Celebrating gardens, photography and a creative life
I’ve never liked the term ‘Outsider Art’, so why am I using it? Good question. It gives me a chance to take a pop at it a sentence or two later! Art, of all things, should be inclusive. Outsider Art seems to imply exclusion or at least condescension (“they’ve had no training, you know”), as if there is an overarching Art Club, but you have to be a paid-up member to lunch there. Continue reading “Outsider Art: Watts Towers by Sabato Rodia at Dusk”
I’ve often seen Thursday Doors posts in my Reader, but this is my first submission: the floral doorway of a woman’s clothes shop. You wouldn’t expect me to walk past this without taking a picture, would you? Continue reading “Thursday Doors: Saint Claude Social Club, New Orleans”
The weekly challenge asks us to share something tiny. If you’re viewing this on a phone, you won’t make out the messages on this keepsake box – blessings, exhortations and affirmations – so I’m writing them out for you:
Peace · Joy · Lucky · Contentment · Devotion · Prosperity · Happy · Laugh · Tranquility · Fun
Picked out in beads on a keepsake box at the Attic Gallery, Vicksburg, MS
Every city should have an Attic Gallery – it’s our communal loss that so many of them don’t. You can travel for miles before you’ll find anything that truly compares. This long established, family owned gallery specialises in southern contemporary art and fine crafts. Their reputation and instinct for seeking out regional talent has helped them gather a definitive collection of work. Continue reading “Keepsake Box with Bead Blessings”
There was a time when I often heard transmogrify – my school friends and I thought it was funny.
I still can’t take the word 100% seriously, so I wanted to share something that made me smile – these wooden spoons that have been transmogrified into pirates.
Aaaaar!
These two souls are my contribution to this week’s photo challenge. What could be more local than a relationship?
The artist, Simon Jago, is also a professional set designer with a mastery of the most essential tool in a sculptor’s toolbox – space. The sculpture seems to tell a slightly different story from every angle. It would have been interesting to walk all around it, but the setting didn’t invite that. Luckily the artist is showing the opposite view on his website.
The wall that divides these two figures is slender but sturdy – part physical, part metaphorical. He has placed a steadying foot on the blue floor/plinth that is structurally linked to hers. Their body language mirrors each other: the barrier of his left side reflects the barrier of her right; each downcast head obliquely angled in counterpoise to the other.
It’s funny how tempting it is to judge, even faced with a sculpture. There’s a lesson in that. Who is to blame? What should they do? Is there even a problem? As the artist asks, why do they look so alone? Continue reading “Back to Back Sculpture by Simon Jago”
Susan Rushton 