Tag Archives: art

Step by Step

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Community Service.” Your entire community — however you define that; your hometown, your neighborhood, your family, your colleagues — is guaranteed to read your blog tomorrow. Write the post you’d like them all to see.

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I’d like for the residents of my fraccionamiento and the village of San Juan Cosala to see the three blog posts whose links are given below and to perhaps then contribute to a dance program I am setting up in San Juan Cosala–at first mid-eastern dancing for 20 girls, then with more funding, perhaps we’ll branch out to flamenco as well as different dance styles that will be more appealing to boys.

I know that people in my community have huge hearts and they’ve proven that where there is a need, that will fill it.  They’ve set up soccer teams, a free spay and neuter clinic for dogs and cats, a 150+ child orchestra and chorus, English lessons, and a program that feeds and clothes the neediest families in town.

I would simply like to expand this wonderful world that is blossoming in the village of  San Juan Cosala. In Camp Estrella–a week long camp for 30 San Juan children–I saw how the dance lessons taught cooperation and gave a feeling of pride to the children–some of whom do not go to school or do not even have a house to live in but live in tents.

The three blog posts whose links are given below show their wonderful accomplishments during  Camp Estrella.  I’d like to continue that experience throughout the year by providing weekly free dance lessons for the girls.  I’ll pay instruction fees for the first twenty girls and buy their costumes that are necessary for the dance.  We’ll see how it goes and perhaps have a concert later in conjunction with the orchestra and/or chorus to raise funding to expand into break dancing and other dances attractive to the boys.  Let’s see what happens.

If you’d like to see the wonderful things thirty children accomplished in their week of activities that included art, dance and reading, please have a look at the below sites:

https://judydykstrabrown.com/2015/07/21/camp-estrella/
https://judydykstrabrown.com/2015/07/23/the-boy-in-the-blue-feathered-mask/
https://judydykstrabrown.com/2015/07/26/camp-estrella-final-show/

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Lucky Star.” Today is your lucky day. You get three wishes, granted to you by The Daily Post. What are your three wishes and why?

Well damn. I just spent 45 minutes writing a poem and before I could save it, WordPress crashed and opened a new document!! I know, I know I should save as I go along, but I get into the creative process and forget. So, a new vow. After this I create in Word and copy into WordPress. But, that doesn’t bring the old poem back. Hard lessons. Okay, starting over again–totally new poem as I can never remember what I’ve written:

 Epiphany

A glitch in WordPress lost my wishes–
wiped them clean as fresh-washed dishes.
As though the wishes were taken away
before they saw the light of day.
So I must take a different tack
to try to get those wishes back.

When you wish upon a star
how does that star know where you are?
You are a dot in outer space.
It does not know your name or face.
So you must make those dreams come true–
what no one else can do for you.

No stars can make you lose that weight.
What works is just an emptier plate.
Discipline and time will do
what no wish can do for you.
And yet much easier to wish
than to avoid that favorite dish.

My other wish was for long life
away from illness, grief and strife–
a harder wish to make come true
without some magic helping you.
Diet and exercise once more
might keep me longer from death’s door–

Both things I have to do myself
to keep my place on this world’s shelf.
My third wish was a sort of pact–
a pledge I vowed that I’d enact
if my books began to sell,
I’d bring the plan you know so well

from earlier posts to light of day
and give the money all away
to make a place for language, art,
dance and music all to start.
A cultural center where kids could go
to learn to paint or sculpt or sew.

A place where they’re encouraged to write
so hidden selves could come to light.
A place where they could have a chance
to express themselves in song or dance.
A place with books and art supplies
to fill their hands and hearts and eyes.

My earlier poem was all a dream.
A bit of fluff—a hopeless scheme.
Wishes, wants and hopes and lies.
Visions seen behind closed eyes.
Yet when that poem was lost to me,
I suddenly began to see

How these wishes could all come true–
simply, what I have to do
piece by piece and bit by bit
to start to make the pieces fit.
It is now clear and I can see
the one to grant these wishes is me!

