felices

escenas de la vida
some scenes from inside my life...from my inside life...from my life, inside...Happy Holidays!

the ice man

Whoa.
he has a way of slowing life waaaay down. way.

la vuelta

the return
the decline and fall from ripeness of autumn.

Trees trapped by lamposts cast lines of gleaming orange paillettes over walkways.
I take the bait every time. Hungry for image, folding myself into strange public positions, I am determined to capture a perfect angle.

The ducks and geese are back on the pond. The beaver who has appeared for three seasons and is rumored to have been transported and dumped in the city-locked waters still builds and rebuilds his lodge as if for family. At dusk he skims the waters like a fat little submarine.

In silence the dark-haired boy looks up while his teacher explains this is his last art class. Wordlessly I stare into infinite pools of deepest brown while he scans my face, ever-vigilant for the slightest shift. I hear the teacher say that she and her staff just found out themselves- in two days he goes back to Oaxaca.

The boy is deaf; lip-reads Spanish. Like many Hispanic deaf children, he leaves us wondering: how much can truly be heard; which language is most comprehensible; which abstract system of word is uttered or pictured inside to make sense of the outside world.
Perhaps none... perhaps neither is needed on the inside when you have a direct line to truth of experience.

Some of the children are mute. They do not speak, but do hear.
Once upon a time a little girl and I communicated over the course of years by my talking and her eye expressions and acting. Once in a while she would whisper, barely audibly, a few phrases in the language of her family. But this was quite rare and was quickly carried away like the breeze.
One day she left as well, pulled out as if by root. The hope is that she is a sturdy bulb who will bloom again in Spring.

In my mind's eye I see the boy crossing the main plaza in Oaxaca, el zócalo, with his mamá. Scene of human gatherings and drama for over 500 years, it is said to be one of the most beautiful public spaces anywhere and ever. His father will stay here, en el norte, to work and send money back home. Mamá has become homesick for family; the story, cliché by its repetitive warp and weft through so many lives.

I try to imagine him in school in Oaxaca. Could there possibly be an equivalent level of special services for children there to that which he has received here?
He is in first grade. For two years he has come to art class, the first in a group of six children in preparation for the transition into a full first grade class of children who hear. He has done so well.

Googling yields a report from the past spring describing the occupation of the school for special needs children during a protest that echoed back to the Oaxaca of 2006, when extreme unrest and violence held the city hostage for months. This latest event must have terrified the children.

And he is dark, not fair. Another strike against him there. Or three.

Music blares, ground fireworks suddenly shoot off three feet away. I feel the spirit of the plaza raise me up while marchers performing Posadas and carrying Guadalupes on litters made of heavy posts sway past the crowd. Around and around the stone square worn smooth by thousands of footsteps a day, they circle. This is Christmas Eve spent with strangers and it occurs to me I've never felt more at home.



The first woman I chatted with brings her friends over and introduces me. The women are either old or old before their time. They explain how far they've come from their villages, some very far, just to be here for this night. They wear their best black dresses.
They ask me about my life, well, about part of it, the most important: "Where is your man? Where is your husband?" Incredulous that I am here alone, they ask how I got here.
"By plane."
"But how did you afford the ticket?"
"I work- I teach, I bought it."
"Is it one-way?"
"No, señoras, de ida y vuelta.....going and returning, round-trip."
The circle of women around me gasp as they repeat to each other, "de ida y vuelta, ¡dos boletos!"
"Yes, two tickets, both ways."

As if rehearsed, the women start to pray for me, actually they pray for a husband to be sent. I take this as my cue to take leave- I have become conscious of other people starting to watch the healing the women are attempting to impose, and it all has become too much. I say goodbye, they bestow serial blessings as a send-off. Walking away, grateful to sink again into the anonymity of the crowd, I can still hear them praying.

new work

Wishing you the happiest of holidays!

If you love gifting art as much as i do, see the NEW 5" x 7" digital repros now available at my etsy shop, ateliermaryk.
Here is a sneak peek, with more to be offered at my shop daily:

Oooops, and almost forgot: Etsy Madness is happening, with sellers slashing prices and offering discounts all over the place, so to join in the merriment, I am offering:
* * * CYBERSPACE SPECIAL * * * Now through Tuesday, December 2, take 15% off everything in my shop, PLUS free shipping and handling.

green eye mandala


the view was her own

kewl, dude

Witness! a signboard spotted recently in a nearby elementary school...


the following week, a new message appeared:



BTW,
being smart is in.

speaking of smarties, Krazy Kat has had a loyal and devoted fan following of famously smart, geeky, kule dudes and dudettes:

Pablo Picasso, Charlie Chaplin, Gertrude Stein, Walt Disney, F. Scott Fitzgerald, James Joyce, Ernest Hemingway, Kristen Hersh (of the band "Throwing Music", whose song "The Key" was inspired by the strip), H. L. Mencken, Umberto Eco, Frank Capra, Jack Kerouac, e.e. cummings, Charles Schulz, Richard Diebenkorn, and Wayne Thibaud.

