may the wind deal kindly with us may the fire remember our names may springs flow, rain fall again may the land grow green, may it swallow our mistakes we begin the work may it continue the great transmutation may it continue a new heaven and a new earth may it continue may it continue - DIANE DI PRIMA
7 Comments
You doing ok in there? Yep, just don't bend over, or look up, or look down, or lift anything, or fall down or bang into things. Hmmm, well that is awfully restrictive! How about if I just lift this thing? Well, ok, but tomorrow could be iffy. Iffy? Uh huh. You might be in some pain. Might be? Yes, I can never say for sure. And why not? I mean, you are the actual bones, right? Yes, well, I am also prone to sudden mood changes. Don't get. me wrong, I love my bones! I am grateful for their reslience and tenacity. But I sometimes delight in portraying my bones as unpredictibly monstrous. Somehow it feels better to imagine a moody monster within than a slowly crumbling structure of minerals. And my bones like being seen as sassy, anyway. How about you, dear reader - what is always at your back?
Here is the final installment of the wonderful and surprising Questions Exchange with Dotty Seiter. My last question for Dotty, and her response in poetry: Aperitif - when you look back at your body of work, written and painted/drawn/scribbled/collaged and the life you have lived making all of that, what do you see and feel? digestif after yoga class, the poet-artist gives her friend a ride home and her friend says, wanna join me for lunch? sure!, she says, and they poke around her kitchen and cobble together what they decide to upgrade to a “luncheon," finding a little of this and a little of that to fill the roles of appetizer (tortilla chips), soup (tomato juice), salad (celery sticks), main course (tuna sandwich), and dessert (frozen thin mint cookies), at which point her friend says with mock solemnity and a faux haughty voice, would you care for an aperitif? uh, the poet-artist hesitates, isn't the drink at the end of a meal called a digestif ? which hits their funny-bones and sets them to laughing hilariously. still laughing, the poet-artist stands up and asserts, what do we care what it's called!, i don't want a drink anyway, best digestif to my way of thinking is a post-prandial passeggiata. perfect, says her friend, and she adds as they begin walking, i have a question i've been wanting to run past you— you've been painting for almost 12 years now, and writing blog posts for all those years and now poetry as well. when you look back at your body of work, written and painted and drawn and scribbled and collaged and wordsmithed, and you look at the life you have lived making all of that, what do you see and feel? the poet-artist takes only a few steps before she replies: i remember in first grade having to color a mimeographed page of circles with color words printed below them. you know, like BROWN PURPLE GREEN, and so forth. i began coloring, easy-peasy, and then before i could even finish coloring the second circle my teacher walked by and told me i was coloring the circles the wrong way-- the RIGHT way was to move my crayon round and round and not from side to side. which i knew was just plain stupid. the writing and painting and drawing and scribbling and collaging and wordsmithing i've done for the past dozen years, and the life i have lived making all that art and all those poems feels like i went back to the day before the mimeograph page landed on my desk and shifted my body just one degree in a different direction and scribbled my way into the best whole-arted life ever. --dotty seiter
And now it is time for the next exchange of questions with the incredibly talented Dotty Seiter! My next question for Dotty: Dessert - what is the sweetest, most decadent and delicious part of your creative life? dessert dessert for the poet as she walks rue saint-denis in montréal is a mamie clafoutis oh mon dieu croissant, a classic flaky buttery french pastry filled with a substantial core of rich chocolate ganache, drizzled with dark chocolate and dusted with confectioner's sugar. dessert for the poet as she listens to an audio novel while she walks her own massachusetts neighborhood is the italian word fermata, a word new to her that might never have caught her ear had she not had a nearly finished draft of a poem awaiting final tweaks for which fermata becomes its oh mon dieu croissant! --dotty seiter
I've been following the monks who are walking for peace, and find this so comforting at thiis time.
And so I leave you today with their words: When peace, compassion, and loving-kindness shine in our hearts, all the barriers that seemed to divide us simply dissolve-- and what remains is the beautiful truth we might have forgotten: we were never strangers, only family and friends who hadn’t yet recognized each other. May you and all beings be well, happy, and at peace.