We will see if I stay true to the sudden insight gained by the sacrifice of a better poem than that above, but one that told less of a truth. As I wrote a second poem, I suddenly realized that we really do already have a cultural center in our town. It is the building next to Agustin’s restaurant where we held Camp Estrella—where kids are already learning English, taught by Agustin, as well as music–an orchestra and chorus of 150 kids. All I need to do is to help to expand the program into dance and writing and to do more art activities than the one or two a year I’ve done in the past. Eureka!!! And I don’t have to have a best-seller to accomplish that. I’m going to start today to see what it would take to establish a dance program and I’m sure it would be within my means to sponsor it. I have no kids to support. Why not adopt a lot of them??? Stay tuned for what happens.

A further insight: Is it just coincidence that Camp Estrella was the experience that helped to spark this sudden insight and that the other factor contributing to it is this prompt entitled “Lucky Star?” (You all know estrella means star, right?) I once wrote about the effect synchronicity has had in my life and it seems it has emerged again.  Lets hope I continue to follow its pull.

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The Beautiful Children of Mexico

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The Beautiful Children of Mexico

IMG_1808 (1)The beautiful children of Mexico
shed music as they come and go
see how they dance and how they flow–
the beautiful children of Mexico?

IMG_2036Long hair held back out of the way,
womanhood fastened there at bay.
They’ll loosen it another day,
but for now they need to play.

See how the big boys stand aloof
in the shadow of the courtyard roof?
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Yet their guard lets down as they sing and dance,
with an occasional sideways glance.
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They lean and banter, jostle and
cavort like puppies as they stand.
IMG_2172But see how the smallest one of all
suddenly seems to stand so tall?

IMG_2201See the talents they all display–
victorious at the end of day.

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So clever, given half a chance,
they show their bravery in dance.
Intelligence in the written word–
a painting of a flower or bird,

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these beautiful masks they’ve put in place
obscure the beauty of each face.

Mothers and fathers, heed me well
as the truth of it I seek to tell.
As they lift their masks, end their parade,
see the beautiful children that you’ve made!

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I’d been asked to read a poem at the children’s performance at the end of camp tomorrow night, but nothing I’ve written seemed appropriate, so I  wrote this poem that I will read at the end of the animal song and mask presentation as they are about to take off their masks and leave the stage for a party and dinner prepared by Agustin, the owner of the restaurant where we held this six day camp. I hope you’ve enjoyed getting a glimpse of a few of the over 600 pictures I took. Too many photo opportunities!!! I guess I’d advise that no one else try to sift through this many pictures to adorn a post.  It has taken me from 4 p.m. until 10 p.m.–with a few diversions..two one hour phonecalls and a few email interruptions!  So, a very late posting, but  appropriate for this prompt: https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/well-i-never/

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The wonderful participants in Club Estrella–an equally good experience for counselors and students alike!!!

                    Schooled for Peace, Creativity, Humanity and Prosperity

If I were designing a new school, I would make it as experiential as possible.  Maths would include hands-on experiences.  Children would learn to add and subtract by making change and algebra and geometry would be taught by application to real situations–building or designing jewelry or figuring out how high a wall must be built to block a neighbor’s view. My own education was good, but I never really knew the real purpose of algebra and geometry, even though I won the school math prize!

Chemistry, also, would be taught by showing its application to everyday life–the chemistry of cooking and cleaning, the effect of different fertilizers and pesticides in the garden as well as chemicals in the house.  The interrelation of chemicals and pollution to health and safety would be made common knowledge among students and field trips would be taken to demonstrate the dangers of pollution.

Every student would be taught music and music theory, because I know it has a huge effect on math skills and those skills translate to other subjects as well.  All students would be encouraged to try different forms of art–sculpture, clay and graphic design as well as drawing and painting.  It is my belief that everyone has some artistic skill if they can just find their own particular medium.

