What I Did on My Summer Vacation - at the Zanesville Museum of Art

What else? Created an environment befitting of Narnia's perpetual winter, of course!

The day I delivered this fine art photo "Winter Birdhouse" to the Zanesville Museum of Art, my car thermometer was showing 101 degrees F. It was an absolutely sweltering summer day. But two people at the museum, a son of Adam and a daughter of Eve, smiled and said looking at the photo made them feel cold.

The Ohio Show ran from July 23rd to September 8th, 2011. It was an awesome experience being able to participate in this exhibit as an artist.

As autumn begins and the temperatures start falling my way, I look forward to catching up with everyone I know in the blogosphere to see how your summers fared, as well as to meet new adventurers, like minds, and kindred spirits along the way in seasons to come.

Autumn Kaleidoscope

Autumn scenery featuring the fall foliage in a Southern Ohio woodland as seen through the looking glass of imagination. A long way down into the gorge so that you could almost get dizzy by just looking. A drenching downpour of rain gave everything that day a soft and indistinct dreamy watercolor feel. This photo was taken way back in October of 2004. A special effect has been added in Photoshop to further convey the mood.

My reappearance on this blog signals the changing seasons with their pleasantly falling temperatures. As we move into autumn's beauty, winter can't be too far away.

And this blog existing as it does within Narnia, that's just fine by me ...

Treasures from the Winter Realm of Narnia

* Disclaimer: Those sons of Adam or daughters of Eve awaiting the arrival of spring will not find it here in this realm. This is a flower-free zone. Lion-free as well, for it's not March just yet, at any rate! *

Due to a recent ice storm, all the trees in Narnia remained frozen solid and encased in ice or snow for two straight days. The ice took on a pleasing appearance of glittering silvery crystal.

The sun rose as though lighting a giant ice sparkler.

Another view of that same dawn from farther back.

Feathery snow-laden branches under a noonday sky of refreshing blue.

Enjoy the beauty of the season!

Go Light Your World

"I hope you like your present this year. It's really not much." So said a dear friend of mine this past Christmas. Seems many of us find ourselves on a budget these days.

I assured my friend that in fact I loved the candle. It was green. It was vegan. It smelled good ... like " fir, pine, and an earthy smokiness from the fireplace" according to the description. So I kept my Christmas Hearth candle from AuntieDis Etsy shop right by the computer along with a lighter.

Good thing. The power went out this past Sunday night just after I'd taken dinner out of the oven, and my flashlight batteries didn't work. Ah, the simple pleasure of enjoying chicken, rice, and rosé wine by comforting candlelight rather than in the unsettling pitch darkness of a blackened apartment complex.

Better to light one candle than curse the darkness. And even better to give light and joy to a friend.

This candle came from an Etsy shop called AuntieDis, which you can visit at the following link:

http://www.etsy.com/shop/AuntieDis

The photo below was taken by AuntieDis and shows the listing for the Christmas Hearth Candle:

Blocking Off Time ...

.. as a chip off the old ice block, of course! Above is another icy abstract, a moment frozen in time transformed into an iridescent panel of art.

Have you blocked off time to be creative this week? Would you like to? How so? What would you do? Or do you find yourself frozen up against a creative block? If so, you may wish to take a little time off and think outside the blocks.

Here's the original icy pond soaking in the winter sun:


Enjoy the seasonal beauty!

Chickadee Abstract in Blue and Brown

The above is my entry for this month’s Wilderness Art Challenge on a blog of the same name hosted by the esteemed painter Gary Keimig. Here’s a link to his blog:

http://wildernessartchallenge.blogspot.com/

While this challenge is mainly geared to painters, I enter fine art photos on occasion. I do my best to either make my photo entry look painterly, or at least very different from the original photo that Gary posts to inspire our creativity. In this case, “Chickadee Abstract in Blue and Brown” comes from a photo he posted of a Mountain Chickadee.

Participating in the Wilderness Art Challenge is fun. Anyone interested go check it out. I’m sure you’ll be welcome to join in!

Spring Cleaning Giveaway Winners for February

Congratulations to the two winners:

Nancy -- you have won Springtime Vision!

Allison -- you have won Farmer's View!

