Resurfacing after a long winter and neglect of blog

Last weekend I participated in the Paradise City Arts Festival in
Northampton.  A young woman came by to make sure I was still
alive and well...She'd been  checking my blog and saw it had been
a very long time since I posted -Dec. 2014!!!  I apologized to her
and now to everyone else who has been wondering just where Wendy
was wandering...and in what universe.

I'm happy to relate that I didn't disappear under the 100+ inches of
snow we had in Boston this winter, nor fall to some dreadful disease.
My life just became complicated by an extra job. Sam, the long time
director of Hawthorne Youth and Community Center  where I was
teaching art workshops once a week went into the hospital in January
and died in  early February.  She had led the organization for over 40
years, working  often 80-90 hours a week up to the day she entered
the hospital. Needless to  say the sense of loss to the organization
and community at large was significant.  Processing  loss and grief
on the part of the children and adults was difficult. Someone who
knew the after school children was needed to fill in every afternoon
from 2-6. Since I live only a couple blocks away, I was the logical
choice...especially considering the conditions which prevailed in this
record  breaking Boston winter.  There certainly have been snowy
winters before, but usually the snow melted between storms.

It has been good to be there for kids and adults, but has impacted the
time I've  been able to spend on some  aspects of my art business like
my blog.  For the next few weeks I'm going to try to catch up  on that
front....reflect on some of  my art making, the art of others, and some
of the projects I've done with the after school children.

Now that it is actually warm in Boston,perhaps I can look back with
a smile  at  this winter... and what emerged from under the snow.
I created the traveling  librarian pictured above during the February
blizzard names "Juno" - thus their title "Juno and Julz".  It seemed a
bit like we were living in Alaska. Juno's snout was one of the stones
I picked up in the caves of the Bruce Peninsula - see my blog post
from last September 19

I continued my series of traveling librarians this year and printed up
a small 8"x8" book with images of  them, a couple poems and
description of our daughter and son-in-law's library and literacy
non profit From Words to Wings. I sell the book  on behalf of their
program in Ecuador. ($25 paperback,, $30 hardback).

In February, I participated  in the Baltimore American Craft Council
show.As always I was inspired  by the creativity of exhibitors...
including their creativity of finding ways to actually make it to the
show.   An example of the extraordinary work at the this show is this
sculpture by  Jeffrey Raasch, title "Brick Treehouse". It stretched
my concept of tree houses.

I've been in awe of Jeffrey's work for many years.  Be sure to check
out his website: jefraasch.net to see photos of his spectacular work
and his story.
    One of my favorite puppeteers, Don Becker was also there:

Don was going to participate in the New Orleans Jazz Fest this
spring.  Have to check in with him and hear reports.  I'm sure
his sales were spectacular.
    Sometimes connections are made at shows via folks who see
your work and are sure who else will like it.  That happened for
me this year at Baltimore.  A couple came by and immediately
thought of a friend of theirs who is a dragon collector and gave
me his contact info.  Turns out he has more than 20,000 dragons
in his collection - but only two leather ones.  I said we had to do
something about that....This spring I made him up one of my
Dragon Names books - with now 465 different names of dragons
in it:

Understandably he doesn't have room for my 4 foot or 10 foot dragons,
but has ordered a 12" leather dragon sculpture.  It's still in the hatching
stage.

    I'm continuing to work with children after school until the school
year ends, but don't have any more spring shows so hope to be able
to post on a regular basis...catching up for this year.

   See you back here soon...and thank you for your patience.

   Adventure on.    Wendy
 

Traveling librarians -process and completion

As mentioned in previous blog posts.. Inspired by the program

From Words to Wings which our daughter and her husband founded

in Ecuador, I've been making a series of traveling librarians...even

tried my hand at a little poetry to accompany them. 

          Traveling librarians

Some children cuddle at home
To share a book, hear a story
Some children walk down the street                                             
To find a book, hear a story
Some children go in a car or bus
To search for a book, hear a story
Some children go online 
To discover a book, read a story
Some children turn on the tele
To see a book, hear a story

Some children dream and wait
For the traveling librarians
     Who come by jeep
     Who come on horseback
     Who come by canoe
     Who come by skiff
     Who come on dragon’s back
      Who bring books
      And stories 
      And  wings

It's fun to see them emerge in the studio...