About the art: beginning with a piece of gesso'd Yupo, I created a mask in the shape of the critters and boat and painted around them with a thin layer of background paint. I use the mask technique when my hands feel uncoordinated (hello, arthritis!) and I want to be sure to get the composition and placement just right. Once the initial background layer was dry, I worked exclusively on the characters first, building the layers and details from the heads and faces outward. Then the sail and moon, then the boat. While those layers dried, more pinks and plums in the sky and movement in the sea. A final layer of detail on the characters and the boat, and one more layer on the background. After a couple weeks of thorough drying, a final layer of varnish over the whole shebang to really make the colors pop. The Question Exchange with the amazing Dotty Seiter continues! Here is my question number three for Dotty, and her gobsmackingly gorgeous response: Main Course - if creating was a main course (a sandwich, even!), what would it be and why? piatto principale the main course of creating, according to my poet/artist friend's way of thinking, is not a particular meal or dish but, instead, an actual course-- a flow, a pathway, a series of illuminating moments, an alchemy, a transcendence, a transformation, a lived experience highly sensory and immediate, a space outside of time and place, a threshold consciousness with which she becomes one, inhabiting it as it inhabits her, animated by generative energy and invigorating tension that resolve at the intersection of process and product no matter the process, no matter the product. in other words, not beef wellington, not quiche lorraine, not shrimp diavolo, but a life force that sustains her from the outside in and the inside out. buon appetito! --dotty seiter
While Dotty and I continue our Question Exchange over the coming weeks, a new winner and a new exchange will begin! Congratulations to Diana D. - you're the winner of the December Reader Giveaway! Huzzah! Send a message to me at [email protected] and let me know what method of exchange works best for you. I am looking forward to it!
Many thanks to all who have read, viewed and listened to the Question Exchanges over the last couple of months. Upon reflection, I am certain I personally feel enriched beyond expectation by the entire process! Anyone who is interested in participating in a future exchange please reach out to me at [email protected] and I'll gladly leap into it with you! For now, blog comments will be just that - comments! Thank you for them! Your readership and participation make this whole blog space sparkly and so very rewarding! xo
It is more difficult for me to check in than to measure. More challenging to probe and question than to analyze. But there is gold in them thar hills, and I am excited to go looking for it. I put one foot in the river and smile. Despite the whole world seeming to run amok with madness and mayhem, what is real, what is possible here in this very moment is good. Very, very good. I am curious - do you have end of year practices in your world?
About the art: another dive into the Sea of Shenanigans in the SS Malarkey, this time with Rocky the Crow. Rocky insisted on a fancier boat than the others, with a full crew below deck. Beginning with a piece of gesso'd Yupo, I drew the figure and boat loosely with a brush. Working from the outside-in to refine the figure and begin to tease out an abstracted sky and sea by using washes of light, neutral colors. A long drying time. Then building layers on crow and boat, taking time to develop the darks and lights. Wet into wet, then a drying time and wet onto dry. More layers for the background colors and then the background and sea darks - layer after layer until the drama appeared. More drying, then a layer of varnish to protect the paint and to make all the darks pop even more. Ta-da! One happy corvid on his tiny fancy boat. And now it's time to continue the Question Exchange with the inspirational artist and writer Dotty Seiter! First up, my second question for Dotty and her answer in poetry form. 2. now that you’re there, how do you usually begin, and is just beginning sometimes enough? =====soup and salad gotta say, i never tire of watching my friend who writes poems and makes art. here she is in soup-and-salad mode in her creative space, no recipe i can see, no mise en place. she just grabs whatever might serve her rough "plan" and begins with a turn of phrase, then maybe a simile. if she can't recall a word she wants, well, too bad, she uses a different one, keeps tasting and adding to the soup pot as she creates; anything goes. same with the salad bowl, she tosses in a bit of linework, a brushstroke of color, making occasional slight adjustments, and mostly plays like a child on a playgound, running with giddy freedom from one thing to the next. if something barely begun tastes great, she calls it done. if bright flavors and pleasing combos build happily, but she runs short of time or ingredients, no worries—she puts everything under refrigeration, returns later, resumes tossing and tasting. leaves me breathless, i tell you, leaves me hankering for the main course. —dotty seiter Get to know Dotty, her art, her dazzling writing and her rhythmic creativity at dottyseiter.com Dotty's second question for me, and my answer in art (with words to further elucidate).
Thank you to everyone who followed this blog along its journey in 2025! Your comments, emails, texts, messages and letters are a source of joy and wonderment to me. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
Leave a comment to be automatically entered to win the final Reader Giveaway of 2025! Someone will win a Question Exchange of their own, in the format they prefer, to be revealed in 2026. Ready? Set? GO!
