The Lake in July

I visit Lake Centennial all times of the year, and frequently walk the some three miles around it. This was not such a day. I just wanted a taste of green, light, ducks, geese and sky--and was not dressed appropriately.  Pulling up to a parking lot and getting out of the car, I was treated to an incredible sky--that veiled sun coming through the trees!  It was a coincidence that I arrived to get the full effect. 

Then, I could see the Canadian Geese--or are they ducks?--cruising across plaited waters to bathe with friends...it got to be quite a splash after awhile.










One young man positioned himself and started fishing. I didn't stay to watch. He was enjoying his solitude, probably before going to work there with the boats--the concession area. Perhaps not...

The paddle boats were moored and waiting--and a bright sign boasting tasty food.

Finally, the kids' gym area with all kinds of slides, tubes, and things to climb was still quiet, but later, I'm sure was filled with joyful children and watchful parents and grandparents. I know--I've been there with my grand.daughter, Ariella many times, and photographed her every time.
 

This is a great place for kids to play!

Lake Centennial is a Howard County, Maryland, public park just off of Route 108 in Columbia, MD. Summer Concerts every Wednesday from 7:30 - 8:30, and I think I'll go...or consider it.  Yes, a great place to hear some cool music and relax!


Kay Weeks, content and photos on July 9, 2013


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Don't pass this one by!

Meet Still Life Gallery's... 
Sara Arditti  

Fine Art & Custom Framing

When you go into Still Life Gallery and meet Sara Arditti, it's a wonderful and unforgettable experience.  Of Greek heritage...but says she hasn't yet traveled to the Greek Isles...her style is broad-brush, lightly humorous, anecdotal, and, at the same time--when asked anything specific about an artist--sharply detailed. She is a story teller, a raconteur. Being in the Gallery with Sara is like having the walls and art come alive. She is happily married to David Dempster, co-owner of Still Life Gallery, and, when I asked, told me she has two sons in their 20s. I sent Sara a few questions by e-mail and received the most readable and entertaining text; it went far beyond my questions in interest. In short, I was in direct touch with energetic spirit.  Rather than make changes, I'm presenting Sara Arditti to you--in her own words:

Q:  Sara, please tell me a little about your journey across “time and space” that resulted in a move to Ellicott City’s Main Street in our Historic District?  For instance, have you always been attracted to small-scale areas with history…and a river? Where else have you lived?

Sara:  I spent almost my entire life in Los Angeles, where there is little in the way of visible history; it is something people do not value there. I have always been strongly attracted to places that take me far back in time, especially where you can walk around and see interesting sights all around you. 

In 2007 my husband and I sold our house in LA and left for good. We stayed in Paris for a year;  it was a fantasy come true.  We lived in an ornate 1882s Haussmannian stone building with a view of Sacre Coeur Basilica, walked every inch of the city, drinking it all in, and immersed ourselves in the art, architecture, food and culture. 

Sara's design

After that we lived in the United Arab Emirates for 18 months, which I did not like, but it was quite an adventure. Dave had a job managing construction projects for one of the oil-rich Sheiks of Abu Dhabi. 

When we returned to the US,we decided to settle on the East Coast. We lived for a year in Washington DC, which I loved for its European style-charm, arts institutions, and walkability.  In 2010 we moved to Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, to give country living a try. The Civil War history there is fascinating, and we were able to visit the preserved historic town and its many small museums many times. When I first saw Ellicott City’s Historic District in 2012, I was charmed by its intact historical atmosphere and beautiful setting by the river and decided it really suited me. 

Still Life Gallery is located at 8173 Main St, Ellicott City, MD 21043.

Q:   I am most interested in your selection of items to show in your storefront window and how people respond.

 
Sara: The display window is critical. I always have several pieces of art and lots of out-of the ordinary jewelry in it. I used to work in the display department at Saks Fifth Avenue, Beverly Hills. You have to have elements that grab people, stop them in their tracks to look, and make them want to come in.  I watch people stop in front of my window all day long and point things out to each other, and sometime take pictures on their cell phones of the things in it. I like to have a large variety of colorful, artistic, non-mainstream things that you won’t see anywhere else. 