{this was but a partial list, courtesy krazy.com by Peter Campbell.}

so fear not, if you have ever felt the need to quell the escape of multi-syllabic or intentionally mutated words from your lips; if you routinely listen more than you speak; and if you demonstrate maniacally obsessive behavior toward reaching the stars or throwing bricks with precision like our boy Ignatz,

REJOICE! BC UR KEWL.

etsy Treasury and Showcase

Hurry, this Treasury by darling OhFaro will expire promptly at 8:58 p.m., Thursday, November 20th.

It is so great to be pictured with other Etsians from all over the place! Make sure you click on the Maya Angelou soundtrack as your browse the Treasury. Thanks, OhFaro.

And also on November 20th, my text ties will be featured in the etsy Accessories Showcase. Here's a little preview, enjoy!

new url

Coconino County argot: "Eureka! New url is borned in the oith, li'l ainjil, we'll be rich, rich, richie rich from this black fountain of yute."

Translation back to anglais: ¡Atención! "love letters to ignatz" debuts here at its new address:
http://loveletterstoignatz.blogspot.com
Fresh and slightly tweaked look; continuation of the blog "love letters to the universe" and its customary perspective.

Back to Coconino County:
For those of you unfamiliar with Ignatz, the Kat and the Pupp, the following tutorial is proffered (Keep in mind, tomes have been written in profundity analyzing the characters, antics and landscapes described in cursory form herewith.)



Krazy Kat is the legendary comic strip/ brainchild of George Herriman, who gave public birth to Krazy in 1913. The strip ran in U.S. newspapers between 1913-1944.

The action in the strip focuses around three main characters mired in a "love" triangle amidst the shifting landscape of Coconino County.
The characters are: a cat, Krazy; the cat's antagonist, Ignatz Mouse; and the protective police dog, Officer Pupp. Krazy nurses an unrequited love for the mouse, while Ignatz despises Krazy and constantly schemes to throw a brick at Krazy's head, which Krazy takes as a sign of affection. Officer Pupp, as Coconino County's administrator of law and order, makes it his mission to toss Ignatz in the county jail for his brick-tossing schemes.
(This excerpt was distilled from Wikipedia's detailed and informative entry on Krazy Kat.)

Dialogue takes the form of alliterative and stylized argot, a mixture of French, English, Spanish, Yiddish and Herriman's New Orleans dialect, Yat.
To my great chagrin while pondering the direction of today's post, the sudden reality that the language unintelligible to the rest of the family and still spoken between my sister and me derives largely from early exposure to the Kat.

How did I not connect these dots before, after a lifetime of Krazy exposure and existence? BOINK! It hit me like a brick in the noggin.
Thank you, li'l dahlink readers, for the opportunity for this most egregious epiphany.

a year in the life

the reds are at it again
another fall blooms




summer
a dim memory
already

the time
of decline
upon us
the holy of holies
so we can't forget:
Días de Muertos

or is it the 'Ween...
watch the little movie below and decide.

Véase también mis otras entradas sobre esta celebración tan bonita.

See also my other entries about this celebration.

51

hard to fathom: one Fall day i'm touring kindergarten classes with my band, The Ladybugs; said to be the first karaoke-all-girl-band-on-the-planet (the year: 1964, the Brits have landed).
the next, i'm discovering remarkable similarities between Kurt Cobain's and my birthcharts.
(so what's forty-five-ish years between these two events: a mere micro-drip in the scheming of the cosmos)
nothing can make me happier, except another tour.



proof: you can take the girl out of the rocker, but never the rocker out of the....

so thanks, Paul, for playing at my place Nov 1,

and thank you,
madcap lads from liverpool and all you rockers before and since, for the continued celebration and inspiration.

la bea

Well I had intended to write about the horrific weather and wind storm we are currently experiencing in the Great Northeast.
Bear-boy Cat is running around in the pitch dark of the storm at this very moment and i am worried semi-sick about him. He bounded outside just as i cracked the door to let my la Bea inside. He is ever vigilant of any chance to escape paradise to be in the ravages of any storm- the colder, the crazier, the more intense, the better.

Instead, i distract myself with a much sunnier clime: Brazil.
Page 22 of this past Sunday's NYTimes caught my eye with its surging circles of vibrant painter-color, and so i was introduced to the painter Beatriz Milhazes.
Her work is hot, hot, hot.
I just adore it, here is a little feast of it, with links:





Now pretend you are strolling through the gallery, up-close and personal with the art and the show is narrated in Portuguese, it doesn't get much better than this- pure heaven!




Hungry for more work and a biography of Beatriz? Check out this blog entry at Colourlovers.com

Stay warm.

I swear it's true,

this tale about the glue.

kid in art room
and my true-life responses,
as recorded in my sketchbook:

"Where's the glue?"