Please e-mail me with your addresses, Nancy and Allison, so that I can send out your prizes. My e-mail address is:

the_phoenix_42@yahoo.com

Here's how the winners were selected:

It was a case of "pick a card, any card," doubled. Since there were only eleven entrants, I decided to choose the two winners by drawing two playing cards from eleven playing cards, with the ace being number one and the jack being number eleven. The first card I selected was an ace, and Nancy being the first entrant and first winner won first choice of photos. The second card I selected was a five, and Allison being the fifth entrant and second winner won second choice of photos.

Because this giveaway was fun and my studio still needs some spring cleaning, I'll be planning another giveaway. Stay tuned!

Happy St. Valentine’s Day

Sending you greetings inspired by Mother Teresa of Calcutta. All the quotes below are taken from a book of her daily meditations called “Love: A Fruit Always in Season,” edited by Dorothy S. Hunt.

“Love is a fruit in season at all times and within the reach of every hand. Anyone may gather it and no limit is set. Everyone can reach this love through meditation, prayer, sacrifice and an intense inner life.”

“Let us learn to love in our family. In our own family we may have very poor people and we do not notice them. We have no time to smile, no time to talk to each other. Let us bring that love, that tenderness into our own home and you will see the difference.”

“Let us not love in words but let us love until it hurts. It hurt Jesus to love us: He died for us. And today it is your turn and my turn to love one another as Jesus loved us. Do not be afraid to say yes to Jesus.”

“Let us become real branches, filled with fruit, on Jesus’ vine. Let us welcome Him into our lives whenever He wants to come in. He comes as Truth which must be spoken, as Life which must be lived, as Light which must be reflected, as Love which must be loved, as the Way which we must take, as Happiness which we must spread, as Peace which we must plant, as Sacrifice which we must offer in our families and with our neighbors – whether near or far.”

Winter Stream on Exhibit at the Market Street Art Center in Lockport, New York

Last Saturday, I had an opening reception to attend at a local art gallery … two states away, in Lockport, NY with snow forecast. My photo shown above, "Winter Stream," is currently on display there until March 18, 2011. Normally there are huge obstacles in my path whenever I take on a major venture related to art, spiritual battles like a last-minute illness or car trouble. This time there was simply a sense of not wanting to travel.

Good thing I went. Sometimes, it’s not about the art after all.

My photo was hung on the second floor. But it was the first floor painting exhibit I was meant to see.

My dad died some months ago. Just a couple weeks ago, dad showed up in a dream asking me if I was going to watch the stars. We had gone stargazing and watched shooting stars for many years, in the town of Lockport where both the dream and then the art show took place. The first floor paintings … many were titled with “Dream” or "Vision" and contained shooting stars. The more I walked through Andy Russell's exhibit, the more shooting stars I saw.

Below is a link to an example of Andy Russell's work. It happens to be called "Heaven's Window." And yes, it contains a shooting star ...

http://www.andyrussell.com/hwindow.htm

As Requested by Allison ... Heeeeeere's a Cleveland University Skyline!

In the comments for my last post, "Skywatch Whenever," Allison asked, "How about a sky shot of the Cleveland skyline? Or the sky above the buildings?"

Well now. As a rule, I hate cities.

So this photo from January 30, 2006 is a real rarity. It's a shot of a sunset over Cleveland State University in downtown Cleveland, Ohio.

If you look real close, you can see the silhouette of a seagull ...

Skywatch Whenever

There's a reason why I don't participate in the Skywatch Friday meme.

It's because I live in Cleveland. Which means, there's no guarantee you'll get a sky to watch on Friday. Better to just grab one whenever ... * grin *

So here's a sky from earlier this evening. Enjoy!

A Dance of Winter Sun

Ice is filled with creative possibilities.

The painterly photo above shows just one way in which nature can be transformed into abstract art.

Here's the original icy pond, which has a pretty cool pattern in its own right as the sunlight dashes across its slippery surface:


Enjoy the seasonal beauty!

Groundhog Day in Narnia

Dear Punxsutawney Phil,

You may have noticed the sounds of Dwarvish construction last night while you slept. Lots of shovels, axes, hammers ...

My Dwarves have hewn out a marvelously long staircase which you must climb in order to discover whether or not you can see your shadow to make your prediction about the six more weeks of winter or an early spring. Well as you know, it’s cold out there, and those stairs are snow-laden and treacherously slippery.