 
Everything I have in the window--and inside the Gallery--reflects my own personal taste.  I have a preference for jewelry that looks somewhat exotic, and quite definitely nothing that you would find in the mainstream jewelry stores. I do not follow trends. I have never been a person who follows trends in any aspect of my life. I like to set my own trends.

Another element in my window is something my gallery has become known for- the Travelling Mice. These are small white hand-felted mice that stand on two legs and wear various accessories such as acorn hats, crocheted bags and tiny backpacks. Before Christmas last year I succumbed to my passion for certain artistically cute things and ordered various critter ornaments.

The Travelling Mice took off like mad! I have sold over 200 of them and decided to keep them on permanently. I call them my ambassadors and they beckon people from their position in the front of the window. Some people have told me they come into the gallery because the signal from the mice is that the gallery owner is not a typical one, but someone who is warm, non-pretentious, and accessible--which I definitely am.  

Q:  Sara, one more question. When you select an artist or artists to be featured in your gallery, what are the three most important criteria?  

Sara:  First,   I have to really like it a lot. I am the sole curator and will not carry anything in my gallery just because I think it will sell, because it caters to the mainstream, or because it is the current fashion. I think of my gallery as a mini-museum. I also do not carry mass-market production art which unfortunately is so popular in some galleries, but which I find completely unappealing. Even the prints I have are from local artists.

Second, artists who are local. I like to have the artist be able to come into the gallery and bring their work in person. I have been very happy to discover that there is an enormous amount of art talent in this region, and I am dedicated to promoting it. So far I have not had to look further than about  90 minutes away.I, like most gallery owners, prefer artists who have a large, cohesive body of high quality work. If they are versatile- which is rare- that is a huge plus. For example, one of my more popular artists, Dottie Dunsmore, an instructor at The Zoll School, is amazing in landscape, portraits, still life, and realistic sculpture.

  
Third, and really the most important thing is what I call “mojo”, that hidden spark, the intangible factor that gives the painting or any work of art a soul and makes it come alive.  Mojo exists (or not) in all forms of art, whether painting, photography, sculpture, drawing. It is a matter of finding the art that has it. It is not a matter of technical ability- there is a lot of art that is technically perfect but soulless and has no mojo at all. I am a trained artist and have a very keen eye for spotting  this. Most art does not possess it. 

For example, I represent an emerging artist, Nancy Van Meter, who is a fourth year student at The Schuler School of Fine Art. She is trained in the Classical Realist style, my favorite genre of art. Over the past six months I have sold about a dozen of her paintings- still lifes, landscapes, animals. People love her work because it has an inner spark, an aesthetic quality, similar to the works of the great master painters such as Rembrandt.  



 

More Mojo.  Sara's current favorite is called Soleil Du Matin (Patapsco River, Ellicott City) a pastel painting by local artist Maria Marino. The dramatic colors are phenonmenal, and it has a visceral sense of space and distance. Says Sara, "This piece scores high on the "MojoMeter"!

Custom Framing at  Still Life Gallery 

"When we do custom framing here we adhere to the absolute highest standards, using only archival, museum-quality conservation materials from the mats to the adhesives, which are reversible. In recent years some amazing high-tech materials have been invented that prevent fading and deterioration of art on paper."

When I design framing, I strongly believe in doing what best enhances the piece itself, and try to stick with classic moldings in styles that will not look dated 20 years from now. New molding styles, like fashion, come out once or twice a year, and we of course carry them. Right now among my clients there are certain trends: non-ornamented modern simplicity in silver, copper, cherry, or black; rich, somewhat rustic woods; and the ever-popular wide gold "plein-air" style frame. I always work with the client and show them at least three or four different options and of course they are welcome to pick out whatever grabs their eye from the sample wall and try it out. It's a process that can be quite fun and something I really enjoy.

The best part is seeing my customers' faces light up when I present their beautifully framed art, given new life.

