Category: Sauntering Existentialist

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Victorian Radicals @ SAMA

Victorian Radicals: From the Pre–Raphaelites to the Arts and Crafts Movement at the San Antonio Museum of Art brings the art of Dante Gabriel Rosetti, William Holman Hunt, John Millais and other artists and artisans of mid-19th Century England together in a stunning exhibit, showing through January 5th. The lush romanticism, idealization of nature and return to medieval mythic themes and legends grounded the bohemian and early avant guard members of the Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood (preferring Medieval and Renaissance art before Raphael), whose members represent some of the most well-known works in the exhibit. The brotherhood challenged the constraints of the formal art academy with vivid colors, flair for detail and a bold vision to bring beauty into the minds and homes of Victorian citizens, faced with the harsh and often ugly reality of the industrial revolution. Many adopted the egalitarian principals of socialism and encouraged women and working class artists, poets and writers to join their nascent aesthetic movement. They were inspired by the poetry of Shelly and Keats and encouraged Oscar Wilde, August Swinburne and emerging Decadent and Art Nouveau artists and writers to join in their Bohemian rhapsody.

Works below by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Sydney Harold Meteyard, William Holman Hunt, Samuel Colman and John Brett

Wistful, idealized landscapes, beautiful male and female archetypes and love of myths and classic literature fed their romantic fantasies. The first image below, by Florence Jane Camm, is a beautifully detailed scene in stained glass depicting Beatrice turning away from Dante (from his autobiographical work, La Vita Nueva, 1295). The second portrait of Bacchus, by Simeon Solomon was painted during his residency in Rome, openly embracing pansexual Hellenistic legacies popular in the 19th Century. Rossetti’s Proserpine features his muse, Jane Morris as the Greco- Roman Goddess of the Underworld. These Medieval and mythic themes with the lush romanticism of the Pre-Raphaelites remain an enduring influence in Fantasy fiction, easy to see in the works of Le Guin, Tolkien and Lewis Carroll.

“I made a new religion of poetic tradition, of a fardel of stories, and of personages, and of emotions, inseparable from their first expression, passed on from generation to generation by poets and painters. I wished for a world where I could discover this tradition perpetually, and not in pictures and poems only, but in tiles round the chimney piece and in the hangings that kept out the draft.”  William Butler Yeats

The Arts and Crafts movement in England heralded a return to handcraft, emphasizing quality materials and the relationship between an artist and their work. The opaline glass goblet and copper tea service were produced by WH&B Richardson and William Arthur Smith Benson, both members of the Arts and Handicrafts Guild. William Morris & Company carried the banner of the Pre-Raphaelites, heeding Yeats’ call to bring art into the home with meticulous interior designs and beautiful objects to be used in daily life. Art Nouveau and American handicrafts movements were inspired to continue the tradition of artisanship as manufacturing and industry became the dominant aesthetic.

More on the American Arts and Crafts Movement

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Sauntering into resilience


Sauntering integrates resonance, rhythm and rejuvenation – a walking meditation connecting us to our environment. As Lady Bird Johnson said, “My heart found its home long ago in the beauty, mystery, order and disorder of the flowering earth.”

  • spiderwart & buttercups
  • evening prmrose
  • blue wild indigo
  • antelope horn milkweed
  • wild iris
  • goat’s beard

When we flow in rhythm with the trail, awakening our senses to the life around us, we are rejuvenating. In gratitude, we share healing energy with the earth. Spring flowers become dewberries in the fall, reflecting the organic process of unfolding and ripening that also applies to projects and resolving problems.

  • dewberry flower in spring
  • dewberry fruit in fall
wild onion

This wild onion springs forth from a hole in the rock – undaunted, zesty, pink, flourishing – resilient.

    I felt resilient, resonating with the color and fragrance of so many, gorgeous wildflowers.

    • crabapple blossoms
    • golden eye phlox
    • agave in bluebonnets
    • yucca in flowers
    • indian paintbrush
    • yellow poppy

    These tough cacti pushing bright green shoots from their dry, winter skin speak to the power of regeneration. Resonating with the vibrant energy of Spring brings joy in the transformation of browns and grays into rainbows of red, green, blue, pink, white, yellow, purple and orange flowers.

    • lace cactus
    • sprouting
    • prickly pear cactus

    As temperatures rise, our dormant friends come out to play. Athena the owl returns to her nest at the Wildflower Center to raise her owlets. To everything, there is a season.

