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Driving to Hotel Hallo Coca Cola / Cow Dust Hour

Birla power

Tata trucks

Leaf plates stitched

Earth swept

sunlit

barefoot

chili

Saris

goats

monkeys and a pig

Dark skin

between

coconut palm

Thursday

wires

dust

electricity

Two bullocks

idli

a Honda bike

Bindies

and

bangles

men dressed

in white

Darkness falls

headlights

when

An evening lamp

is lit.

Mitered bamboo picks

stitch leaf plate.

The cow is served dinner.

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Brass

nose rings

neck rings

earrings

fingers and toes

silver pins in her hair

market day

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An “artist’s book” is a work of art, not just a vehicle to contain a story and communicate non-visual ideas. Different media are used in a unique way to create a book-like object. These books are puzzles. They are undefined. The viewer and the artist make up their own story using clues from the book-like structure. Image, text and structure are equally important. It’s a book!

This book is titled ‘Library Selection’

I took apart a case of wine and assembled the pieces in a new way. The wood dividers became the pages holding words pertaining to wine, A to Z.  The definitions of the words are on the back each page. By reassembling the original cutout wood that cradled  the bottle, I created a round hole for the bottle of wine.

Library Selection  1998

Stamped wood wine shipping container

1987 Trefethen Chardonnay

12 x 13 x 12 inches size

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Behind the Veteran’s Building  2001

Handmade paper using plant life from Napa, CA. pen and ink, watercolor,

Parchment paper, ink jet print, stamps, raffia, plastic

7 x 5 inches

It’s really easy to make your own paper. All you need is some scraps of paper, a blender from the kitchen and a framed screen. You’ll need some felt to sop up the excess water. After collecting leaves and tiny flowers I made the pulp. Before the new piece of paper was dry I inserted straw for a tie.  One day when my husband and I went on a hike, I jotted down some notes along the way. When I made this book I just just left the notes the way they were, made the font really tiny and printed it. The grasses and tiny flowers were collected during the hike. This kind of handmade book is called a single signature book, an Artist’s book.

Portrait

Looking at the names of sketching strokes

in Chinese art, I see the country:

Ancient wavy silk thread

String

Iron wire

Moving cloud and flowing water

Leech

Nail-head, rat-tail

Wedge

Broken reed

Olive

Date pit

Willow leaf

Bamboo leaf

Shaking ripple

Earthworm

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I remember thirty nine forty Maryland Road

where, upstairs,  I played my favorite record, “ Fire, fire, fire

put the fire out. Here come the firemen to put the fire out!”

The sweet scent of acacia trees filled my room.

“Thirty nine forty,” where on Sunday morning I’d wake up to Bing,

our canary singing with music coming from the living room,

“Rum and Coca-Cola,”  “Deep in the Heart of Texas,”

and “ Cement Mixer Put-Ti, Put-Ti.”

Where Mother Kitty, the homeless neighborhood cat,

wouldn’t let me get into my bed, we moved the newborn kittens

onto some old clothes in my closet, using an eyedropper

I fed the scrawny one.  In the backyard, Sweetheart my white swan,

floated in a galvanized washtub. He, or was it a she?  kept an eye out

for Bumpie our black cocker spaniel. Wearing a two piece sunsuit,

I was unselfconsciously happy, round and soft like the bunnies

in a wire cage beneath the gnarled apricot tree. I would climb that tree

to pick the sweetest fruit, the taste I have not been able to match.

I wonder if my grandchildren will ever know the taste of a tree ripened apricot

or feel the sticky juice dribble down their chin to land on their bare tummy

warmed by the sun. The Oakland Hills fire took the house, leaving our  brick

chimney standing alone except for a white cement front step. A tree is so solid,

so stable, that’s what puzzled me, the trees of my childhood were gone.

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• Color A Day #24 – Apricot (colornerd.wordpress.com)

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I love going to Yoshi’s with my son

We listen to jazz while I sketch

in the smoke and cell free zone.

The chairs are so high and small I slip off.

My feet hang.

The man in front of us has a coffee

bean printed on his cap.

The room goes dark as the waitress

brings a beer and a scotch.

Wearing a light weight summer suit

the pianist walks out on stage.

Three other musicians follow.

The pianist begins to play.

Look at the line of the piano.

How tall the string bass is.

The bass player’s fine line

fingers work the strings

into peppermint strokes.

His body moves back and forth

He plucks the strings.

Coffee bean head starts bobbing.

Fingers are tapping.  I’m drawing.

The sax player presses the brass

buttons of his saxophone

as he leans into his song.

His body filled with intuitive

spontaneous feeling

moves back and forth

up and down.

A familiar tune is playing.

Wrapped in the rhythm of the moment

I’m in there

dancing alone

in between

inside outside.

Loose ink glides over

the paper.

My eyes, hands and the music are one.

The players pour out their stories

Drums join in.

It gets going

changes direction.

Sounds play off each other.

Now a full easy tune

yellow daffodils become

a thundering herd of mustangs.

Heads are bobbin. Feet are tappin.

Everyone is gone

completely entranced.

Fresh silver stars stretch out.

A meadow of blossoms folds over into peach.

The music textures down to

sunset tones.

Applause follows quiet.

The set is over.

But I sat down only a moment ago.

I understand how I could

learn about the workings of

a computer or build

a painting or dissect a frog but

how to build jazz

I do not know.

Suzhou

Away from jet airplanes,

computers, and CNN

is a garden in Suzhou.

A child waits there,

quiet and pure as a peach.