Interview with Artist Alexandra Eldridge

1. What is you personal/aesthetic relationship to the line? That is, how do you understand it, use it, etc.

Immediately what is called to mind, is Wm. Blake’s insistence on “the bounding line and it’s infinite inflexions and movements”. I see the line as a means to give merciful boundaries to the Imaginative forms that I am bringing forth. The line in my work, activates the image.

2. Do you find a relationship between art and the human body? Or between your art and your body?

Again, Mr. Blake…”Man has no body distinct from his Soul”. It is in the realm of the Soul from which my paintings emerge. I did a whole show in Serbia based on the interaction of Body and Soul. Enormous transparent hands were printed on old maps and emerged from oceans and birds sat on the fingertips conversing with one another. Feet graced old chinese scrolls, hinting at pilgrimage and earth connection. And of course, wings were not excluded.

3. Is there anything you dislike about being an artist?

I am so grateful that I have the life of an artist, that I hesitate to complain. Perhaps the isolation, when you are an extroverted-introvert, can at times feel unnatural. I have come to terms with this necessity and the utter devotion and deep relationship with silence.

www.alexandraeldridge.com

“Four Investigations” by Michael Bisbee

“Four Investigations” by Michael Bisbee
Opening reception: September 14, 5:30 – 8 pm

THE LAND/gallery
419 Granite Ave. NW, Albuquerque, NM 87102

September 14 thru October 6
Gallery hours: Thursdays and Saturdays 11:00 am to 5:00 pm and by appointment

An exhibit of photographs, text, and 3 dimensional art objects. What happens when an artist is confronted with 40 acres of New Mexico landscape set aside exclusively for making and thinking about art? Using art objects created in the studio as intellectual probes, Magdalena, NM artist Michael Bisbee has done 4 projects to investigate this question of land usage as art.

Haiga–image and haiku–by Julia Deisler

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I’ve been intrigued by how the internet and electronic creation has created a kind of renaissance in haiga. Originally a Japanese form combining haiku and painting, it has now become quite innovative. Enjoy this example by Julia Deisler!

2:30 a.m.
the stars do not shine
through walls

Goopy, but it wanted to get written: Devon Miller-Duggan Muses on Friendship

Goopy, but it wanted to get written:

I recently spent a week at The Glen Workshops—a nice conference on religion and the arts that’s full of some of the nicest people I’ve ever been in a group with. I’d made an unusually large (for me) bunch of friends when I went 3 years ago and I was a little nervous about meandering back in and being welcomed after a couple of years of not going. Wasted worry. People were gloriously, heart-healingly welcoming. And I made new friends. Like I said, the place is unsually dense with folks who are smart, art-driven, and truly nice, so it’s very, very fertile ground. I didn’t stay on the campus of St. John’s College in
Santa Fe where the Workshops take place, though. I stayed down the mountain in the city with one of my oldest and most deeply beloved friends. 40 years we have now.

I don’t think of myself as someone who makes friends easily—a holdover from a slightly isolated only childhood (we moved a lot and I was a little weird and a lot shy). I do a pretty good job these days of acting like I’m an extrovert when I’m in groups—mostly because I’d rather make that high-energy effort than go
back to watching from the side and feeling weird and socially dysfunctional.

Anyway, I started thinking about friendship. I’ve had an interesting year, friendship-wise, a weirdly good year, partially because I’ve maybe been more focused on it than usual, for a variety of reasons (one friend out of work and
stressed, another grieving the loss of a child, others who’ve wandered back into my life because of Facebook, the happy surprise of the Glen, and my I’m-always-smarter-when-I’m-talking-to-her Santa Fe friend whose wisdom I particularly needed this year and who runs this nice blog and lets me write
these meandering think-bits). It’s probably good to periodically run through your friendships and make sure you’re paying proper/nurturing/conscious attention to them. Because I, at least, can be careless, and have been.

Smarter and more profound folk than I have written reams on the subject of the value (salvific, succor-giving, steadying) of friendships of various sorts and degrees. I can’t add anything to those reams and don’t mean to try.

