musings from the studio and beyond ~
dawn chandler’s reflections on art and life. . . .
new for you, each saturday morning ~ honoring grace
sunset sandhill cranes heading out to their evening roost ~ bosque del apache ~ winter 2017 ~ photo by dawn chandler
‘never have I seen grace like this” ~ by dawn chandler ~ mixed media on panel ~ 10″ x 20″
The writing & text come from my own musings… the pages of my journals, and stream of consciousness written on the papers collaged into the painting….
You’ll be seeing more of this figure in future paintings… Eventually I’ll share their story…. It’s a good one. 🙂
‘never have I seen grace like this” ~ by dawn chandler ~ mixed media on panel ~ 10″ x 20″
Thanks a bunch for reading my blog. If you enjoy my musings here, please feel free to share this post! Also, I invite you to discover more of my stories, insights and art on Instagram, Facebook and via my Inside the Studio Notes. Very Artfully Yours ~ Dawn Chandler
under the spell of new mexico gold
Something magical has been spreading across New Mexico this September… I’ve never seen anything quite like it.
And I’m not the only one stunned by it. I go out each evening to walk and find, despite distressing world news, I’m smiling. And there’s many more people out there on my walks, and they’re smiling, too. It’s as if we can’t help ourselves — which, in fact, we can’t.
We are under the spell of gold — gold coins.
Coins made up of pistils, stamens, and soft jagged petals.
Coins scattered densely across seemingly every field, empty lot and fence row in Santa Fe County. Coins known in Latin circles as Verbesina encelioides.
I’m talking about Golden Crownbeard.
Also known as the Cowpen Daisy.
…. or American Dogweed…
…and Butter Daisy….
…or South African Daisy….
… and Gold Weed….
… and Wild Sunflower.
To me, they’re known as the OMG-I-Can’t-Believe-How-Gorgeous-Those-Golden-Flowers-Are-What-The-Heck-Are-They-They-Are-So-Incredibly-Beautiful-I-ve-Never-Seen-Fields-of-Gold-Like-That-I-Just-Can’t-Get-Enough-Of-Them.
My neighborhood nursery Plants of the Southwest describes Golden Crownbeard on their website as “a showy, fast-growing annual with a profuse display of bright golden daisies in fall. Marvelous along fence rows, in meadows or at the back of a casual garden. Sow anytime. Zones 5-8.” I read elsewhere that the Cowpen Daisy is “excellent for reclamation and pollinator conservation mixtures. Provides nectar to bees and butterflies.”
According to the Native American Ethnobotany Database, the Hopis used an infusion of the plant as a treatment against the fever and itch of spider bites, while the Navajo used the dried leaves as a treatment for stomach ailments. Further, they brought good luck, for the seeds were nourishing, and the petals, if chewed, boded a successful hunt — and protected one from lightning.
I don’t know if these flowers will do any of that, but I do know that THIS YEAR, at least, the cowpen daisy is capable of inducing endless smiles and cheerfulness. For the flower is positively E X P L O D I N G across New Mexico, including in the usually dusty dirt pit of field at the center of my neighborhood park.
Come late summer in New Mexico, we all welcome — with a mixture of joy and wistfulness — the first sunflowers that pop up along the roadsides, a sure sign that autumn is on its way. And so when I first glimpsed this gold color on the landscape, I assumed it must be the roadside sunflowers.
But I’d never seen whole fields of sunflowers in New Mexico before. Upon closer inspection I realized these are not the roadside sunflowers I’ve known for decades. Though related — both are Asteraceae — of the aster or daisy family — these fields of gold are a different flower altogether. And I am utterly intoxicated by their magical properties of imbuing joy.
As I write this, the gold of the cowpen daisies across the landscape is becoming burnished as their petals dry and fade, disintegrating into the earth….
… just as a different trove of gold coins begins to scatter in the mountains high above the fields ….
and another, along the valley waterways….
swelling again the treasury of my imagination with golden autumn riches…
Ahhhhhh…… September in New Mexico….
All photos — except the top image of gold coins — by Dawn Chandler.
Read more about autumn in New Mexico here.
Thanks so much for reading my blog. If you enjoy my musings here, please feel free to share this post!
Fnd more of my stories, insights and art on Instagram, Facebook and via my Inside the Studio Notes.
Very Artfully Yours ~
Dawn
heartache turned to beauty turned to giving: own a limited edition philmont print
Just released: Signed and numbered limited edition prints A Philmont Morning is the Best Kind of Morning by Dawn Chandler. More that half of the proceeds of the sale of these prints are being donated to Philmont’s Fire Relief Fund.
