photographic series
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Thursday, May 26th, 2011
Tree fern shadows cast across garden rocks in Chapala, Mexico
“Your true colors are beautiful” - Cindy Lauper
I’ve been in Mexico for the past two weeks, so I’ll be contributing more images to the True Colors website, created in 2007 as tribute to the colorful landscapes and cultures here. Developed separately from the other chapters of nikkiartwork.com, True Colors is considered as one complete and independent project. I’ve posted a few more of the recent pieces in this series on nikkiphotography.com
A continuing saga
Friday, October 22nd, 2010
“This could be your last chance, Sweets. I’m moving on up to Oregon.”
The Studio Affair saga on previous blog posts: October 20th, 2009, October 28th, 2008 , October 30th, 2007
That’s right, me and all the skeletons in my closet are moving to Oregon, so the painting now is all about walls. I’ve bought a small 4 x 6 sketchbook, hoping to sneak in some time to do a few thumbnail drawings of my travels this year.
The past six months: starting with driving up to Madison, Wisconsin at the end of April to set up the Dancing With Trees Exhibition, after the show opening, it was back to Dallas then shortly afterward to Singapore for 3 weeks (amazing!). Two days after returning from Singapore I drove up to Ottawa, Ontario. At the end of June, the drive back down through Michegan.to meet my internet artist-friend, Virginia Wieringa (triple amazing!) then across to Wisconsin to pick up the DWT show, then down through Chicago to drop off Morning Light 01, through the U.S. midwest back to Dallas.
Two weeks later I drove up through OK and North Dakota into Saskatchewan,. then into Alberta. I took so many photos (that still need sorting) on the drive across Canada through the prairies two weeks later, and the Great Lakes region back to Ontario, where I stayed for another 2 weeks. Back down to Dallas! During September we found out that my husband is transferred to Portland, OR for work. So here we go again. The first week of October we both drove west in separate cars, across the Continental Divide, the red rocks and incredible geography in Utah, finally reaching our future home just outside of the Columbia River Gorge, and on the other side: the Pacific Ocean shores and the Sequoia and Redwood forests. I drove back to Dallas with a truck and trailer to refill, and will make the trip across only one more time before winter – hopefully the weather holds up. I’m excited to get to work again after the move..
“Oh well, maybe she still needs more time… guess I’ll jus’ hang around here for a while.”
The Studio Affair
Tuesday, October 20th, 2009
“I’ve got my eye on you!”
See the other years’ posts on October 28th, 2008 and October 30th, 2007
More Roots garden sculptures
Tuesday, June 16th, 2009
Rootosaurus gardenicus
African Mask profile
Frog
Please pass the peace
Saturday, February 14th, 2009
Garlic Chive seeds
..and click here for some joy that has just come my way from Virginia Wieringa. This video emanates true human spirit, where there are no barriers of language or land or any of the other superficial stuff we create around us that we think will make us happy; joy is simple. It’s right there in a goofy dance.
..and click here (and scroll down a bit on that page) for some laughter that just came my way from Chris Bolmeier. Regarding Art, love and laughter: we need to be no more or less than ourselves to inspire one another. One person inspires so many.
On Cloud Nine
Sunday, February 8th, 2009
On Cloud Nine Left: The view from the road to the Giant Redwoods in the John Muir National Forest, western coast CA. Right: A forest fire still smouldering in October 2008, Mariposa Grove, Sequoia National Forest, central California.
Some new photos of the Giant Sequoias have been posted on majestyoftrees.com
A Studio Affair
Tuesday, October 28th, 2008
“Your eyes are like plastic pearls”
“I bet you say that to all the inanimate objects”
The romance began last year.
Riders on the Storm
Thursday, September 4th, 2008
OK, so I’ve been delinquent in the painting department, but I’m very excited to start back at it this week. Before two weeks off travelling from Texas to North Carolina I started organizing my FlickR photostream. Now there are about one thousand new photos to sort through, and the ones I’m most excited about are the set of the 1500 year old Angel Oak in South Carolina (now that’s a tree!) - plus a creepy-cool old steel playground beside a gross, moldy, condemned Family Inns Motel, a real treasure! The tree and playground collections are uploaded in FlickR.
There’s also a short photo editorial of our encounters with many of the electric company truck convoys travelling south from Michegan, Indiana, Virginia, and Kansas to restore electricity to 90,000 homes and businesses along the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Gustav. Here are a few of those photos from that set, which we were about to post on CNN’s weather.com when I inadvertently killed my husband’s laptop by plugging a cable in the wrong place. An expensive proposition that now is not as timely as it was, so I didn’t even get to send them in. I just found out that fortunately all the travel photos were retrieved, but the laptop is dead. Um, me no good with computer cables…
The Angel Oak: Update
Thursday, July 31st, 2008
Post-dated not February 2009: Thanks to individuals rallying together and signing the petition, we are reassured that even small efforts can and do make a difference on this planet. The land surrounding the Angel Oak is no longer in jeopardy. http://www.savetheangeloak.org/
~
This set of photos honors the efforts of a petition to halt construction on John’s Island, South Carolina that would encroach on an area of land boasting an Oak tree estimated to be between 1,400 and 1,500 years old.
