Summer

    The Pond Eddy bridge, sans tubers

I enjoy exploring and taking photographs year round.  Every season is special in its own way, and I’m hard pressed to pick a favorite time for beautiful subjects.  But when it comes to comfort and convenience, summer is the best.  The obvious advantage over the other seasons is the warm weather.  No need to scrape my windshield and warm up the car, just start ‘er up, roll down the window and go!  There are no snow drifts to sink into, snowbanks to climb over, and no painfully numb fingers from manipulating a metal tripod or fumbling with tiny camera buttons. Sometimes the very best spot to capture a waterscape is not at the edge of a river or lake, but a few feet out into the water. When you’ve taken great pains to be at the perfect spot at the perfect moment, are you going to let a few feet of water get in your way? In spring or fall, I carry along an extra pair of shoes for such occasions, but in the summer such sacrifices are instead a pleasure, when you can strip down to bare feet and wade out to your knees with ease.  My favorite time of day is early morning, when the sun starts its climb into the sky. The lighting is often quite dramatic. Here again summer has its advantages.  The days are longest, and sunrise right now is about 5:30.  So I have beautiful light very early, when there are no people, tubes, kayaks or cars to get in the way.  It’s easy to share a river when everyone else is curled up in their beds or sleeping bags!  By Tom

Our New Show at Liberty Museum

By Kathy

I’m really pleased with how our current show looks at the Liberty Museum located at 46 South Main Street in Liberty, NY. It was one of those shows that just came together with fluidity and not too much fussing and moving things around. It helped that Liberty Museum has such a nice big space to offer us. We had a very fun opening reception with many of our usual guests, plus a few new faces.

As always the food was YUM! I made my usual signature spinach/water chestnut, scallion dip and my ultra rich choclate brownies with walnuts, Tom has a great  kielbasa connection in Orange County  and brought that and some of his wife Pat’s fantastic hummous with red bell peppers and some wonderful artisan bread made by someone he knows down in OC. I myself couldn’t stop eating Cate’s corn and black bean salsa.

Buff and an early guest with food before everyone plunged in

Enough about food, and as for the art—

Cate's fish mobiles

Cate has been doing some fantastic fused glass wind chimes in fish shapes and she has quite a few of them in the back part of the gallery, not to mention a profusion of large glass bowls that are absolutely stunning, with matching utensils that incorporate glass bead handles to compliment each piece. At our opening reception Buff had a run on her new fabric appliqué placemats that she sells in pairs. She also has new tote bags with beautiful collage designs on them, and at the museum she finally had space to show many of her wall hangings from her fascinating, dream-like “doors” series. Robert made some great new bent metal wall and pedestal sculptures that I found very striking when I first walked into the back gallery.

Robert Friedman's sculptures

I could go on, but I hope this description is enough to entice people who live in the area and have not made it to our show yet,  to make your way over to this spectacular exhibit of fine art and fine craft. Also, keep in mind that by going to Liberty Museum to see our show you are making a good effort to support the arts in Sullivan County!

Art and the Garden

By Robert

For the last week, I have been working on two contrasting projects -- finishing sculptures for the Catskill Artists Gallery opening next Saturday and planting in our raised beds. Although they seem to be unrelated, they have much in common.

My material for sculpture is sheet aluminum, cut into flat shapes. Since the metal is light enough, it can be shaped by hand. Gradually the parts organize into organic compositions with tension and movement. Colors will be chosen later for the final surfaces.

In the square beds, some of last year’s perennials are sprouting. The new plants are placed according to future height and color and most important, whether they are attractive to our enemies, the deer, which seem to think they own the place.

Herbs are good choices because with their strong taste they do not appeal to deer and are placed on the edges of the beds to protect the more attractive edible plants.        

So we have three-dimensional compositions to create in both projects. Visual movement, color and space are common elements.  How exciting it is to go from one to the other and see satisfying results in the studio and in the garden.

When is a Piece of Work Finished?

by Hank

When I had my studio in Manhattan, I specialized in still life (if it didn’t talk back, I photographed it).  I worked with large format cameras (4x5 and 8x10) so the subject stayed in front of my camera after an exposure, unless I was photographing food.  I would add highlights, open shadows, and adjust the exposure one sheet of film at a time until I was satisfied with the picture.

A photograph was finished when I could do no better.

Today, I still keep those standards except that I view the changes on the back of the camera and then on my computer screen instead of a light box.

Whether it’s a photograph or a wooden vase, it seems like there is always one more thing to do to make it finished.  Prints have to be signed, matted, framed, and finally a hanging device added.  My wooden vases need at least three coats of polyurethane, with sanding between coats to remove the excess, then making the signature permanent, and finally a coat of paste wax.

A piece is finished when I say it is.

Compassion

by Nada Clyne

Downloading images of art I've produced over the past seven years onto my new computer, I came across one of my favorites, called Compassion.  It is part of a series on the virtues I created by photographing flowers under water, then writing contemplations on the quality.  Here are the words:

Notice

Those around you

Their happiness

Their suffering

If you can help

Do so

Compassion

The flowing lush softness of the colors remind me of that essential human virtue.  I've found that feeding myself beautiful sights -  both from nature and on the walls of our home - keeps my mind nourished and happy.  Over the years I've also discovered that when I'm happy within myself, then I have the capacity to help others :-)

There is a big difference between commiserating and compassion.  When I commiserate, identifying with another person's hard times, there is a downward spiral of energy.  When I'm able to give love and support from a state of happiness, not echoing another's hard times with my own, then I'm not depleted.   The other person receives that state as well, and sometimes it helps!

Time

by Buff

I often find myself saying "I don't have time to do that," or making myself crazy because there is "just not enough time in the day."  Of course, I have the same amount of time as everyone else -- 24 hours a day -- but I'm always trying to squeeze at least 36 hours into the 24.  What a drag it is to have to work at a day job in order to eat 3 square meals a day!  It would be wonderful to be independently wealthy and just create art all day.  If only I could win the lottery . . . of course, I don't buy lottery tickets, so that's not going to be happening any time soon.

Beyond working, there are those pesky chores and errands -- shopping for groceries, doing laundry, vacuuming up dog hair.  Wouldn't it be great to have a personal assistant?  (Perhaps a robot would be less intrusive than a person.)  Just think about it -- an entity who would find your misplaced keys, cook nutritious meals, weed the garden.  Dream on . . .

Oh, my, look at the time!  Gotta go. . . .

Ridgewood Street Fair

Our booth at the Ridgewood, NJ Street Fair

by Tom
We had a perfect spring day for the Ridgewood Street Fair.  There was a large crowd and a nice variety of vendors.  Our display looked great and we made some nice sales.  Sales make me very happy.  Of course they are a source of profit, which sustains us financially and allows us to continue to create.  Sales are also the culmination of the creative process.  They symbolizes acceptance.  Your endeavors are appreciated to the degree that people want to possess your work or present it to others as a gift.  There’s no higher compliment.

You missed the show?  Too bad!!  It was a most enjoyable day.  But it was just the beginning of the season, and you’ll have many more opportunities to see our work.