Winter Solstice Human Sacrifices...or not.

The WINTER SOLSTICE has come and gone with the proper sacrifices made. The victim was appropriately George Bush, whose trussed body was lain upon the altar stone and beaten with a sock full of frozen Tootsie Rolls until Dick Cheney's hand popped out. They were then both painted red and sent north across the frozen lake to meet their fate. Eight years too late, but a satisfying image nonetheless.I went down to the lake on the solstice to see what nature had in store for me on this shortest day of the year. It was a stunning revelation in grey. High winds and cold temperatures beginning early on the 21rst and running through the 22nd had piled the surf up on the beach 40 feet beyond the normal waterline and then froze it in several rows of dunes. Now this is a yearly phenomenon, but the surprise here was how quickly it happened, how far inland and how high. The dunes were already about 10 feet high in places and were made up of ice balls of various sizes, from ping pong balls to volleyballs. The end result was an unearthly Jovian vision. A grey-white corrugated icescape for as far as the eye could see. The ramparts of ice blocked the view of the lake, but if one were to climb up a bit of a dune, the brown waves topped with white crests could be seen making their way shoreward. They could not get far, as a shelf of ice has formed along the shore and then a skirt of frozen floating iceballs beyond that would absorb them as they tried to make their way home.The above photo was taken looking down towards Presque Isle. Of course it can't be seen through the snow and gloom. In fact you can barely make out Baer Beach. Now one of the truly amazing things about this place is that three days ago I was down here on the beach working in a T-shirt in near record temperatures in the 60's.The following three photos are of some of the stone cairns covered in ice and snow. On this day I couldn't work as the snow covering made it too hard to find the proper stones for laying the new courses. So, I waited a few days and by Christmas the conditions were much improved for working and I have been able to make significant progress since these photos were recorded. I will post those images next time. Until then, I hope that the new year is an interesting one for you all. Good health...

Shiftiing Stones and A New Form

The year is coming to a close and in Erie it has been a grey end. Already the sun has become a stranger. It looks like we are in for a long cold haul. The solstice approaches and with it some time off from work that might lead to some extended hours at the beach so I have that to look forward to.

I've started a new large scale project out of the ruins of last summer. I 'm not so sure where I'm heading with it just yet, but I began with this square of stone above. I began to push the top off of the vertical a couple of inches in each course until it began to lean. I liked what was happening with the other attempts at leaning forms and gapped forms.

Unfortunately every day that I worked was either rainy, sleety or otherwise slate-colored so that the photos look like they were taken without the benefit of sunlight or color. It has just been sucked out of the landscape. It's a convention of earth tones around here right now. In the background you can see the storage wall for the stone which will slowly become smaller as the project grows.

After the initial square was planted I began a second platform that was quadrilateral, but the south line of it was bowed a bit. This platform was spaced about 4 inches from the original square and it followed the lean of the original square.

I don't know for sure where this gap is going to go just yet. Whether it will recurve or bend back I can't say for sure. I suppose the final height of the platforms will determine that. I like the way the tree on the bluff behind the sculpture bends along with the gap in the picture below.

Since these photos were taken I have added a few more courses, laying in the seat stones. These are long stone planks that are relatively flat on the upper surface that make a pretty good surface for sitting. I am toying with the idea of having a sitting space incorporated in the form.

There has been some significant stones wash up in the last week or two, so I've benefited from donations from the lake both stone and stick wise and I hope to integrate a bit with this piece.

Here is a view or two of the second platform. The next time I go down I'll begin the third platform and by that time I'm hoping the final shape and scope of the thing will become more apparent. In the mean time, have a nice solstice.

