Art Book Love

Oh what a find at Good People Books in Austin! How cool is this? I know, I know, your heart isn’t going pitter patter, but mine is. :)

Self Portrait, Part the Fourth

Well, here we go again! Find my three previous posts down below this within the past few days.  I’m continuing my self portrait, as described by this stack of books. Oops... I chose the wrong pic - me and my son... and it’s too good to delete, so... this picture is of me and my son! We just finished having lunch at the BIGGEST RESTAURANT IN TEXAS, The Oasis, on beautiful Lake Travis. :)

Now, back to the self portrait... let’s see if I can do better ...

Here we are. All right, I’m moving my way downward, and have arrived at Bernini. Oh, Bernini, how I love you! I was so excited to meet your work in person when we were in Roma, and my love for you has not dimmed! Michelangelo did a great work.  You built upon that work. You took the idea of his gorgeous figures further by adding emotion and muscle tension. Your sculptures are alive with emotion and feeling, right down to their very toes! I love this book as well because, well, it’s a Phaidon book, and Phaidon knows how to do things right.  You can count on Phaidon to produce beautiful stuff.  It even smells good.  Don’t you just love a book that smells good?  Also, I use this book almost every year in my art classes.  Soo handy for so many reasons.

The Complete Van Gogh.  I love his work. I sympathize with his lot in life, which, try as he would he could not seem to improve.  That he could create such beauty - it’s just a wonderful thing.  Also he’s Dutch.  So am I. We Dutch artists have to stick together.  Visiting the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam, home of MY PEOPLE is a memory that I cherish.

Down on the far right you see a little Latin dictionary.  I know I already covered Latin earlier, but Latin is really just so important to me, that it’s an ongoing thing. Just today I was reading semi-historical fiction about 14th century Norway, and so much Latin comes up in it.  It’s everywhere, and nice to understand it when it comes along.

Enough for this post! We are getting there! I believe I now have four books and a wooden toad left to explain.  See ya in Part the Fifth!

Bookish Self Portrait

Well, I decided to do another self portrait, this one with books.  I walked around the house for a couple days and gathered the books that have been so important to me that they have come to represent me, and this gathering is actually a pretty telling portrait.  How shall we begin? How about top to bottom?

Nature in Winter. Ahh.... all the field guides we have used over the years, beginning when I was a child feeding and identifying birds, progressing to teaching our own children about everything under the sun.  The guides are pretty much all gone now, but this one is too beautiful and special.  I love it.

Wicked Plants. Noah gave me this one for Christmas and it is a plethora of creepy, delightful information about plants that KILL and TORTURE. I have an intimate relationship and deep working interest in plants and this one is just plain fun.  

Next to that is Dragon’s Fat Cat by Dav Pilkey. Oh, Dav, how I do love thee and your quirky, colorful Dragon books! I agree with your admiration of VanGogh and your continual nods to him in your children’s books! I have read them to my own children and to scores of students over the years.

The Heart of the Artist.  This is a sweet and inspiring book.  God has given us gifts, artist friends.  So must we use them.

Good Poems by my dear friend (although he doesn’t know it) Garrison Keillor.  For ... oh, how long was he on the air with Prairie Home Companion anyway? 30 years?  I can count my listening time back to 198...4?  His shows and work have given me great laugh-out-loud joy for many years.  He also had a program that was literally maybe three minutes long where he would read and discuss one poem.  Just found this book and I’m loving it.  But although it’s new, it represents a long history, and also represents my love of both reading and writing poetry.

One more book, and then I’ll post this, or my writing will be too long and put you to sleep!  The next - How Should We Then Live? This one is deep.  I’ve read it many times over the years and glean new gems with each re-reading. It has helped me to form and solidify my philosophy on how we should view, understand, produce and discuss art, and how to live our lives in relationship to art.  It’s a really beautiful, beautiful and timeless reference.

There is a marked difference in this last picture, in fact, I forgot something extremely important to my personhood. In fact, it was so important to me that I had to add it in and redo the photo shoot the next day.  Can you see what it is? See if you can figure it out before you look at my answer UNDER it at the bottom of this article. :)

Yep.  Musica.  That sheet of music at the bottom is not a book, but represents hundreds of music books I have laying around the house holding little impromptu jam sessions when no one is looking. I have long loved and played piano, flute and piccolo in every imaginable situation. Words cannot express how music has enriched my life.

They say that music itself is a language, and I am certain of that! So, I am extremely fluent in two languages, and pretty good and downright dangerous in several others. :)

Now, I’m going to post this and continue with my ramblings in the next post!  See you!