Story-Hoard

Story-Board

Rock Steady

Old clay:
See Survivor sequence from 2013.

Surge

Triton: sculpture mix; nutmeg/brown and blue glazing.

Photos: 2012; Pacific Grove.

Whisky Friday II

Rereading, Again:

Jan Siegel's Prospero's Children is always a lively treat.

Moya Cannon's Sheep: Trust and Manipulation

Here are two poems by Moya Cannon that I just found and do admire:


SHEEP AT NIGHT IN THE INAGH VALLEY

For Leo and Clare

Maybe the dry margins draw them,
or grass, sprouting among limestone chippings --
they are here, as always,
on the edge of the tarmac
on a bend.

They shelter under the clumped rushes --
white bundles in the night --
their eyes are low green stars,
caught in the trawl of my car's headlights.

Occasionally one hirples across the road
but, usually, they stay put
and gaze at the slowed-down car.

I envy them their crazy trust.


WEANING

He carried a lamb
up over the bog to the hill,
took sugar from his pocket and let it lick.

The clean tongue searched the crevices of his hand,
then he set it down to graze.

It would never stray from that hill,
tethered by a dream of sweet grass.

--by MOYA CANNON


Respectfully borrowed from
Carrying the Songs
Carcanet Press Ltd
Manchester, UK
2007

Fresh From the Kiln: Mermaid and Wave

Mermaid, Swimming and Wave:
silverstone clay; cobalt carbonate oxide.

Mask on a Mollusk: Musings

Friend:  'Splain, please.

Me:      I don't know if I can.  

I like putting my clay--pottery and sculpture--out in nature, especially water--and taking photos, aiming to capture something evocative or expressive.  Sometimes I have very specific artistic goals; sometimes I'm goofing or experimenting.  The results have ranged from the silly to the sublime--as you can see if you examine the many such shots I've included in this blog--and sometimes I've wanted the silly or the sublime, depending on mood and interest.  My main approach is intuitive.

("The Door" or "The Drowned Man" series are among the most successful postings, I think.)

Art involves expression and exploration, and these pieces allow me to experiment.  My recent "Frog-Man II" captures loss and longing, I'd argue, in the juxtaposition of the situation I placed my sculpture in, that natural setting ten feet beneath the surface, with the specific features and expression I'd sculpted into that particular clay-face, that specific clay-head.

I think about displacement.  Artist Jay Trinidad wrote to me about how art works:

"Art works by displacing.  I think displacement is an essential element.  It needs to pitch you out of your own experience."

JT works more ethically, more in the veins of social justice and sheer beauty, than I do, but one element of my work would have to be displacement, surprising you with the clay, the worked clay, in the natural settings.  Perhaps that surprise catches you -- makes your footing just a bit uneven, makes you laugh at the absurdity or boneheadedness of what I do --catches you enough to slip inside, to spur or spark a reaction or a recognition in the face of oddity or silliness or some deeper emotion.  Sometimes, my pieces are illustrative, meant to tell a story, sure, but also to highlight the natural environment, and my clay contribution would subside in terms of attention.  Other times, I am seeking an emotional recognition.  Many of my pieces are sad, I think, for grief is one of the deepest feelings I know.  Others are enhanced, made better, by the watery environment.  A bowl in a stream is just clay in water, but it is also, perhaps, an offering to beauty, to the muses.  A mask on a mollusk is a slightly different offering.

And there are nine muses, each with a different temper and temperment.

I try to please each and every one of them.

Visage:
Silverstone clay;
Oribe & Abalone glazes;
leather cord--
and assorted kelp forest denizens.

Mendocino: Current Favorite Shots

Swimming with Sofia

No handy kelp to anchor the boat to, so I just swam with her.

Why I Paddle

In one photo, one fairly simple photo . . . .

I love Keats' poetry, but I don't often agree with his famous lines about truth and beauty.

Kayaking out of Van Damme, I do agree, inescapably.

Do You Like My Tie?

Aquaman:
sculpture mix; green house-paint;
leather cord; and abalone shell.


Cover shot for that book of poetry I haven’t quite written yet . . . .

Dream-Dram

Glenlivet: Founder’s Reserve

Almost as good as poetry
And far less labor.

I falter,
And drain the glass.

--MD

Sam Hamill: "Ars Poetica"

PREFACE: ARS POETICA

Some say the poem's
best made from natural speech
from the inner life.
I say, That is sometimes true.
The poem's a natural thing.

Some say the poem
should rise into purest song,
a formality,
articulate expression
achieved through complex structures

derived from classics--
which also is true enough.
Let the song arise
as it will.  Learn to revise
the life.  Beware.  Disguises

rise up everywhere:
most dangerously, self-in-
fatuation.  "More
poets fail," Pound declared,
"from lack of character than

from lack of talent."
Some insist the poem is
heaven-sent, claiming
angelic heirs.  The poem,
I believe, is a failure

elevated in-
to triumph, a form of truth
wrought from mortal flesh
and blood that will soon perish,
but which--for one brief moment

or an hour--reveals
the tragic human spirit
in the very act
of imagining itself
cured of the sickness of self.

The poem cannot,
finally, be explained nor
defined.  The true gift
poetry bestows begins
and ends with humility

before the task.  All
the suffering of this world
can be truly felt,
absorbed adn transcended, just
by the act of listening

to that deepest voice
speaking from within.  Forget
hagiography.
All the great masters are dead.
Forget rime and irony.

Forget words, meter,
diction, whole syllabaries--
the literary.
The heart by way of the ear.
What's that you wanted to say?

--SAM HAMILL



from Gratitude,
BOA Editions, Ltd.
Rochester, NY  1998


(This one is for Eric, a very welcome house-guest)

Sam Hamill: "The Nets"

THE NETS

Somewhere someone is untangling
the heavy nets of desire
beside a small fire at the edge of the sea.

He works slowly, fingers bleeding,
half thinking, half listening, knowing
only that the sea makes him thirsty.

--SAM HAMILL


from Gratitude, 
BOA Editions, Ltd.
Rochester, NY  1998

Foray

Homer's Iliad: Anti-Indoctrination

Reading Homer’s Iliad is anti-indoctrination.  Is Homer praising war and heroism or questioning their value?  Is Homer advocating for the gods or calling faith in Zeus and his family into question?  Is Achilles or Hector the true heroic model?  Both? Neither?

Aside from the urgent questioning, we are given urgent empathy as well.  The Trojans, the putative enemies, are not the Other, but they are brothers and mothers, fathers and sisters.  All are mortal, and wrath is understandable, but not entirely justifiable in action and effect.

Read Homer’s Iliad and be mortal in the best sense.

Bottle-of-Dreams

That's Chloe, by the way, a dancer of Atlantis, so click the link to know more.

Dreaming Pegasus

I dreamed of Pegasus early this morning.  The horse was trotting down a city street, opened up his wings, and flew up and away.  I stood there, watching that flight in a state of awe, sorry I hadn't a camera in my hand, but knowing better than to dig into my bag for that camera, knowing that the sight needed witnessing for my own sake, as the sun lit Pegasus's silver-gray flanks and wings, as the shadow of the flying horse played across the office building behind him.

And in the dream I never questioned the reality, never doubted that this was Pegasus.

(I love that about dreaming.)