Yellow/Moon

 

This month the ROY G BIV photo challenge brings us to the "Y": yellow. If orange symbolizes joy for me, I would say yellow is the color of celebration and sunshine-filled hope. And what perfect timing... We began the day with a new moon and, just before midnight, spring will arrive in Italy. The solar eclipse, which I followed online in the company of scientists whose enthusiasm was as entertaining as it was contagious, brought yet another celebratory note to the day. In Florence the morning merely dimmed for an odd spell, but Svalbard & the Faroe Islands both experienced a total eclipse (though the latter had to contend with clouds for mcuh of it).

When trying to put together a random collection of photos highlighting a single color, I always find it surprising just how many different shades there are. Everything from subtle to strong and, in the case of yellow, from warm and golden to chilly or verging-on-chartreuse-y.

The squash blossoms above (which we like to quickly dip into a simple batter of flour & water before frying in olive oil) are a shade of the yellow that I gravitate toward. I'm also drawn to the pale (and sometimes bold) yellows that characterize the majority of Florence's buildings. The image below shows a glimpse through our living room window yesterday morning. While I seem to be having problems getting Blogger to portray the intensity of contrast & color of my photos yet again this month, that shadow of the streetlamp against the yellow wall always gives me a moment of delight.

These next two images are from a recent excursion to the rose garden. The rose bushes had all been sharply pruned, and the garden was at its most stark & bare before growth will resume——with the exception of these small yellow blossoms that couldn't seem to hold themselves back (first image), and the mimosas that always bloom in time for La Festa della Donna/International Women's Day on 8 March (second set of images).

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And here are——surprise!——some obsequious yellow: lemons... I had been hanging on to the yellow string bag that held the lemons in case it inspired me for this month's ROY, and found I quite liked the threads caught between the light and the darkness, and the shadows cast by the net.

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And next, the Wallace Stegner book whose orange spine featured in my last ROY post, remains relevant again this month when the cover is revealed. The daisies on the bookmark my daughter made for me years ago are a bit difficult to make out, but each time I would sit down with the book I noticed how their yellow centers echoed the wildflowers "growing" on the cover. (Despite the sadness/cynicism of the story/narrator, I very much enjoyed reading All the Little Live Things, and have just moved onto The Spectator Bird, a sort of sequel in that it continues protagonist Joe Allston's journey——this time literally as well as figuratively.)

 

After examining & photographing the lemon slices, I realized I much prefer lemon-rind yellow to that of its cool/paler/shinier/juicy insides...which led to these photos of a short stack of lemon slices (which, alas, do not display as warmly golden in Blogger as they do in Photoshop)...
 

 

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And now, to conclude this post, is the inspiration for its title, Yellow Moon, a song from Pearl Jam's latest album (Lightening Bolt).

 

 

Wishing you all a sunshiny weekend, wherever in the world you may find yourself. And I'd love to hear what yellow symbolizes for you if you'd like to share it in the comments section below...

 

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A few details for those of you not already familiar with the ROY G BIV
photo challenge... Artists Jennifer Coyne Qudeen & Julie Booth started
it a few years ago. Each month is devoted  to a different color of the
rainbow, and once we explore each of these we will move on to other colors
later in the year. Everyone is welcome to join in the search. Please visit
Jennifer & Julie's blogs for links to each month's participants.

 Guidelines are here.

Elements of peace, Part III - More words

 

I've been wanting to share a few photos of my last visit to the Giardino delle Rose, Florence's lovely hillside rose garden, where I added some more copper "peace" leaves to my favorite olive tree. (You may remember that I'd requested new words for my "Elements of peace" project last fall...photos of the "installation" can be seen here & the making of the leaves can be seen here.)

As I approached the tree, I couldn't make out the wire-words title and thought it might no longer be encircling the trunk, but as I drew closer I realized the copper had merely lost its shine. Now it blends in nicely with the bark. I was surprised to see how many of the twenty-six leaves remained——I counted at least seventeen, but it was hard to keep track of them, scattered among the branches/foliage as they are. I do know that "love" was missing, because it had been placed on a new shoot close to the trunk. I like to think that either a happy couple or someone looking for love has claimed it...

 

Here are photos of some of the latest additions, which include sustain, alegria (Portuguese for "joy") & gratitudine (Italian for "gratitude"). I'm afraid these few that I photographed are a bit difficult to make out; the noon-time sun was glaring, so I turned the leaves away from it and ended up with considerable, difficult-to-make-out-the-details, contrast.

I am always happy to make/add more leaves. As I'd mentioned in the initial post(s), just as the quest for peace is ongoing I hope this project can be as well. So please feel free to offer an "element" that you feel might help to bring more peace into the world (either in the comments section below or in an email). Now that spring is in arrivo I will be up at the rose garden more regularly, and on future visits I would love to place more peace leaves among the branches of my favorite olive tree.

Wishing you a happy & peaceful week...

 

The original "Elements of peace" leaves, mixed in with their inspiration

Orange-inspired: ALaW "Place"

 

Hello again! As promised, here are some more of the orange/paper-related photos of the letter forms shown in the image at the beginning of my previous post. I really liked how the light hit the different surfaces, and the shadows that were created by/in/on these little "places"...

