Open Studio as a Practice

When you're in a yoga class, the teachers often refer to "your practice," a phrase that both personalizes one's practice and places the responsibility for it squarely on one's shoulders (or should I say palms and feet?) When  my teacher was directing a complicated pose the other day and used the phrase "if you have it in your practice," those words that simultaneously reassured and challenged me.

I'm taking them to heart and applying them to an event that's just up the road, my first Open Studio event in several years. I always get excited about the idea of an open studio, but as the date gets closer, the idea of opening my house to people feels like the proverbial dream where I look down and realize I've forgotten to put on my shirt. Exposed.

But here's the thing: I love being up in my studio and making my work, watching it fill up the walls. But there's another part to the process of making art that I struggle with: sharing it. Its a way of completing the circle, to bring what is internal out and allow the world to see it.

I do want to share it, but that feeling of exposure is uncomfortable. And that's where yoga comes in. Perhaps, I thought, I could see the whole thing simply as a continuation of my art practice,  something that is actually a natural extension of making the work.

In a practice, whether it's an art or yoga practice, the important thing is to show up. As I thought about this, I began to feel more confident and I got curious about this idea of practice. I read different yoga blogs to get a feel for what different teachers meant by practice. While they generally agreed on the physical benefits, I collected different tips about how to maintain a practice:

•Set an intention or goal and set aside time for that each day. • Stay positive -- know that it is possible. • Be patient with myself; honor my body. •Acknowledge my accomplishments, big or small. • Continue my practice. Combine these points with a heaping portion of non-judgement and compassion, and I've got a good recipe.

So far, so good. I've been staying tuned into Art Hannah. I think that the most exquisitely difficult and simultaneously most rewarding part of the practice is this: I can't make my art or my home or myself anything other than 'what it is' or 'what I am'--and that if I am completely myself and my art is too, there isn't any better place to be.

Ruth's Table

I recently met a new friend, Monica Lee, a San Francisco photographer and artist-in-residence at Ruth's table; a place and a space where people of all generations can meet and explore the arts. The organization was named after artist and sculptor, Ruth Asawa, and is situated in a senior housing facility in the Mission District.

Fascinated, I decided that visiting Ruth's Table would be a perfect artist/art therapist field trip. Securing a professional leave day, I planned an excursion with another artist, Linda Clark Johnson, Monica and her artist friend, Leslie Flores. Monica made a list of artistic destinations and we set off early on a Tuesday morning, all meeting up at the Ferry Building.

After our first compulsory stop at Dick Blick to pick up art supplies, we stopped off at the Andrea Schwartz Gallery to view the work of artist, Wynne Hayakawa, whose landscapes of trees, frozen in a moment of stop motion, provided a perfect first stop.

Wynne's worked intrigued me; the size of the works was large, probably 4' x 4' and they made an impression not unlike that of virtually driving through a forest, looking out the window and trying to secure the images as time and the car moved on.

We also dropped in at San Francisco Center for the Book, a bookbinding and letterpress studio that promotes traditional and experimental book art forms. Walking into the vast open studio space was like wandering around my undergraduate days in the letterpress studio at the University of Iowa. Since then, I thought the art of handset type had almost died out. I was happy to see the trays of type, the Vandercook presses and the exquisite display of books by the Hand Bookbinders of California.

I was also astounded by the landscape of San Francisco and how much it has changed since living there some 30 years ago. It was as if bulldozers had leveled street after street, replacing the old dwellings with newer, trendier but hopefully more earthquake safe townhouses.

However, I needn't have worried that the entire city was remodeled. Our next location was tucked away in an old warehouse district off of Army St. SCRAP, or Scroungers Center for Usable Art Parts was a feast for my recycling eyes. Sprawling in a San Francisco School District warehouse in the Bayview district of San Francisco, SCRAP is the country's oldest creative reuse center, and has been diverting waste from landfills for use as art supplies for over 35 years. According to the website, each year over 200 tons of redeployed junk avoid the fate of the land fill. I'm here to say, that you could create an infinite number of installations with the goods provided there.

After a delicious lunch of fresh fish tacos, served on heavy timbered tables at a Mission taqueria, we made our way to Ruth's Table.

As we entered, Monica explained that the idea for Ruth's Table was the idea of director, Lola Fraknoi. After meeting Lola, we were treated to a tour and entertainment by an older, blind gentleman who had simply walked in off the street and begun to play, quite beautifully, on their grand piano. It was a beguiling scene; the white grand piano (donated by Princess Cruises) set in a spacious gallery with an exquisite calligraphic exhibit and this maestro of the moment, bent over the keys and playing his heart out.

A grandmother and her granddaughter walked in and Monica introduced us to them as two of her students. Monica had recently learned about gelli printing and wanted Linda and I to do a quick demo. We happily obliged using dog fennel that I'd gathered at SCRAP and some plants that her students had picked on their way over.

A quick half an hour later, we were covered in paint and a handful of prints displayed our efforts. Monica dropped Linda and I off at Megabus, where tired and paint stained, we climbed aboard with our backpacks, stuffed with memories of the day.

Summer Fruit

The purple figs in the alley were ripe last week, dropping all over the street and and I wondered why I hadn't noticed them sooner.

