New Work
MOON RISE OVER HIGH TIDE
Living close to the ocean and watching it change the landscape over the seasons of the year, I’ve begun to keep a photo diary. The sea birds and ocean animals change with the seasons, the tides scour out the beach sand revealing sculptures in stone to explore, and even the movement of the sunset and moon rise brings focus to a changing landscape.
Careful observation inspired this piece. I wanted to capture the powerful movement of high waves with a shining moon, and somehow to remember the sound of the water pushing the stones and shells across the shore. Pick up this piece and gently shake it to hear the movement.
SUNSET OVER FOUR CORNERS
Recently I was fortunate to visit indigenous Hopi tribal lands in northern Arizona and spend a day in the home of a tribal elder. From the car window, I photographed as we drove across the vast desert trying to capture the magical views. As sunset neared, the surrounding mesas seemed to rise up in silhouettes containing the land, the people, and their mysteries of survival, knowledge, and beauty over the many years of their life on this land. I wanted to remember and contain a little of that wisdom in this woven basket.
MONARCHS IN FLIGHT
A coastal eucalyptus tree grove just north of Santa Barbara has for years been the winter home to hundreds of monarch butterflies. The neighborhood around the grove has worked hard to protect the monarch habitat, and to provide environmental education for the community. Visiting the monarch grove in the heart of winter is truly awe inspiring. I wove this coiled basket to celebrate the amazing flight of the monarch butterflies.
Evolution
Ochre Sea Star Comeback
During the years that I was visiting the Central California coast, before actually making a move here, I loved seeing the many bright orange and purple sea stars in tide pools and attached to the pillars of the pier. In recent years, I worried that they seemed to have disappeared. I learned that Sea Star wasting disease had wiped out more than 80% of the population and had affected star species up and down the coast. Ochre stars took the brunt of the damage. Though study is still in progress, scientists are looking at a possible virus caused by some sort of environmental stress like warmer water and acidification.
On beach walks during the last year, I would watch anxiously for stars and, on days when I would spot one clinging to the bottom of a rock outcropping at low tide, I began to photograph and document my findings in a journal. I learned that the Ochre Star is apparently making an unexpected comeback. The few remaining animals with plague-resistant genetics went into reproductive mode as an evolutionary response. Those bright orange stars that I’m seeing are living examples of natural selection in process!
I went to work and figured out how to use my twining technique to create a five-pointed Sea Star sculptural form. I placed them on the pedestal that they deserve, each unique and evolving.
Forest, Flames, Flood
If you’ve watched the news in the last couple of years, you know my inspiration for this pictorial piece.
I completed a move to Santa Barbara in October of 2017 and in early December we saw our first big fire (the Thomas Fire) only a few miles away from our home. We weren’t evacuated from our home, but as we watched the bright orange flames on the hillsides, we wore masks on our faces to protect against thick ash and smoke.
Hillsides were scorched black, homes and lives destroyed. High winds had spread the fires quickly and made them impossible to control. It was a frightening and humbling reminder of the possible future extremes of global warming.
More than a month into the fire in early January, winter rains began. At first we were glad for relief from the fire, but then awoke in the middle of the night to a more violent rainstorm than we had ever experienced. The ensuing flood rushed downhill on its way to the ocean, and made a swath through our nearby community that took out homes, cars, giant boulders, everything in its way. Over 20 people were killed by sudden flooding and debris flows. The community was devastated.
The creation of the piece, “Forest, Flames, Flood” allowed me to process what we had been through. It took hours to complete, hours of meditative, repetitive therapy. A couple of years later, I went back to the theme of forests and created another pictorial piece filled with trees and titled it, “Overstory.”
INSPIRED BY RAY STRONG
It wasn’t long after moving to Southern California that I learned about the painting of Ray Strong (1905-2006), and fell in love with his work. He painted murals for the WPA and dioramas at the Santa Barbara Natural History Museum and incredibly beautiful paintings of the rolling golden hills of California. I decided to try my hand at “mixing colors” with my waxed linen on the golden hills of a lidded basket that I created. Here is my “Ode to Ray Strong.”
TURBAN SHELLS
Wavy Turban Snail Shells are always a cherished “find” on a beach walk. Sometimes I am surprised to discover an occupant still living inside and send it back out to sea. I am forever amazed by nature’s spiral design and the shell’s pearl beauty. I was challenged when I tried to copy the Turban Shell design. It’s much more complex than it looks. “One of These Things is Not Like the Other”