Here are some process photos:

A dragon librarian...basic armature:

 

A little further along...polyester and thread

around wire..and designing spokes.

Muslin hand stitched over stuffing....

(small creature in front ended up a winged dragon

named Majestis) 

 

Next leather....






Patina added to leather....and rawhide wet-formed
spokes (and books) added:

Completed Pageante and Roland

Head of another creature...which I thought was going to 

be a dragon...but she had something else in mind

Beaded leggings were definitely requested.

And a basket just perfect to fit between legs and hold mini books..

including a mini dragon book, of course

As I said, thie creature had her own ideas.. These rawhide wings

seemed much more appropriate than dragon wings... and 

Skreeraugh (aka Peggy) came to life..

But it is not just creatures that can bring books...Remember

that wood from the old dock in my last blog post?

 

As I thought it might...it became a skiff with library on
board..



Loofe, the librarian enjoys taking a break to read one
of his books...

Other Star Wandererers prefer to arrive by canoe:

Canoby enjoys paddling  along with books in tow

Next destination for the librarians is the Brooklyn Museum....where

I'll be participating in the American Fine Craft Show, Brooklyn

Nov. 22-23.

There was a fun article by Jenifer Eberhart  on the show  which

appeared  last week with responses by myself and four other 

sculptors to various process and life questions at examiner.com:

http://www.examiner.com/article/sculptures-to-join-other-works-at-american-fine-craft-show?CID=examiner_alerts_article

All my figures  are looking forward  to greeting folks in

Brooklyn....and sharing the booth - #49  with a new species of mini

creatures called  Taradiddles...(more about  them in a future

post.)

Hope to see some of you at the Brooklyn Museum!

Adventure on!   Wendy

Words, Wings and books in Ecuador

What is better than seeing the eyes of a child light up
upon opening a favorite book...hearing  children eagerly
fill in the last word of a sentence in a book read to
them by an adult for the hundredth time...seeing little ones
sharing giggles and smiles at a silly illustration or searching
for a detail about a curious insect...or watching a child's
imagination grow wings and soar into new ideas  thanks to
the worlds books have opened to them?

In our cities, where children and parents can walk/ride/bike
skip to the library down the road or path or fill their homes
with inexpensive books (sometimes discarded by those
libraries or schools), it's hard to imagine a world with few
books for young children.  It is even more difficult to figure
out how to instill a love of reading into a child with the
absence of those  favorite books and  the magic of fantastic
illustrations.

When our daughter, Inga,  moved to Cuenca, Ecuador with her
husband, Diego, and two children two years ago, she knew no
libraries awaited, nor would there be many books for small
children in the schools. Raised in an activist family, she acted.
She put out a call to family and friends for children's books to
share with schools in Cuenca.  They ended up taking down 600
books, 400 in English and 200 in Spanish to begin a mobile
library  program.  Once in Cuenca, she  worked  with the school
her children were attending to figure  out how best to offer her
love of books, her storytelling skills, her experience of working
with young  children and her knowledge of libraries.


News of what Inga was creating at one school quickly spread.
Requests from other schools followed.  And so  Inga and
Diego founded:  From Words to Wings.org  with the motto
" Together we can raise a generation of children who love to
read" and with this cool logo designed by an Ecuadorian friend:

 This past year, Inga and Diego  brought the library  and literacy
program to four schools, including two rural schools high in
the mountains surrounding Cuenca.

Their website. www.wordstowings.org , launched this past
year. It outlines the specifics of the program so I won't go
into too many details here.  Instead I encourage you to
explore its pages to understand the program and view photos.

This past winter when we visited Ecuador we carried with us
more books and posters donated and purchased by generous
friends and family for the  program.  Shipping costs make
personal  delivery the best  method. Additionally, thanks to
donations, Inga and Diego have  been able to purchase some
books through bookstores in Cuenca. It's important to support
local businesses. Perhaps if the market grows for children's
literature there, the high prices will go down.   Although all
schools in Ecuador teach English, Inga and Diego are focusing
on building inventory of books in  Spanish now.

We had the pleasure of accompanying them to visit two
of the mountain schools to see the impact on and enthusiasm
of the children and staff in those schools and to see the program
in action and building networks.

