone east to the land of water and trees to visit again the home of a beloved elder, who offered my spirit sustenance and solace during a long ago chapter of my life; a chapter of much growth and expression coupled with certain uncertainty. (My latest Tuesday Dawnings has some lovely pics from this trip.)
As I made this journey to a beloved homeland, there are others, now — hundreds of thousands of others — making journeys of their own across this beautiful and extraordinary country of ours. For it is Spring, and that means the cranes — the waterfowl, the migrating birds — are moving.
You who regularly read these musings of mine know that for many weeks last autumn and early this winter I dedicated much of this blog to sharing my crane paintings — my mixed-media, semi-abstract, semi-figurative, imaginative paintings celebrating my infatuation with the sandhill cranes. Some of you wrote to me to tell me how much you enjoyed these weekly blog posts, and several of you generously decided that you needed my cranes to inhabit the walls of your home. Thank you.
In recent months however, my online presence has been dominated by my new creative project of Tuesday Dawnings. These weekly curations have been a labor of love. Yes, they are a lot of work. But they also fill me with curiosity and serenity. I’m loving the process of gathering beauty and sharing it with my Tuesday Dawnings circle, my TD tribe. Thank you to everyone who has joined me for these weekly journeys. I so value your openness and willingness to hear from me each Tuesday.
Yet as I’ve gathered and culled my weekly musings this winter, I also made quiet time to work further on my crane paintings.
Now though, as the seasons change and the cranes have left New Mexico for a spell, so, too, am I putting aside my painted cranes for a while. Other projects are calling to me.
It seems the crane paintings want to be my focus in the winter months, when my muse and I can look forward to when the cottonwoods turn gold, and the first wide spread of wings appear high in the sky.
And so here you are — the last of my crane paintings…. for now.
(These will be familiar to my TD Tribe, for you had a peek at these in March. 😉
These crane paintings all are made by building up layers of printed text, cut papers, and acrylic paint. As I build layers, I wait to see what emerges. I never start with a plan or known outcome. Rather, I just respond to the layers and shapes. Always I’m surprised by the figures — the people — who show up in these. Surprised — and delighted!
My personal journals — my written musings and reflections — are the source of the words ghosted in these paintings. Here’s a video of me in my studio one recent afternoon, reading aloud from one of these writings about my first experience going to the Platte River to witness the crane migration. Pour yourself a cuppa and come listen.
By the way if you’re on my REAL MAIL list, you’ve recently received (or are about to receive) a note card in the mail with this painting, “Breath” on it. Alas, the image on the card doesn’t accurately capture the radiant blues of the actual painting; this image above is more true in color.
{ Speaking of mail, if you would like the joy of receiving REAL MAIL send me your mailing address; I’ll gladly send you a thoughtful note a couple times per year. }
Nearly all of these paintings are available for purchase, and I will be adding them one by one to my online shop over the next few days. If you can’t wait that long shoot me message to inquire about any of them; I’d be delighted to answer your questions and provide you with more details!
Thank you for reading my blog and appreciating my musings.
If you enjoy my posts and know others who might enjoy them too, please feel free to share this.
~ Dawn Chandler
You can find more of my stories, insights and art here on my website, www.taosdawn.com, as well as on Instagram and Facebook. Peruse and shop for my art here, and sign up for Tuesday Dawnings weekly deep breath of uplift & insight here.
how to paint yourself free
Have you wanted to travel to the unknown*?
Have you wanted to expand your boundaries*
Are you yearning for freedom*?
Joan Fullerton paintings.
Then I encourage you to sign up for artist Joan Fullerton’s wonderful online painting class Paint Yourself Free. Take Joan’s class, and you will travel — joyfully! — to the unknown. You will expand your imagined boundaries, and you will be liberated — artistically, creatively, delightfully!
Many of you know that Joan is one of my BFFs — so there’s that disclosure. She and I became fast friends many years ago in Taos, thanks in part to similar artistic sensibilities. Over the years we’ve counseled each other through thick and thin, sought opinions from each other, cheered each other on, cried together, and laughed and giggled a whole, whole helluva lot together.
We’ve also painted a lot together (usually with a glass of wine in one hand and a plate of chocolate within arm’s reach) and exhibited our art together.
Joan is an exceptionally good artist.
acrylic on panel ~ 24″ x 18″
acrylic on panel ~ 24″ x 24″
She is also an exceptionally good teacher.
Which is why I dropped several $$ for her online class last year.
Yes, I wanted to support my friend. But even more than that, I knew her class would be excellent.
I knew I would come away with a wealth of information about new materials and how to use them.
I knew I would come away with new ideas for painting techniques — ways that I’d never imagined myself for how to make imagery.
I knew I would be reminded of painting concepts I once knew but that I’d unfortunately forgotten about.
mixed media on canvas ~ 14″ x 11″
acrylic on paper ~ 25″ x 15″
And I had a really strong hunch that after each of the modules in Joan’s class, I’d be unable to sleep at night because my head would be brimming with excitement from all that I’d learned. I just knew that once I immersed myself in her lessons, all I would think about and want to do is PAINT!
All that proved true X 10.
Which is why I’m using valuable real estate on my own blog to promote another artist: Because Joan’s class is worth it.
Joan doesn’t need me to promote her class (nor does she even know that I am). I’m spreading the word about her Paint Yourself Free class because I know it’s a wise investment for anyone who has even dreamed of being an artist — and even for those who are well-established artists!
Joan’s Paint Yourself Free class is now available — but for just a few more days. You can sign up for it until February 28. Once you sign up, you’ll have all year to do the classes.**
Get more info about Joan Fullerton’s Paint Yourself Free online class here.
.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go pour myself a glass of wine, grab some chocolate, raise a glass to my dear friend and go paint!
~ Joan Fullerton, artist, teacher, mentor, friend.
* Titles of some of the lessons in Joan Fullerton’s online painting class Paint Yourself Free.
** That’s what I did: I signed up last January, but didn’t make time until October to watch the videos and do the lessons. This worked out just fine for me, but I didn’t get the benefit of the initial excitement of Joan’s Paint Yourself Free private FaceBook community, when all of the other students were sharing their coursework early on in the cycle of the class. Still, participating in the FB group isn’t required, but it can be a lot of fun as well as be very motivating and inspiring.
Thank you for reading my blog and appreciating my musings.
If you enjoy my posts and know others who might enjoy them too, please feel free to share this.
~ Dawn Chandler
p.s. You can find more of my stories, insights and art here on my website, www.taosdawn.com, as well as on Instagram and Facebook. Peruse and shop for my art here, and sign up for Tuesday Dawnings weekly deep breath of uplift, art & insight here.