Maybe I’m just writing this to let the Universe know that I know how fortunate, how blessed, and how flat-out wealthy in friends I am, and that I’m deeply grateful, even if writing this makes me feel a little bit like an Oprah episode…

Twin 6′ Hearts
Jim Dine 
Born in Cincinnati in 1935

Vertical Gardens by Yves Lucero

I know Yves Lucero primarily as a poet, but check out his easy to maintain vertical garden! So cool–wish I had one.

Haibun From The Hood

I have this lovely yarn, rainbow dyed but subtle, and I love knitting it. But I took the second skein to wind into a ball and within seconds it was a dreadful tangle. Took me hours to unravel the mess and wind it up.I kept wondering if it reflected my state of mind until I realized I was really enjoying myself.

bright tangled yarn–
gently freeing each strand
my thoughts wind a ball

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The mania for comparison is certainly a byproduct of my years practicing poetry. But these things seemed to put themselves together–unaided by me:

vase of cattails
from the Farmer’s Market–
my old cat’s black tail

Flash Fiction by Ken McPherson

Ken McPherson

’s work has appeared in “The Santa Fe Literary Review” and he studies creative writing at SFCC. This is his second published story:

The day already had too tight of a grip, distributing preemptive stress throughout Karen’s body. What was her 9 o’clock appointment about? Why was she meeting at 1 o’clock with Francis? Karen’s memory told only half truths this morning, withholding the remainder for inappropriate surprises.
She did remember that her last appointment, at six o’clock was in her own office, doors locked, with her self. The police would say she “was so stressed she took her own life,” a judgmental description of her wielding the only power she had over her body.

To read the rest–http://orionheadless.com/

Art of Mickalene Thomas

Recently discovered the work of Mickalene Thomas, interesting combo of painting and textile.

A Big Wave Is Coming…or maybe not by Miriam Sagan

A Big Wave Is Coming…

I grew up on the east coast, at the beach, and the ocean engendered awe. One moment you could be splashing in foam, the next dragged away in a rip tide or stung by a jellyfish. Or so my mother’s vigilant face told me. In any case, big–really big–waves have always been a focus of my apocalyptic fantasies.
Enter THE WAVE by Susan Casey (Anchor Books, 2011) a mesmerizing account of those who surf these waves, and of rogues that swallow entire container ships. Imagery to keep me awake at night a thousand miles inland.
But listen to this, from demi-god surfer Laird Hamilton: “There’s a school of thought that says you don’t train for what you don’t want to have happen. I don’t want to consciously know how long I can hold my breath. I just know that so far–long enough.”
What?! This is not the philosophy of the Russian Jews who raised me. A tacit understanding in my immigrant family was that the worried survive. Those who ignored Stalin or figured Hitler wouldn’t get that far…well, let’s just say their descendants aren’t at our cousin’s re-union.
My whole life I’ve been waiting for a big wave. Interestingly, the worst things that have happened to me were things I couldn’t predict–and I managed to survive. Maybe the opposite of that worried preparation is faith in one’s ability to act in the moment.
I was recently on one of my rants, “If, God forbid, something terrible happens, at least I have my–health insurance, working vehicle, husband, (insert your safety net here.) My friend who was listening said firmly, “Mir, just stop it.” I was taken aback. This very trustworthy friend wasn’t a New Ager who thought you bring trouble by your thoughts. Nor was she unsympathetic. I think she was just getting sick of watching me torture myself.
So maybe no big wave is coming…or it can be surfed.

A Chance to Study Flash Fiction with Meg Tuite

Fast FLash FiCtion

Hone your writing skills for publication. Learn to whittle a fiction story down to its essential core through in-class writing, revision, small group critiques and reading contemporary flash fiction writers. The goal is to write one strong fiction piece from start to finish, edit, revise and send out for publication.

Meg Tuite has been published in more than 200 journals. She is the fiction editor of The Santa Fe Literary Review and a bi-monthly online magazine, Connotation Press. She has published a novel-in-stories, two chapbooks and co-authored and edited an anthology. Check out her books at http://www.megtuite.com and follow her blog at megtuite.wordpress.com.
No class on Oct. 31st.
Wednesday, 6 to 8 p.m. starting Oct. 3rd for 6 sessions.
Course #Co319 01/Crn 21497 Margaret Tuite, Fee $79

PS. Out of 11 students we had 7 publications by students in the first class.