The drive, a bit challenging at times,

offered beautiful views...


The children greeted Inga and Diego with eagerness -
excited to see what new books they would leave that month
and what story pieces might emerge from the story box when
Inga read them one of the books.


She  lays out a "magic river" to set the  mood.



Dinosaurs emerged from her story box when she was treating
the children in this class to a reading of Jane Yolen's book
"Como comen los dinosaurios" (Among the books we took
down were some that Jane had generously taken off her
bookshelves to donate to From Words to Wings.) Then
she followed up with a non fiction books on dinosaurs.



The students chose which poster encouraging reading
they wanted for their classroom.



This year they also set up a partnership with Boston's
The Learning Project  (which Inga attended 3rd-6th
grades) developing a reciprocal relationship between
students in the mountains and the Learning Project students.
The children traded videos to learn about each others worlds,
and created handmade book for each other. The LP kids
shared Readathon funds to help the mountain school establish
a permanent library at their school.

We saw the room the school is going to transform into their
library.  There will be a grand opening when all is in place,
hopefully sometime this Fall..





They are hoping to set up some additional partnerships
this coming year.  There is  much to be gained on both sides
by the effort.

As all of us know, creating a program, coming up with
a name (not already used on the web), a logo, then legally
setting up a  non-profit and website is no small feat,
especially while raising your own small children at the same
time.  Everything always seems to take longer than dreamed.
Running and maintaining the entity requires creativity,
endurance and constant brainstorming re fundraising and
ways of  spreading the word. But there is not much of true
value in this (or any) world which is done quickly with little
effort.

Fortunately, crowd sourcing  opens up new possibilities.
They are hoping to launch a campaign or two in the near future.
Keep an eye out for that.

For my part, this past year, I sold a couple traveling librarian
duos at shows and gave the funds to the program.  I received
great feedback on the concept - both of the figures and the
program, and had so much fun that I'm taking the idea even
further this year. A whole series of traveling librarians will
be venturing forth with me beginning this Fall on various
creatures (including a dragon, of course) and vehicles. My
next few posts will be process photos of them, complete
with a poem or two. I'm on Jane Yolen's  poem a day email
list. Waking to a new poem each morning seems to have stirred
latent musings. I continue amazed, startled, and stumped at
how anyone can write a  poem a  day.

Adventure on...and please do check out the website for
From Words to Wings and spread the good news of
another couple trying to make a difference.  In these
times when media images bombard us with reminders
of  the chaos, misunderstandings, and challenges our world
is facing, remembering the small productive steps that
folks are stubbornly taking to make the world a better,
place is more important than ever.

Peace,  Wendy
 

Images of Mountain Summer to Dispell Winter Blues

   While  winter still rages here in many areas of the U.S.,
I pause to remember and savor images from our trip to
Ecuador and Peru in January/February.  We spent 2 ½
weeks with our daughter and her family who live in
Cuenca, Ecuador, a colonial city high in the Andes
where cool evenings and warm days exist all year long.
Then all traveled  together to Peru to spend 10 days in the
Sacred Valley and Cusco, wandering Incan ruins. As I
reflect back and sort through hundred of images, themes
are beginning to emerge, but for now, I offer these images
of mountain summer to warm, inspire and intrigue...

From Cuenca - a river bank path:

 Flowers in the family's yard:

 Hornet's nest in the field near the  house.  Our grandkids were fascinated.

 Landscape on the way to one of the rural schools where our
 daughter runs a mobile library and literacy program (stay tuned
 for a blog post on "From Words to Wings" )

Then off to the Peruvian Andes -where the rocks we climbed
over  in Pisac were alive with plants and flowers:

Here are some images of the luscious green and flower strewn
 Incan ruins in Pisac

And a few images of green, mist and mystery at Machu Picchu:
(Although by the time we reached Machu Picchu we'd already
explored some amazing locations,  its grandeur did not disappoint.)

And finally, some images of the road out of the Sacred Valley on
the way to Cusco:

Hope these images have helped warm you a bit in many ways.
Of course, spring will eventually arrive  - even in the Northeast
U.S. Somehow it always does.
Reflections, more images and stories stirred up by the trip in
future posts.

Adventure on.  Wendy