"Look."

"Where's the glue?"

"Look."

"Where's the glue?"

"Look with your eyes, LOOK!"

"Where's the glue?"

"LOOK!!!" I say in sign-language,
despite the fact
the child is hearing.
My circuits are fried.

"Where is it?"

"Look!!"

"Oh."

saving grace

why we return

Two full weeks of school, down.
From the front lines, herewith an attempt to explain the reason we return
like penguins, salmon, monarchs, lemmings; mindlessly ritualistic and
apparently without the will
to do otherwise.
It's gotta be instinct.

7:46 a.m.
Darn it, running a smidge away from late; what's new.
One of the closest livers to school,
it is the same way every day
despite the best geography.

Lugging three Mexican
market bags, a priceless vintage bag,
a backpack, sweaty-cold
water bottles and assorted lunch ingredients threatening
to break out from too-thin plastic bags,
shuffling past mini-vans
spilling children to the sidewalk,
forever schlepping,
trusty pack mule
navigating the slippery slopes
of education another day.

The day ahead bodes not
much differently:
hauling drippy brushes, glue bowls,
greasy pastels, (ultra-soft
for small hands)
reams of paper,
folders, boxes, baskets, Tupperware
and a universe of semi- and fully-
finished art projects.

Someday i vow to look like the
über-woman in the Coach-
make that Vuitton, ad.
A sleek bag will balance
ever so effortlessly
from the forearm.
That One Bag will hold it all
and not bear the logo
of Price-Chopper.

From a sliding car door emerges
G, a first grader who is,
to be trite,
larger than life.

Sprightly,
incredibly bright
and perceptive, she joins
me in my now accelerated pace,
a quickstep to avoid being
mowed down by the crowd descending
on the two open entrance doors.
Keeping pace and chatting gingerly,
as if we were bgf's who never hung
up,

"Good morning, Ms. Weeks."
"Good morning, G."

Her eyes move from my toes up
to my head, down, then up again,
repeating the surveillance several
times.

"Wow, you look like it's
Whacky Wednesday."

"That's right, G, just like
Whacky Wednesday."

"Gee, with you, Ms. Weeks,
it's like it's:
Whacky Monday, Whacky Tuesday, Whacky Wednesday,
Whacky Thursday, AND Whacky Friday!"

"That's right, G,
every day is whacky."

"Yeah, every day is
whacky."

G proceeds to heft open one of the closed
main doors, holding it open for me with all her
might while i have already scooted through
the open door beside it.

She continues to hold it wide open, as if i were
going to pass through.

"Why, thank you, G, how kind of you."

"You're welcome, Ms. Weeks."

She then swings open yet another door
in the next bank,
believing i will certainly pass through.
But i am already inside the building.

"Thank you, G, you are sooooo polite."

"You're welcome, Ms. Weeks."

"Have a wonderful day, G."

"You too, Ms. Weeks, bye!"

"Bye, G."

The power of belief.

She proceeds on her merry way to the first grade wing
while i turn into the office,
saying a silent prayer of thanks for G.

Cézanne by committee

or: the seemingly random intersecting influences in my life



Watch Three Colours Cézanne online, it's about an hour long; a beautiful documentary of how not to live by committee.
(Netflix also has it.)


Just before school started, we received a reminding email that a curriculum committee made up of colleagues had decided last year that we were not to reference "real" political candidates' names in discussions/instruction/teachable moments nor at any time with the elementary children in our classes during the upcoming election process.
Brilliant.

Instead, we were told to use "mascot" names, as in: dancing animals running for office instead of peeing on trees like in Real Life.
Interpreted this means: fake, fraudulent, deceitful, bogus, cartoony-looney abstractions of ultimate Truth and of Nature; yet again assuming, embracing and reinforcing those two age-old mantras of public education: "Kids are stupid." And: "Teachers are stupider; they'll follow this like lemmings: 'What me, think?'"
I repeat, this policy was developed by fellow educators.

And ultimately, smacks of Disney.
The gauntlet thrown, off we go to a gentler, (?!) more truthful time, to Coconino County.

Herewith, a humble sampling of ensuing campaign posters from the sketchbook:



















If you'll excuse me, me and Ignatz have to go throw some bricks.

new work

in the garden with gustav

the more things change...



a painter
in a garden
with a cat or two
or more
wearing a flowing
robe
every day.












Paradise.


Two books i use in the classroom:

Silver, Gold, and Precious Stones, "Adventures in Art" series


Klimt and His Cat, Berenice Capatti and Shannon White, with lush artwork by Octavia Monaco


Other gorgeous resources for mature audiences, i should probably note, are:
the beautiful Flash site, iklimt.com and in my library: Gustav Klimt, 22 Masterworks by Jane Kallir.



If you have never stood before a real Klimt before, you must.


Homage to Klimt
from the art room,
kid-visions of "cat parties."
Vielen Dank, Gustav.