One client I had actually started crying. She had brought in an old, stained, neglected piece depicting a praying Madonna that was done in some sort of shiny raffia-like material. She explained that her grandmother had given it to her before she passed away. It originally came from the church of her village in the Old Country, in Hungary. The fingers and some of the rays of light behind her head were bent, so we fixed them, cleaned it up, and put the piece into a gorgeous delicate gold frame that made it glow. It looked like it was ready to be re-hung in the church. She was in kind of a state of shock when she saw it. I was thrilled that I could make her so happy by framing something that meant so much to her."

 

 Visit the Gallery soon! I go back again and again...

8173 Main St, Ellicott City, MD 21043

Phone: 410-461-1616

Gallery Hours: Wed-Sun 11:00am-6:00pm

www.stilllifegallery.net

https://www.facebook.com/Still.Life.Gallery

Feature content/photos: Kay Weeks & Sara Arditti
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"Like!"

Ice Cream Ambiguities

Memoirs:  
with Margaret Scott

Strawberry ice cream

melting or not,
is what I chose,
and when you chose Chocolate,
we ended up a dull Vanilla compromise--

so I left you.


The car evoked a dying sound,
a small rattle predicting
the end, but I misconstrued,
and brought if back to life—
But it died again.

The cats know; they always do,
but keep their views to themselves,
silently stalking us,
trying to get us to listen!


One is pretending to sleep now.

The addicted man
held out a small paring knife
and suggested he would use it on himself.
I took it away, and put it back in the kitchen drawer.
Every time I used it to cut onions,
I thought of that earlier time.

When the knife mysteriously disappeared,
I let the story go.  Until now…

****


 
Neckties were very narrow at one time,
and he bought and wore one
that looked silly with his bulky frame,
I never said anything because they were the style.

He’s gone, and so I can smile…writing this.

Oh, earrings…never a pair for long!
It was that coral dangling one I miss the most,
evoking some moment I thought was love.

I never found the other.

*****

Again, that glass! 

Themes repeated; goblets crack.
Wine or gin preferred,
but not a good idea right now, I suppose.

So, fizzy water with lime, or lemon!
Or a plastic bottle when I walk--used to run.
The other one left me for another one. I was glad.


****

How I hate my cell phone,
a small silver intruder that has brought me
so much pain when he calls
to rain those hateful words on me!
Yes, I could turn it off!  But then,
I would miss that call from you--

 
And so it goes…



Poetry: Kay Weeks
Art: Margaret Scott

On March 5, 2013  

Motion/Emotion: Paintings by Trudy Babchak

 Walking through The Show with the Artist

Trudy Babchak and I talked about her paintings a little as we walked around The Rouse Company Foundation Gallery, yesterday, January 27.  Her show will be featured here at Howard Community College until March 17, and a reception held on February 13, from 5 to 7 p.m.

 

 

Afterward, I asked whether her paintings in the show seemed more connected thematically or visually. Of course, I already had an opinion. The connection between her paintings is the type: Figurative Art. Trudy paints the figure in solemn isolation or in pairs, or in groups, and sometimes almost as a frieze, or even floating. All figures—girls, boys, women, men, all ages in life and displaying distinct moods through form and color.

Role as Viewer:  I didn’t write much down, because, in the long run, she told me very clearly that she wants the viewer to consider the art itself, without having to put it in words.  I thought about it, and totally agree with this artist.  For the most part, I feel the same way about my poetry; I don’t want to have to explain it.  If the artist or writer or musician does all the work, then what’s the point? And we all know that some pieces will be more emotional to some, than to others.  Now, I do know about and have previously witnessed a background of pain and loss here, both familial and historical, and have written about it in other features on Trudy’s art.  Losing someone close to us in the horrors of war or other violence serves to underscore a sad and repetitive human theme across the ages.

Specifically Trudy: Whether deliciously dancing on ground, perhaps in the clouds, or somewhere above them, to an irony-filled gloss on women in society, to shapely pin-up girls who are shamelessly teasing, Trudy uses broad strokes, impasto, collage, and sometimes, dribbles of paint that look almost like blood, whether that is her intention or not, making a painting even more powerful. 

