Rough Words, Cold Wax
#105: Tree speech, cold wax, libraries, Baumgartner Restoration, Pádraig Ó Tuama, Lestaret, Willow Defebaugh, colonial herbariums, Melissa Smedley, Daniel B. Summerhill, Gary Lucas, and "In Vitro."
HERE & NOW
Here are a few rough “words” from several “Monkey Puzzle” (Araucaria araucana) trees in my neighborhood:
Speaking of words, here are a few more: local libraries and how idiosyncratic they can be. Two examples:
On the hill above Fisherman’s Wharf, the private Mayo Hayes O’Donnell Library in Monterey (just a few blocks from my house) is in the lovely old St. James Episcopal Church building. Although private, there are a lot of interesting books and documents available for your research pleasure (some of which can be purchased), and it’s a nice quiet spot to browse through Monterey and California history books.
Just a little plug for the Boulder Creek Library, where my son works. When I was a teen living in Santa Cruz, the village of Boulder Creek—up in the redwood forests of the Santa Cruz mountains—had a reputation as a wild and woolly frontier/party town, a place to purchase then-illegal cannabis (and other mind altering substances). The Boulder Creek Library is an important hub in BC. Ironically, the library is in the former location of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (later the Santa Cruz Lumber Company office). An article in the Santa Cruz Mountain Bulletin quotes the 1894 Reading Room dedication:
Here a village surrounded by extensive lumber interests, a railroad terminus with scores of young men on the streets with little but evil before them; boys on the road to death — a woman’s heart is touched. “What ought to be done, can be done,” said the WCTU, and with women’s faith, it was resolved to build a Free Reading Room and Public Library.
ART
For the last year or so I’ve been working mostly in ink on paper. Recently I returned to a medium I have enjoyed working with: colored pencil on cold wax medium. Many artists working in CWM apply the medium thickly for an impasto effect. I’m different in that I only use a very thin layer on smooth (but heavy) paper.
I’ve also tried it out in an accordion-fold book form and would like to experiment more with that. However, because of its oily and waxy qualities (which might deposit pigment from one page onto another) this might not be the ideal format for it. I suppose I could make print copies of them and bind them.
Here’s an older, larger untitled piece from the “Piecework” series (18 x 18 in) in colored pencil and graphite on CWM that I did in 2020:
LINKS
Julian Baumgartner restores a damaged abstract painting by Leroy Turner. In order to do that, he has to make some paper:
Thanks to Melissa Smedley for leading me to Padraig O’ Tuama’s site and “On mysticism, poetry, time, and time’s demands.”
For your asemic pleasure: Byopia Press pointed me to Lestaret’s blog and “An Asemic Outing.”
Writer/editor Willow Defebaugh on transness as “nature incarnate” (from Advaya):
Colonial herbariums. Why is the New York herbarium called one of the great glories of that city? What is the significance of an herbarium? What does this have to do with art?
SOUNDINGS
“Happy Looks Good on You,” Monterey County Poet Laureate Daniel B. Summerhill recites group poems created on the spot at readings in the Hem cafe. Podcast by the Art Ranger (Melissa Smedley).
Listen, You Who Dare Improve the Shining Hour, haunting music by NYC guitarist and composer Gary Lucas.
In Vitro, a short film set in Bethlehem, by Larissa Sansour & Søren Lind. This film brings up a lot of strange feelings and thoughts about inherited “history,” collective trauma, nostalgia, memory, and time. Staring Hiam Abbass and Maisa Abd Elhadi. I watched it last night on Netflix streaming. Here is the trailer:
Thanks for reading Eulipion Outpost!
Some of my other spots on the internet and Fediverse:
My Ko-Fi page (donations appreciated)
@jeanevergreen at montereybay.social
@jeantangerine on Mastodon.art and PixelFed (alternative to Instagram)