Charleston, SC is proud of its heritage and respected for its commitment to preserving history in the area, so residents hope that plans will not proceed to cut down nearby trees and forest in favor of land development.
On the petition website, even if you don’t sign you will be able to read pages of interesting comments and pleas from residents who have fond memories of climbing the immense branches as children, how a nearby elementary school carries its name, and exclamations by tourists who have visited the area specifically to see the Angel Oak.
This summer my husband and I drove through South Carolina and took a short detour to John’s Island. We drove through wicked rains at the edge of Tropical storm Faye, so when we arrived at Angel Oak park no one else was there. The tree trunk and lower branches are so immense, they have been propped up with stakes and heavy cables here and there, which is a little intrusive but obviously necessary. Growth is spread outward more than upward, occupying an enormous space at least 150 feet wide.
It occurred to me that this tree has lived through one serious chunk of history, and wondered what was happening on our planet when The Angel Oak was knee-high to an acorn? 1400 years ago it was the year 608 A.D., Common Era. Almost everything we are familiar with; our collective modern identity has been shaped by many of the events and people who lived and died since the Angel Tree established its first roots in the earth.
Angel Oak’s parent-tree was undoubtedly alive for centuries before and during the year 476 A.D. when the last of the Roman emperors died, bringing about the Fall of Rome. Around the 7th Century A.D. an acorn falls from one of the magnificent Oaks on the southeastern shores of a land only known to the indigenous peoples; a land we now refer to as North America.
The acorn sprouts along with many others…but this one will outlive the rest, seasoning hurricanes, wars, and countless generations of playful children climbing it’s branches; it sprouts in conjunction with the collapse of Teotihuacan, one of the major cities in Mesoamerica with widespread influence in central Mexico. The Toltec civilization was unheard of, and would not flourish for another 500 years (1100-1521). Aztecs did not seize power until the 13th century.
When this tree was 300 years old during 901 A.D., the Vikings discovered Greenland. In 1066 William
the Conqueror and the Norman troops conquered England altering the English culture forever by bringing French rule and rivalry with France until the The French Revolution occuring from 1789 – 1799. Circa 1100 A.D. the famous Buddhist temple, Angkor Wat in Cambodia is constructed to house the Hindu faith, then around 1275 A.D. Marco Polo, the Venetian explorer and trader visits China via the The Silk Road, returning to Europe with new foods and goods from the Orient which impact modern culture, medicine and dietary habits today.
The Black Death devastates Europe around 1348 A.D., while the 740 year old Angel Oak thrives. Columbus and other adventurers would not claim to discover America for another 144 years (C. 1592). Leonardo da Vinci, a man light-years ahead of his time in the field of science and medicine through his various studies. By the time he would paint the Mona Lisa and Michelangelo would paint the Sistine Chapel, the Angel Oak has lived for 900 years. The Tree continues growth beyond the life of Galileo, mathemetician and father of modern Astronomy, and through the life of Shakespeare, who established some of the most famous English literature in our era (c. 1564 – 1616).
Year 1776 – Angel Oak is 1,166 years old when the U.S. breaks free from British rule and establishes the first Independence Day In 1895, and by the time the Angel Oak had already survived for 1,287 winters Sigmund Freud would bring modern medicine and humanity into a new open-minded age by announcing his theories of dream psychoanalysis and studies of the human psyche. The First World War between 1914-1918 was followed by WWII, 1939 -45/51.
According to the Angel Oak website, after the Category 5 Hurricane Hugo hit the coast of in 1989, Governor Carroll Campbell is reported to say that the storm destroyed enough timber in South Carolina to frame a home for every family in the state of West Virginia. All those trees and forests obliterated, yet The Angel Oak survived. It has since healed injuries inflicted by Hurricane Hugo.
Aren’t there enough people who empathize with those who live on John’s Island, whose sentiment toward the tree that symbolically links them to family – present and past? Aren’t there at least 20,000 people in the world who care about the sensitivity of every single Coastal ecosystem? The petition is looking for only 20,000 signatures, and has over 900 as I write this post. Here is the petition link.
To view more photos of the Angel Oak click here, and to view more photos of trees click here.
New heart-shape
Monday, July 28th, 2008
…a new heart shape in nature to add to the series today.
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