    • Athena the owl
    • Leopard Frog
    • Ribbon Snake
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    Ancestral Modern: Australian Aboriginal Art at the Blanton

    Walking into the Blanton, walls alive with Australian Aboriginal art,  one enters into a multidimensional conscious, dreaming and ancestral energy landscape. The images compel the body to enter into the dreamtime.  It’s one of the most vibrant collections I’ve seen, showing through September 9th.  If you go to one art exhibit this year, see this one!

    From the Blanton

    “The word landscape, derived from the Dutch landschap (region or tract of land) and first recorded in 1598, describes a way of depicting the natural world developed by European artists. Australian Aboriginal artists offer an entirely different vision, in which they forgo Western conventions of horizon lines and figure-ground distinctions. Instead, they give form to their mental maps of sites. The new version of landscape painting was most famously practiced by artists in Papunya, a government settle for displaced Aboriginal groups. In 1971, artists there began painting walls boards, and canvases to educate outsiders about their land and the obligation of “caring for country.” This defiance of government policies that forced people into artificial communities and taught children to ignore their ancestors sent shock waves through Australia.

    Papunya artists painted swiftly and retained a commitment to secrets embedded in their system of learning. Their innovation helped spawn a modern art movement in Austraila. The resulting paintings “represent” the desert in ways that maintain the artists’ control over what is seen and what can never be revealed. While many of the sacred symbols and stories in the paintings may be explained to audiences outside the community, some remain accessible only to the individual, kinship groups, or peoples who share a particular Dreaming, an ancestral realm comprising spiritual beings, governing laws, and their narratives.”

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    An Earth Day blessing

    Sometime when I’m walking
    the breeze shifts, blowing from
    the mouth of the universe
    Whispered waves of indigo
    and bluebonnet perfume
    seeping into every pore
    Lifting my heart into bliss and
    flowing back to the sea of flowers
    in a waterfall of love

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    Sauntering the Austin Central Library

    I’ve been looking forward to seeing the new Central Library, an evolutionary leap into the future of community reading and reflection.  To get the most from my visit, I walked from the hike and bike trail, a luxury I truly enjoy.

    There is always construction in downtown Austin, an eager beaver metropolis bent on eliminating the very things that made it so delightful.  The new Central Library, however, is an investment in our collective soul.  It’s shiny and new, but mindful of our need to find a shared sanctuary.  This is  a cathedral of libraries, a stadium among warehouses. The reading rooms are varied, the design flows aesthetically and there are good reading nooks everywhere.

    Art and music spaces and rooms to write and collaborate are sprinkled throughout. The Lance Letscher and the Armadillo Art Squad exhibits were authentically weird and brought back fond memories of great Austin eras in music and art.

    With so many nooks and crannies to explore, the Austin Central Library is a perfect place to rediscover your joy in reading.  For many screen junkies, this will be a great way to fall in love with a good book and get off the endless cycle of bad news.  Saunter over, it’s a beautiful day.

     

     

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    What will catch the sauntering eye?

    It’s impossible to resist the allure of a sunny autumn day, so I took my camera with me to the hike and bike trail at Ladybird Lake. Since you never know what will catch your eye, I started architecturally and flowed into the colors of fall vegetation. Rest in joy Chris, remembering your sweet smile and SRV tearing it up at Auditorium Shores.

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    Yachats, beautiful gem of the Oregon Coast

    From Cannon Beach, I headed south to Yachats, often referred to as the Gem of the Oregon Coast. The beaches got rockier and towns dotting the coastline smaller and more picturesque.  Depoe Bay, where grey whales come to graze along the shoreline, is a magnet for tourists. I caught a glimpse of a whale back nearby and two spouts offshore, which I heard was a mother and her calf.

    In Yachats, I stayed at the Fireside Motel, up close and personal with the spectacular, rocky ocean views that make the Cape Perpetua area such a draw.

    You can’t have too many transporting moments on a nature trip. But, it was at the Drift Inn, while enjoying a rare offering of Mediterranean mushroom crepes, that I experienced that special feeling of connection. Maybe it was the waitress with the blue hair, the murals keeping it weird, or Richard Sharpless on guitar, but I felt a gemutlichkeit as I listened to the music and watched people of all ages and kinds enjoying a communal meal. Nothing like a warm, golden glow and friendly people to make your visit memorable.