...which is how I am thinking of these letters. They are my belated solution for a project I was working on last year, A Letter a Week 2014, the theme of which is "place."

You may recall that I was studying Italo Calvino's Le Città Invisibili (Invisible Cities) in preparation for the "place" alphabet. But, try as I might, I could not come up with an elegant way to structure/do justice to Calvino's fifty-five "cities" with a mere twenty-six letters. I did have fun trying though, as I played with ideas ranging from designing a board game to a multi-sectioned/windowed fold-out book, a deck of cards or a sort of fantastical map. And, in the process, I certainly became more intimate with this poetic work of Calvino's, which considers the multiple facets/personalities of Venice through fifty-five poetic tales.

As an alternative, other ideas——a Florence-centric piece, an artist's book featuring eight of my favorite cities, a series of collages focusing on urban elements...really, the theme of "place" is just about the most inspiring thing I can imagine——tumbled around in my mind. But I was distracted by other things last autumn, and this second ALaW alphabet of the year ended up falling by the wayside. So, with 2014 drawing to a close, I found myself contemplating simpler ways of addressing the "place" alphabet——something less left-brained and more about simply working with my hands.

I started thinking about how to use paper/the structure itself to "draw" the letters and somehow arrived at the idea of creating them from strips of paper seven centimeters high. Each is then housed within a 7x7x7-cm volume/"room," which keeps the letter shape in place; the letters can thus be "read" in either two or three dimensions. Even with past ALaW projects (for which the letters are each required to be presented within a 7x7-centimeter square), I have often found myself extending into the third dimension. Over all else, structure tends to be the aspect that drives my work/designs, and in this case it's definitely the principal element.

Color also plays a role; I've chosen a dozen or so colors of Fabriano Tiziano, and will use different combinations for the various letters of the alphabet. As the making of these first ones coincided with the "orange" edition of the ROY G BIV photo challenge, they each incorporate orange for either the letter, its housing, or both. (ROY seemed as good an excuse as any to get the ball rolling.)

My initial thinking was that each letter would essentially be like a small book(let). This will perhaps be more evident with some of the other letters——those composed of straight lines, as opposed to curves——but can be seen here, for example, with the "Z." I had even considered introducing words onto the "pages," but I quite enjoyed how the sun interacted with the little letter-forms on the gorgeous day when I photographed them last week...and that seems to satisfy any yearning I might have for "content." I especially like the triangles of light & shadow on the "Z" in the second image below——there's a bit of an optical illusion happening.

 

The next images show the letter forms free from their confines...

 

So, I am looking forward to seeing how these letters

turn out as I work my way through the alphabet

 (slowly, no doubt, but I'll get there!).

 Here's wishing all of you a creative week...

Orange joy

 

Once again, it's time for the ROY G BIV photo challenge, and this month we have been looking for "orange." For January's edition I let paper inspire me, so I thought I'd continue with a paper theme again this time. As is often the case, other tangents tempted me, and I must say that it's the most fun I've had for a while (things are still not the same around here since the beginning of the year).

Orange is my favorite color, so the hardest thing was probably deciding what to photograph. My day is full of orange: I brush my teeth with an orange toothbrush, my hair with an orange hairbrush, use amber shower/hair products and orange towels. Orange curtains frame the windows, which look upon terracotta roof tiles, blankets & wraps in shades of orange keep me warm, I pour tea from an orange pot into a cup with a sliver of orange rind. And since it's citrus season, the fruit basket is inevitably bursting with the delicious blood oranges that are at their best right now. However, I opted not to catalogue my orange life here (at least not visually).

In the image at the beginning of this post you should be able to just make out some letter forms for one paper project I'm working on, belatedly: the "place"-themed alphabet for A Letter a Week 2014. Originally I had planned to include several more photos at the end of this post, but have since decided to create a separate entry——so this post is less paper-y than I had first envisioned.

Here are some notes on the photos that have remained...

First is an image of the confetti (known locally as coriandoli) I made in honor of carnevale this week. When I emptied the hole punch of the orange and copper circles I had cut, out fell the remnants of a long-ago project, adding some other colors to the mix——certainly more in the spirit of Carnival. 

After the confetti is a picture from this morning...it's not the first time I have posted an image of the early sun falling on the roof tiles and so beautifully highlighting their curved edges, but this "crescent"-enhancing moment delights me each time I catch it.

Next is a selection of my favorite orange-spined books. The one on top——All the Little Live Things——is my current read from Wallace Stegner, an author whose writing I savor. Not page-turners, but rather stories with a painterly sensibility, told at a pace that invites on-the-page reflection, I have been taking my time working through Stegner's collection. You may notice that Witold Rybczynski's books compose a good chunk of the stack...I've always enjoyed how he writes so engagingly about the multiple facets of architecture/building. (I only just realized he has a blog, which I have yet to peruse.)

