Color, abscence of color

   



























         


 If there's any color that feels natural to be so vivid it's the color orange because it's right there in the big old, everyday sky.

 A visual contrast to all this color saturation took place on a camping trip Jon and I recently took up the Northern California coast. The sun was hidden and It misted heavily the whole entire time. The coast here has a very austere color palette on even on a sunny day. When it's foggy or misty, the predominant color is grey. It's very beautiful, but for some reason I need mental preparation to drop down into it and find that beauty and not want to run inland. Just a few miles further east, the sun was out and the bright fall colors were doing their thing. But knowing it was out there somewhere sort of made me feel better and want to stay and get into the gray.

I guess I'm not one of those people who revel in fog, though I can see that it would be like being wrapped in a big down blanket.

Don't be stealing my pig

We were at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass in Golden Gate Park this weekend and I lost my hat. I have a lot of hats, but never wear any of them except the one that is quirkily Spanish looking and belonged to Maggie, my mother-in law. How I loved it.

 I don't think anybody stole it. I think I just left it behind in the dust. But I still have my pig.

South San Francisco Spring Garden Fundraiser

 The City of South San Francisco invited me to do a floral demonstration at their Spring Fundraiser along with 5 other  speakers. After the initial terror and getting used to the headset microphone, it was great fun!

I'm taking my former Montessori teaching experience and  mixing it up with my years of floral design in the Home Staging and free- lance floral design to encourage people to put together flowers for their homes.

Now to work directly with groups doing hands on design.

Sigh.... that  antique pitcher was so cool. It went to a good home though- don't you have ENOUGH vases, m.a.? Never, never...

Obnoxiously orange vase take 2

Land of VASE

Consider the vase. In my mind it's at it's most lowly form in the kind of cheap and ubiquitous vases that come with FTD type floral deliveries. Where do they end up? I see a lot at thrift stores. They make me sad. The inexpensive, mass produced ones take away from the flowers. Because a beautiful or earthy or quirky container paired together with  interesting flowers becomes something more than the individual parts

Here's my most recent thrift store purchase.The vase is almost obnoxious, it's so vivid. It's brighter than anything in my house. But it turns out it looks interesting with browned out colors and I think there's more interesting combos to explore. It reminds me that fall is around the corner, but I'm preferring to see it as a height of the summer color, rather than that of a Halloween pumpkin. We'll be seeing those soon enough.

Land of daisies and redwoods

These shots were taken at our new favorite campground. It's hard to find a campground that's small, removed and quiet enough to feel like you're sleeping out in nature, instead of in a jolly,noisy town that sprung up in the woods.

- hey, I just described the Strawberry Music Festival outside of Yosemite. I stand corrected. Sometimes noisy, jolly camps are a lot of fun.  

This is Humboldt Redwoods State Park in Northern California at Albee Creek. These shots were taken out of the redwood groves and in an old abandoned apple orchard. I really understand the allure of daisies when I see them growing in fields among grasses, especially in this smaller more delicate size.

Before we came here, I did a wedding in the golden foothills of Colombia, Ca. More on that later, but here's a shot of the little bouquets I made for 4 young flower/cowgirls, who appeared to abandon their bouquets and boots simultaneously.The bouquets remind me of the daisy fields I saw later at the campground- same time of day, around sunset..There's a little magic in the effect of fading light on small white flowers.

Signed, sealed, delivered

Morris Graves Museum, Eureka, CA

June 14-July 22 2012

"Orchid Dreams"

I'm having a one woman show of paintings on bamboo panels 5 hours north at the Morris Graves Museum in the great redwood nation north of my home. I've been an orchid geek for many years. I don't raise them, but have been enamored with the wild, native ones that grow all over the world. In my mind, orchids are fellow citizens of the world. They (like other flowers) are powerful spiritual companions whose language we don't quite understand, but are drawn to from the little micro,micro particles of our DNA.

