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Inspiration and Where to Find It

New Year = New Sketchbook

1/12/2023

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I didn't plan to start the new year with a new sketchbook. In fact, I've been struggling a bit with sketchbooks this past year, making things perfect has always been a stumbling block for me, so sketchbook practice is just what I need, right?  But, there was also the fact that I just wasn't getting excited about any particular book that I saw. And I was having difficulty keeping the one I have going because although I altered it to be more to my liking, I am just not in love with it.  Since our local independent art supply store closed its doors three years ago, gone are the days of that wonderful serendipity of wandering the aisles to find something unexpected and wonderful. And order on line just isn't quite the same as holding something in your hand and enjoying the smell of the paper and the subtle color and texture of the pages.
​​However, I happy to report that art supply serendipity isn't dead! Recently, and on a whim while ordering other supplies from John Neal, I ran across the Mahara watercolor journal.  I wasn't really paying attention except that it was watercolor paper. It's delightfully larger than I expected, and I didn't expect to like that, but I do! Haven't been quite this excited about a sketchbook in a while, but it would be difficult for any artist, I think not to get excited about this sketchbook filled with handmade watercolor paper from India.  Just yummy! 
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 I always like to decorate the inside cover with something special.  A book of Rumi poems, entitled "Gold" and translated by musician and poet Haleh Liza Gafori provided the perfect inspiration.  Not being able to read Arabic and not expert on translation, Ms. Gafori's translation is set apart from other's for me.  It seems she translate with the ear of a musician and eye of an artist. I've always had a love of "ekphrastic" poetry, that is poetry that paints or implies a picture.  I've even built lesson plans around it. A lot of poetry is that for me and is inspiration for my paintings, especially sketchbook work.  Thanks to this beautiful new sketchbook and this lovely slim volume of Rumi poems, I'm inspired again.
​I've been on a nightingale thing anyway.  I found a little book of poems about nightingales, To a Nightingale: Sonnets and Poems from Sappho to Borges.  Birds and Sappho in the same book? It was bought on the spot.  Now I should mention that there is some mystery for me surrounding this little brown bird.  First of all I have an inordinate fondness for what I like to call "LBB's" aka Little Brown Birds. I'm not sure why, probably the same reason I'm fascinated more by moths than butterflies. These little creatures live their essential little lives among us almost completely unnoticed, yet they are beautiful and inspirational in their quiet grace, diligence and sweetness.  
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​It turns out the book is divided into poems where the poet thinks the song of the nightingale is happy and those who find it sad. Hmmm... So I was hooked. I read each poem and decided at the end I would then look up the song of the nightingale (easy thanks to You Tube, despite not living on the continent where they reside) and make up my own mind.  Now the poetry was a solid 50/50 split.  I loved as many happy nightingale poems as I did sad ones, so I was left with a blissfully uninfluenced mind as I listened to the song of the nightingale for the first time in my life.

Alas, I must disagree with Dear Mr. Keats, I find the nightingale's song quite happy and would be more than pleased should I find one making a home in my garden and serenading me each evening.  And Rumi agrees, thus my work here. But decide for yourself!
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Published!

1/5/2023

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