Chances are you were glued to your computer those first days of June, desperate for more news of Philmont and the Ute Park Fire.
If you were able to sleep at all, likely you went to bed each night with nausea in your belly, and your head pounding with anxiety.
Come morning you raced to the computer to see if the fire had spread, and felt your heart scouring the inside of your throat as you read that once again the fire had doubled in size.
Friends and family who don’t know Philmont, who’ve never been there, but know YOU and know that this arid corner of New Mexico is sacred ground to you, saw on their news feeds that this “Boy Scout Camp in Northern New Mexico” was on fire. And they said to you, “I’m sorry about Philmont….” and it’s all you could do to choke down the sobs.
Your HOmEland — your SPIRITland, your SOULand was burning. All you could see was loss and destruction. You were in an utterly grievous state.
But then….
… then you started reading about the current staff, and the good people of Ute Park, of Cimarron, of the neighboring ranches.
You read of the firefighters.
You read of heroism.
You read of resiliency.
You read of unbelievably tough decisions.
You read of integrity.
You read of humor and of hope and of grace.
And out of the ashes — out of your sorrow — somehow rose a little green sprout of life — and hope.
The above description is excerpted from the story behind my newly released print, A Philmont Morning is the Best Kind of Morning.
And now they’re here: 200 limited edition prints!
No wait — CORRECTION. Make that 13
Trying to capture the colors of an early July early morning on Philmont’s Tooth of Time Ridge. Photo by Douglas Fasching, ace photographer & coffee wizard.
5 limited edition prints, because a staggering 65 prints — 65!! — sold in 72 hours over Labor Day weekend to 52 saavy early bird TaosDawn studio Insiders.
Prints are $95…. and….$50 from every print sale is going to Philmont’s Fire Relief Fund.
Which means in just three days we’ve raised an additional $3,250 to help repair, reseed, and renew Philmont’s backcountry.
WOW, PEOPLE!! WOW!!
We have the ability to raise $6,750 more with the sale of those 135 remaining prints. My goal is to get them all sold before October 1st, and raise a grand total of $10,000 for Philmont’s Fire Fund.
Get the full story and purchase your print here.
Or shop around and view this and all the rest of my art in my full online store on Etsy at www.etsy.com/shop/dawnchandlerstudio
Dawn Chandler’s original plein air oil painting, A Philmont Morning is the Best Kind of Morning, was auctioned off in July, raising more than $2,800 for Philmont’s Fire Recovery Fund.
Thank you!
we interrupt this summer to bring you….
pathways….
and waterways… and walkways ….
we interrupt this summer to share meals… meditation… direction….
and glimpses of yesteryear….
… to share the welcoming of shelter …..
and expressions … of friendship … of kindness … of courage ….
to share the splendor of meadows and mountains…
and wise old souls …
and astonishing beings …
we interrupt this summer to bring you a wealth of tiny dazzling things….
Yes, I’ve been walking again.
Slowly and solo, again in the New England woods.
This time, a short 50-mile section of the Appalachian Trail. That little bit of the AT in central Vermont where it breaks away from the Long Trail — a point called Maine Junction — and ventures eastward, to cross the Connecticut River at the border of New Hampshire. It’s a gorgeous, pastoral section of trail (and — thankfully — not nearly as rugged as much of the Long Trail), winding mostly under 2500 feet of elevation. Which means much of the path leads through rolling low elevation hardwood forests of birch and maple, beech and hemlock.
I don’t know how much longer I’ll get to enjoy the shade of the hemlocks… The changing climate means they’re particularly vulnerable, as are so many of the Beings that blessed me with their presence these handful of days.
All the more reason I feel an urgency to get out there now, while they hold on, while my aging body can still carry me through these woods.
How many times a day did I reflect on Emerson’s quote….
Or recited the words of Mary Oliver.
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
(from The Summer Day)
My question to you is this:
When are you going out there, to the fields, to the forest, or the plains, the mesas or the waterways, or even your city park, your own back yard?
When are you going out and leaving
your phone behind?
Go — go now.
Go this weekend.
Don’t bring your phone. Promise me you’ll leave your phone behind.
Go find a quiet spot.
Close your eyes and breathe. Deeply.
Listen for a long while.
Then open your eyes, and look around.
Look.
See.
Breathe.
Notice.
Enjoy.
Don’t thank me.
Thank
your Self
Thank
your one wild and precious life.
Thanks so much for reading my blog. If you enjoy my musings here, please feel free to share this post!
And remember that you can always find more of my stories, insights and art on Instagram, Facebook and via my Inside the Studio Notes.
