Rooted

Painting to commemorate a dear friend’s Tangier travel last year. 

watercolor, colored pencil on paper, 5x7.5

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Accepting ocean sciences related work for From the Tide Pool to the Stars, an e-gallery and pop-up art show at the 2018 Ocean Sciences Meeting in Portland, Oregon!

Poppy print, 2016

Bonfire trout

I met my first pen pals in during a summer camp at a living history site along the Minnesota River. We dressed in mid-1800s era cotten dresses, used quill pens and chalk boards in the school house, marbled paper, learned to use the drop spindle, made saltine crackers from scratch, and performed a number of other “farm chores” with delight.   We took on the names Betsy, Tacy & Tib (that’s me), based on characters from the Maud Lovelace book series, and felt like we were living the dream.  I even used my allowance money to buy a quill dip pen and ink at the craft store chain, which I used to write blotchy letters to Betsy & Tacy until I reached high school.  

I kept up the “character” of Tib/Thelma as a volunteer interpreter at that site until I was 18.  It was there that I learned to knit, spin, weave, dye, and enjoy chicken and dumpling soup.  I believed I was born in the wrong century, but now I realize I just enjoyed playing at a lifestyle where making was a necessity and lack of modern conveniences forced you to know your environment.  By no means do I want to idealize that time; it’s only magical to PRETEND to be a female in the 1800s.  In reality, I’d be married with six children, have few rights, and work as a seamstress.  More likely, I’d be dead from disease or complicated childbirth.   

That wave of memories came upon me yesterday when I my new quill dip pen a whirl for the first time in years.  I tried it out on a cartoon sketch I’ve been working on: Plates.   I hesitate to use the word “cartoon”, because I’ve always associated that term with “funny”.  This isn’t funny.  Well...maybe it is, but in a nervous laughter because this is ridiculous but also kind of sad sort of way.

Sometimes an artist’s studio is as intriguing as their work.