So if it were me, I simply wouldn’t bother. It’s not really worth the trouble, is it? Much better to enjoy a nice piece of Turkish Delight with a cup of tea, go back to bed, snuggle up under the covers, and carry on with hibernation.

Most sincerely and as ever with your own best interests at heart,

I remain,

Jadis

Queen of Narnia

Spring Cleaning Giveaway – This or That, Part I

Two lucky blog readers will have a chance to win a 5x7 fine art photo matted to 8x10.

With tomorrow being Groundhog Day, many of you will be looking forward to things like flowers and warm weather, and envisioning scenes thereof. While the good news is that here in the realm of Narnia on my blog, winter with its lovely ice and snow will continue, at least I can get into the spirit of things by taking this opportunity to do some early “spring cleaning” in my studio.

How the giveaway works:

You can win either a matted 5x7 print of Springtime Vision, which is the photo shown above at the top of this blog entry, or you can choose a matted 5x7 print of one of the other following photos from this list:

1. Fall Reflection
2. Farmer’s View
3. Leaf Harvest Road
4. Road to the Shire
5. Springtime Vision

To see what the photos in the list look like, you may visit my Etsy shop at the following link:

http://www.etsy.com/shop/CountryDreaming

Then simply leave a comment below letting me know which photo you’d like to win. Two winners will be randomly selected two weeks from now. The winners can then e-mail me their home addresses so I can send out the prizes.

All sons of Adam and daughters of Eve are eligible to participate in this giveaway.

Ice Orchard in Pale Blue

Mapleside Farms in Brunswick, Ohio has been a landmark for nearly a hundred years. For the past several, I've wondered what would become of this place with its apple orchard, reflecting pond, and wide open spaces. It was rumored that the land would be sold off to housing developers. In fact, some of it was.

This has always been my favorite spot to go for sunset photos. It's like stepping away from the overly-technological world for a few moments into a timeless realm filled with the quiet and beauty of nature.

The latest news is that Mapleside Farms has a new owner, who plans to both preserve it for people to enjoy as well as to open it up more for people to enjoy. I will simply hope that this place continues on as a superb haven for photography.

Paintbrush Dream

The above is my entry for this month’s Wilderness Art Challenge on a blog of the same name hosted by the esteemed painter Gary Keimig. Here’s a link to his blog:

http://wildernessartchallenge.blogspot.com/

While this challenge is mainly geared to painters, I enter fine art photos on occasion. I do my best to either make my photo entry look painterly, or at least very different from the original photo that Gary posts to inspire our creativity. In this case, “Paintbrush Dream” comes from a photo he posted of the Wyoming state flower known as Indian Paintbrush.

Participating in the Wilderness Art Challenge is fun. Anyone interested go check it out. I’m sure you’ll be welcome to join in!

Team Turkey or Team Deer?

Once upon a winter in the Hocking Hills of Ohio ...

Swooping on in, these turkeys are on a mission, fixing to look for some breakfast feed scattered around like hidden treasure. You've heard of turkey in the straw, this is turkey in the snow!

Not so fast, I’m a little bit bigger than you, even if I’m just a cute and oh-so-innocent fawn. Now skedaddle!

If looks could kill? No, actually I heard that this one poor turkey always has trouble flying in awkwardly and falling down when landing. Watch your step!

Throw Another Log on the Fire

It's c-c-cold out there! Why, it's cold in here, too! A mite drafty at that, ain't it? But you can't beat the scenery when it comes to providing crisp, clear, snow-covered, evergreen-adorned fine winter atmosphere.

Took this photo down in the Hocking Hills region of Southern Ohio while staying at Painted Valley Farm bed and breakfast in February 2007. This unfinished cabin was setting in part of the innkeepers' (or should I say farmkeepers'?) driveway. I looked through one of the windows (there was no glass in the window, just a square hole in the logs) with my camera to get this shot.

Rustic life is surely the life for me!

How about you?

Tie Dye Twilight and the Wide Open Abstract Realm of Possibility

A surreal white sun reflects into the waters of the Dreamkeeper Pond at evening twilight. The sky comes alive, glowing fantastically with the sheen of precious copper and gold metals enhanced by shades of electric turquoise blue stone.

There's so much possibility in landscapes like this!