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Education should be a dish full of treasures we find it hard to choose between.

Children would be taught a foreign language beginning in nursery school and both boys and girls would take shop and learn basic elements of electricity, plumbing and building.  And, dance.

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But the main thing that I would insist be taught is communication skills.  In every class, group communication would be stressed, and students would be given grades not only according to their own discussion skills, but also in listening and it being responsible in encouraging others to speak.  In  small group discussions, students would take turns recording the flow of conversation, recording how many times each person spoke, how many times they asked questions of other students to draw them into the conversation and in listening skills.  I actually used this system when I was a teacher and it worked remarkably well.  Students developed more respect for each other and there was less bullying when students knew their own grade depended upon including everyone in the conversation and respecting the comments of others.

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I believe in incorporating activities that encourage ethics, kindness and a consideration of the needs and values of other people.  Schools are currently so tied up in standardized testing and performing to a norm that teachers are somewhat hindered in their creativity and the teaching of subjects not directed toward rote learning and performing to purely academic ends, and I think students suffer by this.

Extracurricular subjects often center around competitive sports, many of which are violent in nature and which teach kids to win at all any cost.  Better that they be taught to win at being human beings and to learn to accept the differentness of others.  Perhaps this might help to make a more peaceable world or at the least, a peaceable society.

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Thirty students had thirty different takes on how to create a beautiful mask! (Click to enlarge.)

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Yes, call me a dreamer, but better dreams than nightmares!

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “The New School.”  You get to redesign school as we know it from the ground up. Will you do away with reading, writing, and arithmetic? What skills and knowledge will your school focus on imparting to young minds?

I chose this prompt offered as an alternative to today’s prompt.

Cee’s Black & White Challenge: Sculpture, Statues, Carvings

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http://ceenphotography.com/2015/07/02/cees-black-white-photo-challenge-sculptures-statues-carvings/

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Celebrate Good Times.” You receive some wonderful, improbable, hoped-for good news.  How do you celebrate?DSC00212208171_1653270418343_3518364_n
Idyllic Schemata

If I won the lottery–just scads and scads of money,
I’d take my friends off to some isle beautiful and sunny.
I’d hire a house with many rooms where everyone could sleep.
I’d hire a housekeeper and cook, a chauffeur and a Jeep!
We’d swim and snorkel every day, take walks and collect things:
shells, driftwood and starfish–whatever the sea brings.
At night we’d drink and eat and sing, play dice or Mexican Train.
Next morning we would sleep in late and do it all again.

We’d rent a boat and captain and sail away to sea
to examine the horizon–to have fun and merely “be.”
When we’d stop at island markets, I’d give everybody money
to shop for anything they want–beautiful or funny,
delicious or fantastic, things to wear or play or see
and then I would give prizes for what most pleases me.
What I would buy are paint and tools, wood and nails and glue–
all the things needed to do what we could do

to transform all our treasures into jewelry or art.
Each person choosing just one thing closest to their heart
and letting it draw other things with which to tell a tale,
then joining them together with glue or cord or nail.
Then I’d mount an exhibition and ask everyone around.
Food and drink and music and good humor would abound.
Everyone could tell us what they make of all our art,
Which pieces touch their funnybone, which pieces touch their heart.

And we’d give the pieces all away to those who love them most.
We’d dine and raise our glasses in a final toast:
Here’s to all good friends that are and friends who are meant to be.
Here’s to the sand and sunshine, moonlight and the sea.
Here’s to all the luck we share in being here today,
to the freedom that we all possess to simply sail away.
And then I’d build a house somewhere and all could live there free–
each doing what we want and being who we want to be.