Back to the Jungle

Along with the 100 Views and the Beachworks projects I occasionally revisit the Requiem for the Peten project. I've been sending out proposals to galleries around the area trying to drum up some interest in exhibiting this installation. It has been depleted by sales over time, but I have steadily filled the gaps so that it still stretches over 50 feet and includes about 45 paintings and 6 drawings. The show at Glassgrowers Gallery in Erie worked out very nicely. About 25 pieces made up the mural, but that was last year's news. I am hoping that I might be able to find a space for 2009 or early 2010 (if I'm not making my second Space Odyssey at that time). Things don't look good for that at present, but serendipity can not be discounted.

The piece above was finished two years ago and has become one of the main segments of the mural. It is joined to the panel below with a small, narrow painting between them. Altogether it is about 6 feet tall and 3.5 feet wide. It depicts Temple IV of Tikal from a high point on the west end of the Great Plaza. This is a monstrous structure that has gained some fame in popular culture as the rebel base in Star Wars. The butterfly images were derived from sketches and photos taken from walks down the old runway away from the ruins out into the scrub forest. At certain times of the year, that space is so densely populated with butterflies its like the souls of all of ancient Tikal are on parade. And a beautifully dressed parade it always is. I have walked that trail for a couple of miles without finding a terminus, but it is always good for a surprise or two.

The lower panel is a painting derived from a number of different burials found during the excavations at the Plaza de los Siete Templos. To contrast with the greens of the jungle I began to play with sienas and ochres and getting these warm earthtones bordering in some places on warm-blood reds. The stone bone textures counter the plant patterns from th upper panel in an interesting way. This is one of the nicest paintings in the installation.
The above piece is a tangle of aerial roots or tendrils that occasionally fall out of the trees or perhaps are tossed out by the monkeys. I'm guessing they grow at the ends of branches and are knocked off more easily. You can see them from the ground up in the branches, but I never looked closely enough to figure out what they were doing up there. This panel is inset on a larger painting of a ceiba trunk and root system with bones. I love the complexity and the Jackson Pollock frenetic energy.

This is a small panel of a tree trunk with some impressive thorns. The tree grows along the walkway between the aguadas and the ticket booth at the entrance to the ruins. Every time I go down there I'm amazed at the variety of surfaces on the trees boles. Even though I've seen them time and again, it is still an impressive array of textures. Sometimes, I wonder if I will ever go back. So many things pull in so many different directions, but it was a long strange ride regardless.

Dancing Stick Sketches

Well, it has been a while. Much energy has gone into building the studio. I finally have the roof on and tarpapered, so that has cut down on beach time. But calm, windless days with no rain sucked me down a couple of times over Thanksgiving weekend. I have begun a new stone project but it is still in the nebulous stage. I am waiting for the stone to tell me what it wants to do. But I took a break from it and worked with some sticks. There are a lot of sticks on the beach right now. Because there is nobody to burn them and swill beer, I have quite a stock. So I gathered a bunch of them up. The sand has not frozen yet and a new layer was layed down with the last storm. I was able to poke the sticks into the sand a couple of inches deep. Normally that would not be possible as there are so many stones in the matrix. But today the layer was fairly stone free.

So I just lined them up in a kind of random fashion. If one wouldn't poke in I just left a gap. There was no attempt at controlling for height or length. I just pushed them in. All of that other stuff can wait for future sketches. For a first sketch, I liked the results.

The line worked well with the setting, working off of the shore line and the horizon. I think the tension had a lyrical quality to it. When you walked around it, it was doing different things with the tree line and the peninsula. It was only 101 sticks, but it seemed that they had a lot to say.

I even liked the way they looked when set against the stone wall and the remains of the friendly jetty. I can see this having some interesting future manifestations. I hope things stay temperate for a couple more weekends so that I can try some things out.

The 100 Views project is still rolling along. I have almost finished the 25 fall views. The last one is on the board right now. It is an image of frozen puddles with sheets of leaves encased in them. I don't know how this one will turn out, but so far I have liked most of them. Next imae I will probably be far enough along to post some new images of the stone work. By then hopefully everything we'll feel proper and the stone will be ready to go. Until then...