    Another beautiful sunset greeted me on my way back to the hotel.

    The next morning I was off and sauntering, in search of tide pools and sea creatures. The wind rippling the water created some fabulous painterly effects, an unexpected bonus.

    All in all a wonderful, rejuvenating jaunt. When one experiences major life changes, it always helps to pause, recenter and find your compass. Between the ocean’s roar, the towering forests and the gorgeous beaches, I found mine in resonance with the beauty of the Oregon Coast. I’ll be heading back, sauntering north along Washington’s Pacific Coast trail  and looking forward to taking the train into Vancouver.

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    The Rock of Ages

    I didn’t really remember the Pacific Ocean’s booming, rowdy surf and immeasurable depth.  It’s very different from my usual haunts in the Gulf of Mexico. The vast horizontal embracing the towering vertical of mighty spruce trees resonates through the coastland in a deeply grounding spiritual wave.

    This is what I came for – to put my tap root into the earth – to remember that I am.  My reset begins in Forest Park, on the way to the Oregon coast.

    The drive to Cannon Beach on Hwy 26 is an easy ride, rolling through sun-dappled forests, reminding me of biking through the woods as a kid in Germany.  The breeze is cool, the forest fragrant with earth and the sap of evergreens, and the sun beams through the trees painting my skin with warm and cool stripes. The joy of being a kid – the energy, the excitement of discovery and delight – kindled a light in my bones that flowed out into the woods in waves of gratitude and love.

    My first view of the beach in Seaside reminded me to play.

    When I got to Cannon Beach, Haystack Rock was just outside my balcony. It is a beacon to people from all times and traditions. The ancient ones abide.

    The moon rising over Haystack rock
    the waves caressing the shore
    bring me back to Center
    where I am

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    Meditation in Portland’s Japanese Garden

    So much green, lush old growth forest and elegant, unobtrusive meditation paths in Portland’s Japanese Garden park.  The Bonsai Garden is exquisite, with trees ranging in age from 35 to 500 years.  Beautiful.

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    Retired – surfing waves of time and change

    http://sites.la.utexas.edu/utaustinsoc/2017/08/30/a-fond-farewell-to-my-beloved-community/I’m lucky. I retired from a community I loved when I was ready to with a basic monthly stipend.  After 21 years at the University of Texas (thirteen managing the graduate program in the Sociology department) I can now grow a business that I already started developing. This gives me direction, an opportunity to explore new social networks and collaborations (skills that I honed in my former job and the part I liked best).  Will I be as staunch an advocate for myself as I was for others? We’ll see. In the meantime, I am two weeks out and slowly unfolding in the immensity of space and time.

    The day after I retired I was sitting on my back porch staring into a meadow of swaying, native grasses and tall clouds sailing across a bright blue sky.  I was facing north, in the direction of the university and felt I was in a vacuum, like a tree that had been uprooted. I imagined my mind’s projections into all the relationships and collaborations, the structure of the yearly cycle, as roots torn from the earth. I had a frantic last few weeks, but this feeling of being bone tired was heavy with a feeling of loss.

    So much of our identity is framed by “What do you do?” Loss of income, status and relevance can follow quickly, and suddenly we are no one.  While some cultures honor their elders, the good old USA values productivity, not wisdom. Extended family and friend networks help a lot; feeling useful is good at any age.

    But why rush through an existential moment? The feeling that I’m a raft floating in an ocean of time will go away soon enough. I can let synchronicity be the current my raft will follow.  That spirit animated my youth, led me down many light and penumbral paths, to dreams that would foreshadow events or people who offered advice or an opportunity. With intuition as my guide, I can once again become a pilgrim in search of the wholly spirit.

    I had such a moment while visiting the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center the other day.  Part of my plan is to encourage people of all ages to saunter, a reminder to see the beauty in the things that often go unnoticed.  Clearly, it’s something I go on and on about, so no problem making this my mission.  Connecting with the earth, resonating with the vibrancy of life in simple ways promotes well-being. Engage a child’s sense of discovery and let them lead the way. The fox boy I met on the trail agrees.

    Synchronicity led me to the wildflower center, the first place I’ll volunteer.  It was not my plan, just looking for a good place to walk in Southwest Austin.  My camera and I are headed west in search of  . . . ? Let’s see what Portland and the Oregon Coast will bring.