For each of us, this cannot help but become a very personal examination - what does this mean for me? For those around me? For my neighborhood, for my city? What does it mean for my mental and emotional health and for my physical wellbeing? We are, each one of us, messy and marvelous. The spotlight seems to be on the messy part right now. And so we hone our investigations to focus on the beauty, the kindness, the tenderness and the hope. Yep, there are still the thousand knives poking and prickling and prodding. We are still here, still sitting, still marvelous. About the art: inspired by misty views as I walk across the bridge toward the city in the morning. I began with a gesso'd wood panel and drew a rough geometric composition in pencil. A wash of darks across the center line and a wash of lights across sky and water. Rough dabs of treeness and building-ness draaaaaaaaagged with a rubber wedge up and down, side to side. Resisting the urge to define. Allowing the shapes to be blurred as they were in the fog and mist, a paper towel to smudge them some more. A final coat of varnish to seal the deal. The first installment of a Question Exchange with Dotty S, who brilliantly suggested using poetry for her answers, which prompted me to create art in conjunction with my answers! Out of the box and out of this world! Here was my first question for Dotty, with her response following: An invitation to dine. I find myself wondering what it would be like if we sat down and had a meal together - just a casual, long lunch between friends. And so, here is the menu! Appetizers - what whets your appetite for writing and painting, makes you want to go there, do that? appetizers the everyday no-nonsense part of a particular artist i know leans toward eat-to-live rather than live-to eat. this gal, god love her, doesn't snack, rarely nibbles while she preps food, is disinclined to have any kind of happy hour where she sits out on the back deck before a meal to whet her appetite with crackers or cheese or chips or hummus or crudités or hard cider. she'd sooner take a walk than eat a snack, sooner have her fill at the table than at the stove, sooner read than partake before dinner. however, the part of her that shows up to write poems and paint? that gal has a different story altogether! she is all about snacks, always has an eye out for appetizers, is not shy whatsoever about loading up the cocktail plate she carries at all times in her pocket, cannot curb the gusto with which her hungry self reaches for starters! a sliver of shadow? she begins salivating. canapés of calendula and coreopsis? she grabs a handful. an amuse-bouche of seeing her neighbor watering her garden on a summer morning? pass her the recipe. an hors d'oeuvre of grief? she's unafraid to roll it around on her tongue to explore its depth of bittersweet. an antipasto of kandinsky concentric circles? bring on the hot sauce. consider yourself forewarned: when she starts noshing, do not get in her way. --dotty seiter
The December Reader Giveaway continues! Leave a comment on any blog post this month to be automatically entered. One lucky commenter will win their own Question Exchange, to be defined in the way which suits them best! I can hardly wait! xo
I am becoming increasingly dismayed by the erasure of facts. The annihilation of evidence. The replacement of truth. It's up in my craw, twisting my britches and ruffling my feathers. Much of my life has been filled with gaslighters, manipulators and the attempted obliteration of Lola. And so, these larger trends in the world feel deeply personal and prickly. One day at a time. Holding fast to what I know to be true, I stay the course down the river, which keeps speaking of rivers.
Thanks so much for all the comments, emails messages and feeback about the Question Exchange series on YouTube! I'm just delighted! The exchange with November winner Dotty S is underway (and is going to be something out of the box!). In the meantime, the December Giveaway is ON! Leave a comment on any blog post this month to be automatically entered!
About the art: this piece is painted over an epic failed painting on copper panel. The beauty of the paint-over is all that delicious added texture! I covered the original piece with a thick layer of neutral colored oil paint and let it dry throughly, then sketched the main character and boat with a mid-sized brush and thinned oil paint. Working outside-in to refine the shapes, then inside-out to build layers on the dog and the boat. The background was completed last, using thick layers of paint and alternating between brush and palette knife. Voila! Here are the final two installements of the Question Exchange with the amazing Carl Stoveland! Take a look/listen and please let me know what you think, either by commenting on YouTube or here in the blog. Last month's winner had a masterful idea of how to ask each other five questions in a most creative way - I can hardly wait to share the results! In the meantime, leave a comment on any blog post this month to be automatically entered in the December Reader Giveaway. I've got questions! Maybe you do, too?
About the art: beginning with a gesso'd piece of canvas paper, I sketched the figure, sail and boat roughly with thinned oil paint. For this piece, it was important to resist adding too many colors - shades of green, this one, with a bit of blue in the background. Pippi stands out because of her hair and skin tones, which were developed over many layers. Canvas paper wants a lot of layers to build deep colors, and this one was no exception. There is a point, however, where the piece crosses from "needs more" to "ooooooooh la la!" I didn't always know that, and abandoned paintings too soon in the past as a result. But not this one! Pippi kept encouraging me, as she does. Yay.
|
AuthorLola Jovan 
Categories
All
|