In a painting that she titles “Exposed,” one naked woman stands helplessly in a row of suits (men) in a kind of simple line up. I found this to be possibly the most compelling societal comment in the show.  With their backs to us, the players seem innocuous enough, but, of course, the statement is beyond verbalization. I sucked in my breath at the abstracted honesty of her painting.

    

The paintings by Trudy Babchak that always stun me to silence, however, are of her family—quiet, flatly produced portraits on doors, some with red backgrounds—of those lost in the Holocaust, or survivors blunted by loss.  They are huge paintings, and I find the details often just as powerful as the whole: For example, pairs of high heels worn by Aunts in the family lost to war; or a face behind a window, imprisoned, that seemingly disintegrates as we look at it.

 

Some of her work is difficult to view and think about (easy to feel) because it comes back at you with such immediacy. We reflect that those in power can prey on and

destroy, both physically and spiritually, those who are vulnerable.  Human beings repeat and repeat the violence toward one another, and one has to wonder if our penchant for fear, hate, envy and rapaciousness will ever go away, or be transformed.   Trudy Babchak’s paintings are neither identified by title nor theme within this show, so the viewer will be able to pay close attention to their dynamism, their raw power.  I love her dancing women, partly because dance and joy in dancing, have been part of my life, and my daughter’s life in particular.

 

Most of Trudy Babchak’s paintings are acrylic, some oil, and although the paintings vary in size, they are connected through motion and emotion, exactly what she named her show. Also, these paintings are displayed in a way that lends itself to her art. Any themes that may have initially been grouped together are not here. The viewer literally moves from joy to questioning, back to joy, to sadness, even despair…round and round. And that is indicative of the life experience.  Don’t miss this one. I plan to go back again, if I can.

By Kay Weeks

January 28, 2013  and posted here on February 7, 2013

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Letter to the Winter Sunrise

You, so filled with giving passion

that I almost have to look away—

Morning lover, I was sad,

But then got caught-up

with your color and my mood moved

from gray to orange to yellow, to red,

and I was saved from dolor,

held fast with you as if we were in bed!

 

This morning, once again

your intense hues fanning out

across my dried-out grass,

held me up, embraced me as a friend,

and nodded now,

respectful, far off-lover.

Sky, all I need, without wanting,

I return again and again,

for direction, and with awe, even disbelief,

but you never fail me, are always there,

So I am coyly thinking

that if we keep meeting like this,

I may, or maybe might, or yes,

would, if you were to someday ask,

even consent to wed you.

Kay Weeks

January 1, 2013

Poem/Photos
In Ellicott City Historic District

A November Walk at Centennial Lake

THIS MORNING AT LAKE CENTENNIAL , the sky held sway over the lake itself. The diverse and swirling clouds made me stumble along while looking into compelling overgrown avenues down to the water. I could only feel awe.  

Not alone--there were bikers, walkers, dog walkers, runners...but I may have been one of a few looking up, then out, then up, and out.  When I got home, I quickly wrote a poem:

November Walk at the Lake

I said a prayer for little birds;

they said a prayer for me.

The universe reached out—it seems—

for what it heard and saw.

We watched the lake absorbing light

and mirrored in our eyes!

Nothing like this in the night,

except some form of dream.

Chartreuse, my scarf

with brown-gloved hands

against that cold north wind;

It whipped around with willful lash,

at play with crisp-browned leaves.

The birds went south

And I to west, then stopped

To count these words—

Nothing out of mouth, all heart,

And I felt good.

November 5, 2012

Centennial Lake, off Route 108 in Columbia, Maryland, is a public park with walking trails and incredible views any time of year. In the summer, it is a popular place to have picnics. Now, people have to be willing to brave the cold and wind.  Always beautiful. You should visit often, and walk...look up and out. The beauty will fill your day, and heart.

Kay D. Weeks
Content and photos.
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