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Handmade

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Unless it’s imported from China, everything is home made in Mexico!  These lovingly handmade items were all snapped at the Dia de los Muertos celebration in Patzcuaro last year!

http://wheresmybackpack.com/2015/06/05/travel-theme-handmade/

A Photo A Week: The Circle of Life (2)

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The circles of life above  were constructed by Nancy Gerdt, a talented artist from Felton, CA.  Here is her beautiful garden and her studio:

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https://nadiamerrillphotography.wordpress.com/2015/05/28/a-photo-a-week-the-circle-of-life/

Second Chance

I wish that I’d been wilder and freer in my day.
Had imaginative friends to join me in my play.
I wanted to stage circuses and playact vivid scenes,
but schemes like this were always far beyond my means.
There wasn’t enough zaniness in anyone I knew
to dream my dreams or want to do what I yearned to do.

We’d play school or hospital or house when we were smaller,
but this imagination palled as we grew taller.
I wish there had been classes in writing and in art
to allow  that side of me to flourish from the start.
Instead, I had to search for whatever it might be,
never finding anyone who seemed at all like me.

What was it I was lacking? Where was the rest of me?
I didn’t have a clue about what I was meant to be.
Half of my life I think that I was trying to fit in
to places and activities where I’d never win–
achieving just enough to make my life appear successful,
yet still I felt unsatisfied–unfulfilled and stressful.

Since I was nobody’s mom, nobody’s loving wife,
at thirty-one I ran away to find another life.
I quit my job and sold my house and caught a westbound train.
Perhaps I’d find in water what was lacking on the plain.
So I went to California and took a writing class.
Then another and another, until it came to pass

that I finally found the playmates lost to me in youth.
They were irreverent, creative, clever and uncouth.
Here, at last, I finally felt like I had found it all.
Words were the playthings that we tossed among us like a ball.
My own life now surrounded me–securely, like a bowl.
Here I felt a part of things–a section of the whole.

Later, I discovered I was an artist, too,
All my life, I hadn’t known.  Hadn’t had a clue.
It took someone just guessing and pushing me that way.
Then I had two mediums for saying what I say.
Art filled out the rest of me ’til I was full at last.
It took almost forty years to find how I was cast.

And then all of those playmates lost to me as a child
began to pull me out with them–out into the wild
to paint myself and write myself anew each dawning day–
discovering those hiding parts in what I sculpt and say.
Every day, like hide-and-seek, I find another part–
all those portions of me I’ve been seeking from the start.

I know that second childhood is a derisive term,
but I have found in fact it is the apple, not the worm.
It is the food I feed upon, the fruit I’ve always sought.
It is simply what I am instead of what I’m not.
It’s filled with messy, juicy things like paint and flux and glue.
Explosive things like nouns and all those verbs like “am” and “do.”

What I missed in childhood, I found when I was thirty,
and it was simply glorious: naughty, messy, dirty.
I rolled around in words and paint with others of my ilk–
these artful things more nourishing than bread or mother’s milk.
At forty, fifty, sixty, I’ve become what I can be–
found what I lacked in childhood: friends that are like me!

The Prompt: is there anything you wish had been different about your childhood? https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/childhood-revisited-2/

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The Window

opens onto an empty lot.
Guamuchil trees and wild castor beans
rise from its slope to lift toward
where I sit above, hands engaged
in taking me away to a place
far beyond ideas.
It is that destination dreams only point us to–
that place where, perhaps, I’ll float
after the feared moment
when I’ll leave this world for good.

I dread it so, that zone,
and yet if what my fingers have just told is right,
it’s where I choose to go again and again,
escaping to that little house
down in my garden
where I keep my tools and paint
and ten thousand small objects
all of which have a particular place they want to be fastened.

I am just here to help them go where they want to go.
Where they have, perhaps, been created to go–
taking me with them to the zone,

all of us
headed toward
the inevitable.

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“The little house” is my studio, here seen from the garden. The earlier view was of the wild lot next door, seen from the window of my studio.

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A message from the zone. Click to enlarge, then hover over objects and click again to see more detail..

The Prompt: Tell us about your favorite way to get lost in a simple activity — running, chopping vegetables, folding laundry, whatever. What’s it like when you’re in  “The Zone?”