Why, when something is almost right in front of our eyes, don't we take notice? There are all kinds of answers, but I've been thinking about this one: What if we're just suffering from "habitual landscape," stuck in a fixed framework, unaware of the bigger picture?

I've been pondering a similar situation in my life: Summer. After moving to Davis, CA some years ago, I began to long for a way out of summer. The sun is hot and and the air is dry--the temperature can sit on us over 100 for days on end. Like today: forecast:101 degrees.

For one reason and another, our family rarely leaves the valley during these extreme months. Frustrated, I imagined vacations in Maine or British Columbia.

I realized I have a perennial problem: without a surplus of money and bonus time, how do I find acceptance for where I am? Like the preschoolers on a recent NPR report, I decided to opt for flexible, fluid thinking. I was struck by Michelle Trudeau, the author of the report's words:

Children try a variety of novel ideas and unusual strategies to get the gadget to go. For example, UC Berkeley psychologist, Alison Gopnik says, "If the child sees that a square block and a round block independently turn the music on, then they'll take a square and take a circle and put them both on the machine together to make it go, even though they never actually saw the experimenters do that."

This is flexible, fluid thinking — children exploring an unlikely hypothesis. Exploratory learning comes naturally to young children, says Gopnik.  Adults, on the other hand, jump on the first, most obvious solution and doggedly stick to it, even if it's not working. That's inflexible, narrow thinking. "We think the moral of the study is that maybe children are better at solving problems when the solution is an unexpected one," says Gopnik. --Preschoolers Outsmart College Kids in Figuring out Gadgets

I decided to try and solve my problem by diving deeper into the very environment that frustrates me. Thus began my "Shift" series; a monoprint series using plants gathered within my immediate surroundings; first in my own back yard and then, broadening out to my neighborhood and beyond.

Initially, the process felt abstract and remote, but soon enough, I became an avid collector of the most common plant species in my neighborhood; what one gardener described as "top 40" plants. Top 40 or no, it didn't seem to matter. Their shapes made elegant tracings in the acrylic paint and their signatures on the paper made me want to stay in the studio and do more and more.

Soon, I had a collection of prints; postcards of my explorations, but I also noticed that my attitude had changed. I was no longer trapped in the heat of the Central Valley. Instead, I was released into my own ongoing exploration/vacation.

These days, I'm taking those prints and cutting them up, piecing together collage prints. It's still hot and I still spend only the early morning hours outdoors, but instead of Maine, the studio is now my refuge.

Of Figs and Gelli Plates*

I've been on a tear the last couple months, collecting all kinds of plant specimens that grow around my house, sorting them and then printing them using a gelli plate.

I'd taken some professional leave during that time which  allowed me to dig deep. I had a blast and a taste of what it might be like to dedicate myself to my art work full time.

And something happened--something to do with the gelli plate. For some time I've wanted to work larger, but couldn't find the vehicle. The gelli plate in all of its simplicity turned out to be just the ticket.

Its innocuous presence (so not intimidating), the squish of the brayer as it rolls out ink, the sucking sound as the paper is pulled away from the print, and the surprise of lines and curves and color; all are a sensual pleasure that I can wade in for hours.

The biggest discovery was learning how to curate the prints once they were completed, i.e., discovering a way to put them together. I like to lay them all out on the table and play with them, moving the contenders in and out of place until I feel that internal tug that says: "this is it."

Although I'll be working full time at the hospital this summer, I'm looking forward to the weekends, filled with buzzing insects, sleeping cats, and gelli prints of summer flora. Perhaps a frozen yogurt at the end of a studio day.

Oh, and did I mention, the ripening figs? Nothing like them when inspiration is needed!

*My apologies for sending out 2 versions; I accidentally hit the publishing button while editing:-)

What I'm Learning in my Fifties

I recently read an article in the New York Times entitled, "What You Learn in Your Forties." A humorous article, it included such tidbits as "There are no grown-ups. We suspect this when we are younger, but can confirm it only once we are the ones writing books and attending parent-teacher conferences. Everyone is winging it, some just do it more confidently."

That got me thinking it might fun to consider what I've learned in my fifties, because, as my office mate reminded me this morning, we'll both be turning 59 this year.

The term "synaptic pruning" springs to mind. This term refers to the brain's regulatory processes, in charge of pruning the neural structures in the brain, and thus reducing the number of neurons and synapses in order to create more efficient synaptic connections. This tends to occur in younger folks...

I've experienced a similar kind of pruning in my 50's. As we grow, we make choices and those choices close off certain possibilities--while others open up. It is true that I will never climb Mt Kilimanjaro or become a lawyer, however, in the areas in which I've chosen to focus, the possibilities appear to be growing.

I've been pondering a new series I've just started: "the ecology of place”–or, “my ecological niche”: a series using plants gathered within my immediate surroundings, to create monoprints exploring the relationship between me (the human) and my environment (my yard).

As I thought about pruning choices, I realized that it was no surprise that I’d chosen this theme. I’ve had an ambivalent relationship to staying in one place for a long time; the result of moving frequently as a child. Although I truly love my small Central Valley town, there is always a part of me that wonders "I wonder what it's like in…"

This little thought keeps me from living fully in the present, in Davis, CA on Olympic Dr., in my house, and probably in any number of places I frequent. What better way to settle in, than to make a series out of it?

I look forward to sharing this work with you as it unfolds, both in my backyard and beyond.