And then are some chili peppers that have been slowly drying (shriveling!) over the last several weeks. They began as a bouquet of bright oranges, reds & greens, but had changed considerably by the time I rediscovered them when making a pot of chili earlier this week. (In fact, they are perhaps even more photogenic now——definitely more patinaed——though I will spare you the dozens of photos they inspired me to take).

 

I thought I'd finish with this photo of an orange freesia that I took a couple of years ago, against the temporary "garden" of freesias that popped up on the studio table during a photo shoot. I liked the image so much that I gave it a title——OrangeJoy——and offered it in my Etsy shop for a while (plus have sent many post card versions as thank you's). It remains one of my all-time favorite pictures, and fills me with joy whenever I come across it.

 

Here's wishing joy for everyone, in whatever shape, form or color

that happens to be. I'd actually love to hear which color symbolizes
joy for you if you'd like to note it in the "comments" section...

And Happy Year of the Goat/new moon!

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For those of you who are not familiar with the

ROY G BIV photo challenge from past years, it was first begun

by artists Jennifer Coyne Qudeen & Julie Booth. Each month is

devoted to a different color of the rainbow, and once we do each

of these we will move on to other colors later in the year. All

are welcome to join in the search. Please visit Jennifer & Julie's

 blogs for links to other participants. Guidelines are here.

Hope + Comfort

 

As is true every January, the paperwhite bulbs are beginning to bloom. Witnessing tiny miracles like this always fills me with hope, something we could do with around here right now. Things are still very sad as I watch my daughter going through the most difficult period she has ever faced. Disbelief continues to be my overriding emotion, and acceptance seems far away.

Besides hope, comfort is another thing you need in times like this. When I opened up Natalie Goldberg's Long Quiet Highway to a random page the other day, the first paragraph I read led into these words:

Whether we know it or not, we transmit the presence of everyone we have ever known, as though by being in the other person's presence we exchange our cells, pass on some of our life force, and then we go on carrying that person's body, not unlike springtime when certain plants in fields we walk through attach their seeds in the form of burrs to our socks, our pants, our caps, as if to say, "Go on, take us with you, carry us to root in another place." This is how we survive long after we are dead. This is why it is important who we become, because we pass it on.

-Natalie Goldberg

I always find Natalie's words to be relevant, reassuring, full of compassion and hope, and this time I found comfort in them too. So I typed them up to keep nearby, as a reminder that those we lose will always be part of us. It will also remind me how important it is to live as well as we can, since we will one day be passing that on to others...
 

Paper tree

It's time for 2015's first edition of the ROY G BIV photo challenge, so we are once again beginning with the color "red" (the "R" in ROY). My images this month are of our 2014 Christmas tree, pre-"assembly."

The Christmas tree was always one of my favorite traditions of the holiday season, but getting an evergreen home on foot and up fifty-five steps became such a project, and then I always felt guilty having to dispose of the tree in the new year. So, as an alternative, for a few years we made one of tissue paper pom poms suspended from the ceiling fan in a pyramid arrangement that loosely represented a tree. Last year we were in Sydney over the holidays, but my daughter emptied several bookcases to create a tree of books that we draped with beaded garlands and a string of lights. I really liked that one, but it made accessing many of our books a bit of a challenge until we finally got around to disassembling it some time in February!

Last November, as I was hunting out crepe paper to make streamers for my daughter's birthday, I found some luxurious (i.e. beautifully sturdy) red and purply-red papers. Since the holidays arrive soon after her birthday, I grabbed some olive crepe paper as well, thinking maybe it could at some point be brought into the equation, extending the birthday decorations into December. The ceilings in the living room are a few meters high, and I envisioned a second, more intimate, "ceiling" composed of crisscrossing streamers.

After trimming the paper into narrow sections, there were far more than I needed for the birthday decorating, so they sat, pretty little rolls, in a basket. I liked how they were all kind of squished together, somehow reminding me of roses. At some point I got the idea to create a Christmas tree with streamers. We gathered the ends together at the top, suspended them from the trusty ceiling fan, and then attached the loose ends to a ribbon-covered hula-hoop...so there we had it——a lovely "tree" of red, purply-red & olive streamers.

But first, I took a few pictures...

Incidentally, I find red to be a very difficult color to photograph accurately when it is the main color in a composition, so I tried under a number of different occasions before getting the handful of images you see here. Controluce, with the day's later light, seemed to best capture the reds & purply-reds. Then all of the JPEGS became washed out once they were imported into Blogger, giving the lovely reds a pinkish cast, so I resaved them as PNGs. (I include this info because I know others have also had issues with photos retaining their properties in Blogger...the PNGs are a bit darker, but definitely truer to the originals.)

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I just wanted to say thanks again for the condolences and very kind comments in response to my last blog post. Things continue to be hard here; it still feels like things will never be the same in our little world, but the support is very much appreciated. Thank you...

 

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And, for those of you who may not be familiar with the

ROY G BIV photo challenge from past years, it was first begun

by artists Jennifer Coyne Qudeen & Julie Booth. Each month is

devoted to a different color of the rainbow, and once we do each

of these we will move on to other colors later in the year. All

are welcome to join in the search. Please visit Jennifer & Julie's

 blogs for links to other participants. Guidelines are here.