03-31-15. Monster Soup commonly called Thames Water, 2015 edition.

03-30-15. Big grin in a wedding dress stockroom.

03-29-15. Woman wearing a camouflage jacket in Japantown, San Francisco.

03-28-15. Making 1910 Halley's Comet plates in a Royal Delft potter's studio.

03-27-15. A musician plays a banjo at the Rainforest World Music Festival in Malaysia.

03-26-15. A sheep wandering past an agave farm.

03-25-15. El Topo enters Valhalla.

Nabi Yunus, Florida Man (238)

"Nabi Yunus, Florida Man (238)", oil on burlap mounted on canvas, 16x20". For sale on Etsy.

Opening lines of two poems by Elizabeth Bishop are scrawled in paint on burlap. "The state with the prettiest name, / the state that floats on brackish water" is the opening line of "Florida". "In one of the Assyrian wars / a chariot first saw the light / that bore sharp blades around its wheels" is the opening line of "Wading at Wellfleet". Both poems were included in her 1946 collection "North & South". My randomly selected topics were Florida Gold (color #238 in Naomi Kuno's Colorscape book) and the Assyrian Empire (from my DK Family Encyclopedia). Elizabeth Bishop joined the two topics by writing poetry that mentioned each one.

The painting evolved as I worked on it. The placement of the words was determined by the original shape of the objects in the painting. At first in the foreground was a large stone head excavated at Nabi Yunus in Nineveh, near modern-day Mosul, Iraq. While I worked on the painting, I learned about the terrorists destroying this and other ancient sites. I'll admit that I'm ill-equipped right now to comment directly on what is happening there, but it definitely was on my mind and filling me with disgust.

The background was based on a painting by Bishop. She made several small paintings in addition to writing poetry. This one was of the armory building in Key West, Florida. Nabi Yunus was the location of the armory of Nineveh. Bishop was inspired by Paul Klee among other artists. Klee made many paintings on burlap.

While I worked, I read several books about Florida (as well as the Assyrians). I learned about the human-caused destruction of the Florida Everglades, which also disgusted me. I hope to return to these topics, to do more than just feel disgusted, but for now this is what I have to offer. 

03-24-15. A gravestone in a rose garden.

03-23-15. A wax figure of Selena Gomez on a hard hat tour of a new Madame Tussauds opening soon in Orlando.

03-22-15. Man with a parasol in a New Age commune.

03-21-15. Young man digs up a small bank shaped like a safe in a community garden.

03-20-15. An onion between a rock and a hard place.

03-19-15. A sea monkey at a lonely crossroads.

03-18-15. Young woman wearing a Rolling Stones shirt in the middle of nowhere.

03-17-15. A model of Sailor Jupiter sitting in the backseat of a car.

03-16-15. A tourist finds a quarter in Monet's Giverny flower garden.

03-15-15. Benjamin is 3 months old today. Harold will be 41 tomorrow.

03-14-15. What the Fork truck on a runaway truck ramp.

03-13-15. Imagining a burning bush (Euonymus alatus) growing in front of St. Basil's Cathedral at Red Square.

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03-12-15. Buster Keaton kissing a girl in a projection booth at the end of "Sherlock, Jr." (1924).

03-11-15. View of a sunset from a barbershop.

03-10-15. A young woman shows off her nails near Shibuya Crossing in Tokyo.

03-09-15. A man buying a can of stew at a mini-mart.

03-08-15. A cottonmouth on a long, hot dirt road.

03-07-15. Helping Maxwell with a craft project on Valentine's Day.

03-06-15. Fancy couple seated on a tacky rug near a pond in a city park.

03-05-15. Shoes dangling from a wire by their shoelaces in a flooded neighborhood.

03-04-15. Airplane on a screen in an evening news studio.

03-03-15. A player wearing a Jiminy Cricket shirt at an '80s video arcade.

03-02-15. Presidential pets at an epic skateboard park.

03-01-15. Passenger looking at her photo booth strip in the first class cabin.

02-28-15. A Queen Victoria agave growing near Cuatro Ciénegas, an oasis in the Chihuahuan Desert.