'T Paardje

I hope I spelled that right. Dutch and English are getting more mixed up than ever. I painted this one in the 80's when I got out very early Sunday mornings and drove to a fishing village, Marken, on the Dutch Ijsselmeer. I can't paint from my imagination. It doesn't interest me.The thrill of painting is being inspired by the light and movement going on around me. Being "in" it so to speak. Now I am being like Claude Monet who, when in old age, painted what was around him. And Edward Manet who painted a lovely series you can see in a book, "Manet's Last Flowers".

Eternal

What is that anyway: Eternal love? 

For me the reason why I keep painting Psyche, Eros and red roses. it is something out of bounds for us. A wisp of a dream and longing. Maybe we have felt it ever so briefly. Not to be captured, sealed in a box. In our hearts? I hope so.

We search for metaphors and symbols. There have been so many sculptures and stories made about these two mythological lovers. Most all are classical-romantic=idealized.

Years ago a Flemish girl friend gave me a small replica of a terracotta sculpture found in the ruins of the Roman settlement, 1st to 3rd C. AD. It is in the Gallo-Roman Museum in Tongeren, Belgium. Amazing how it had survived. This small image is simple and clear=a woman and man,naked, holding each other and looking out into the world, proud and human. 

This image stays with me.

Psyche and Eros

These two eternal lovers are linked to the red rose for me. Woman and man in their nakedness, open to the world, bound to each other by their agape love, the highest form. The rose symbol of life and death. It's all here for me.

Happening

There are such good winds blowing from the West in this direction, across the ocean. I feel so honored to know stronge, courageous Hilltown women like Katy Eiseman, Polly Ryan and Rosemary Wessel. They just keep pushing on, keeping the pipeline and Kinder Morgen out.

And for my daughter-in-law, Joy, who saw a future food in a horseradish plant we put in probably 6 years ago. The Hilltowns harbor very special people.

Will I still be able to manage a stick shift when I return? Today photos of the broken bones in my left foot. Patience is the name of most games.

I want to paint today. Girl friends have given me beautiful bouquets. In the garden calla lilies white and creamy as Cararra marble are fluting into the cool Blue Dutch sky. Life is good. 

Happy sitting

Limited by broken bones in my foot, but still painting

Roses