I'm especially jazzed for this opportunity because the namesake of the museum, Morris Graves ( 1910-2001) is a painter that I have admired for a long time. He is labeled a "transcendental painter" and was a practicing Buddhist. Among other subjects he painted a series of flowers that provide an early inspiration for flower groupings in small bottles.

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The Visit- to Flora Grub in S.F. The Book- The 50 Mile Bouquet

Flora Grub floragrubb.com/ is a very hip gardening and landscaping store in S. F. that focuses of the use of succulents, air plants (tillandsia), and palms. Their selection includes many plants suited to our Mediterranean-type of climate. The store has a contemporary feel with a bold color palette. The design of this large store and cafe is as much a feature as it's offerings. I felt like I had stumbled upon a happening scene.  Was I dressed okay?

  

Above is a beautiful arrangement made in a demonstration lecture by Susie Nadler, the resident floral designer who seems to incorporate succulents and air plants in almost all of her work.

But But But...the other reason I made the trip: The flower arranging demonstration was part of the introduction this long awaited book;

 "The 50 Mile Bouquet", the50milebouquet.com/ by Debra Prinzing and David Perry. 

Debra was on hand to talk about the movement to grow flowers locally. Currently the majority of flowers are grown in South America with a heavy use of pesticide exposure to the workers and the flowers. The book tells the story of the local flower growing movement on the West Coast. It shares the stories of flower growers and the floral designers who use them. A very inspiring and uplifting project. Debra gives updates on this trend on the website.

Little Flower School comes to town

It been a long time. I've been in my studio making paintings for a show at the Morris Graves Museum in Eureka. Painting has been harder these days with my growing commitment and business of floral design.

But I had to throw down my brushes for this class and now my brain is short circuiting again. You would think that working on paintings of flowers while working on floral design would be so natural and easy.

 It's not for me. I don know......

The Little Flower School  http://little-flower-school.blogspot.com/ is run by two floral designers with separate businesses n New York; Nicolette Owen & Sarah Ryhanen.

Nicole shared that she had lived briefly in Rockridge in Oakland before returning to live in NY. Now she and Sarah have come to do a tour of  Northern California and offer 3 classes. It's a testament to their amazing talent and tech ability to plug in internationally, that they can fill their classes at a top dollar price. And the sheer number and quality of flowers and foliage they brought to class was worth the price of admission. They edited their selection of 30 or so materials from a palette that is their signature; Soft, muted colors. This time the selection was from warm side of the color wheel  which included browned out magenta, pink, yellow, grey green and purples. Though their instructions were clear and simple, their way of using color isn't. It's quite nuanced and that's what makes their work so distinctive- that and the quality of movement and and controlled wildness. My bouquet (shown) included 26 kinds of flowers tucked into a container that was the size of a large coffee mug. It didn't lend itself to a long lived arrangement, despite my care. But it was my choice to pile it on as most of my arrangements are more spare. And it brought back home the notion of the true ephemeral quality of flowers.

Thumbs down to cymbidiums, thumbs down to mauve???

How can I say that I don't like an orchid after spending 6 or so years studying and then painting them? In my artwork I chose to work with wild (species) orchids which often look like they don't belong on this planet, or are less showy and often very tiny. I chose them mainly because they are fascinating and overshadowed by their very beautiful hybridized cousins. I have nothing against hybridized orchids for sure, but cymbidiums fell into my thumbs down category because they are so ubiquitous here. They lurk behind every garden gate, as we can easily grow them outdoors.

But then I was given this huge cymbidium plant last fall. This spring it has come forth in bloom with 6 huge flower sprays with no effort from me except to water it. And it's the color mauve, one of my least favorite colors. So it's a challenge to my opinionated self, because it is very beautiful and I am now it's proud guardian. Once again, I'm up against my value system of the flowers I gravitate to and the ones that bring out the yuk factor. Is it possible to like all flowers equally? To be able to work with any of them instead of saying this one is in and this one is out. Just bring an open, creative mind to the table and and see what happens. Is this a metaphor for life or what?