Very Artfully & Gratefully Yours ~
Dawn
painting my way back to philmont….
Saturday morning, July 7, 2018 ~ Me, attempting to capture the unique shape and color of Philmont’s Tooth of Time. Photo by Douglas Fasching.
Over lunch, I had commented to my friend that I was shocked we hadn’t suffered any fires yet. The winter and spring had been worrisomely mild, and the winds had howled across April and May. And yet here it was one day from June and New Mexico had hardly suffered any fires yet this season.
The day was Thursday, May 31st, 2018, and an hour after supping with my friend, I was heading home to Santa Fe, taking an unusual route — north through Taos so that I could then bear southwest across the Rio Grande Gorge and out into the wide open sageland of Carson, where I hoped to get some photos for a commission.
As I drove up Paseo del Norte, I noticed an odd cloud behind Taos Mountain. That looks like smoke I thought to myself. A visitor to the Southwest might not have noticed anything unusual, but we who spend late spring worrying about fire evacuations have an acute eye for clouds. That’s got to be a fire… As I made my way across the gorge bridge and out through Carson toward Ojo Caliente, I kept pulling over to take a look, further convincing myself that that cloud was smoke.
The Ute Park smoke plume rising behind the Taos Mountain, Thursday, May 31, 2018. Photo by Dawn Chandler
The Ute Park smoke plume rising behind Taos Mountain, as seen from near Carson, New Mexico, Thursday, May 31, 2018. Photo by Dawn Chandler
Of course we now know that what I was watching was the smoke of the Ute Park Fire, which exploded across the heart of Philmont. (If you don’t know what Philmont is or why it’s significant to me, you can learn more in my bio). For the next 72 hours, the fire would double with every update, eventually reaching 37,000 acres, 27,000 on Philmont. Neighboring communities would be threatened and forced to evacuate, as vast acres of pinon, juniper and Ponderosa forests would be wiped out. Some of the most beautiful hiking country I have known would be rendered unrecognizable, despite the herculean efforts of an army of hundreds of heroic firefighters.
After the Ute Park fire ~ burn damage on Philmont, as seen from Cimarron Canyon, July 9, 2018. Photo by Dawn Chandler.
More of the Ute Park fire damage on Philmont, as seen from Cimarron Canyon, July 9, 2018. Photo by Dawn Chandler.
And Philmont would ultimately make the utterly wrenching decision to close its backcountry for the season — the first time in its 80-year history — crushing the dreams of thousands of Scouts who had been anticipating a summer of adventure hiking in “God’s Country.” But the continued threat of fire, and the threat of extreme flooding and mudslides, made the decision to close the only prudent option.
Meanwhile Philmont and its neighbors rose and continue to rise to the challenges of disruption with awe-inspiring resiliency. Summer staff have been reassembled and put to work on fire recovery efforts, while Philmont’s admin team has worked tirelessly in rescheduling crews for the 2019 season. Scout camps from across the country have welcomed troops whose Philmont treks were canceled.
Philmont’s “big board” of summer backcountry trek itineraries, normally a mass of tiny well-planned notes, completely blank. Photo by Dawn Chandler.
And people have been giving — have been desperately, passionately wanting to give — to help Philmont. For while Philmont’s insurance will cover a great many things, it unfortunately won’t cover things like forest recovery efforts and reseeding.
So a great many people have made contributions to the Philmont Staff Association’s Fire Recovery Fund — which is a heck of a great way to help.
I decided though to do something a little different; to give in the way that I give best.
I decided to paint a picture, and auction it off.
Saturday morning, July 7, 2018 ~ my trusty plein air paint kit. Photo by Douglas Fasching.
So here’s my painting, which I did at Philmont a few days ago. I’ve called it A Philmont Morning is the Best Kind of Morning, and that morning that I painted it was indeed a “best kind of morning.”
“A Philmont Morning is the Best Kind of Morning” ~ by Dawn Chandler ~ oil on panel en plein air ~ 9″ x 12 ~ painted July 7, 2018.
A Philmont Morning is the Best Kind of Morning PAINTING AUCTION UPDATE
After a week of exciting, nail-biting bidding on eBay, I’m utterly thrilled to announce that my painting raised over $2,800 for Philmont’s Fire Recovery Fund!
A Philmont Morning is the Best Kind of Morning PRINTS
As of 1 September 2018, special limited edition prints are now available for $95 each, with $50 of each print being donated to Philmont’s fire recovery effort. Half have already sold, raising over $4,500 for the fire fund!
Click here for more details and/or to purchase a print.
Meanwhile…
I want to go back to Philmont….