Feeder with Icicles, 2020, Archival Digital Print
I repeat myself: Drawing is the basis of it all.
The first impulse of the mind, it is where it begins. That very first spark of an idea. Not only does it show what one sees but it orders the experience. This photograph taken this morning, doesn’t exist without my experience as an artist who draws. I frame the image in the camera; it is rarely changed in the processing. That is drawing. The division of space within the bounds of the edge.
Thinking of Southern Sung Painting, Archival Digital Print, 2018
Our first big snow and the roads were bedeviling last night. I left town on an earlier train trying to get home before the worst of it hit. But Amtrak is not reliable and we were stopped for forty minutes in the Bronx because of a stalled Metro North train ahead of us. This is customary now. Infrastructure deteriorates by the day and our politicians dawdle.
Once in Hudson and heading home, the white sheets of snow, the winds, and the lack of any guide other than the midline studded strip, made for impressive conditions. I missed the turn-off from 9H but was able to back up on the highway since no one was on the roads. Turning off onto my country road it was worse, but the sight of a huge plow blinking red and white like a happy Christmas tree up ahead was a beacon and it guided me safely home. After feeding everyone I fell into a deep and grateful sleep.
All worth it to be able to live in this paradise.
Two Horses just out of the Barn, 2018, Archival Digital Print
Billy and I drove up to North Chatham to pick up tick and flea meds for the puppies. Coming back to the car, it was just the moment when two striking Thoroughbreds were let out of the barn. To watch these two, their pleasure at being free, actually kicking up their heels and stretching their long muscles, their playfulness with each other, was to step into another world. We are all eager for spring. I’m predicting that it will come early. I need to believe this.
A Hungry Hawk, 2018, Archival Digital Print
Just a snapshot from my phone yesterday, a hungry young Cooper’s Hawk has been hanging around hoping to get a warm meal. Earlier he was sitting atop one of the feeders he was so desperate to eat. The birds disappear as soon as they catch sight and the place is empty until he leaves.
It must be very hard on a young bird trying to learn to survive in such threatening cold. Last night I watched again the PBS documentary on The Donner Party. It is tonic to anyone who feels sorry for himself or indulges in self-pity, a reminder of what being cold, far from home and lost can mean. A young woman who survived wrote to her friend about the experience. She ends with this advice, “Don’t take no shortcuts and hurry along the way.” This young Hawk will have to learn that.
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