books, gifts, quotes, gratitude

new friend and muse

Am always buying books, for many reasons, one might just be to expand my mind, the more I read the larger it becomes, a desire* I inherited from my mother, another reason being to move as it were in a different space, to relax even.

from right to left:

LaceLady quoted Gaston Bachelard in her comment over at Grace's the other day in her post 'touching in'. I had never even heard of him but LaceLady's comment made me very curious to learn more, I set about ordering a copy of 'The Poectics of Space'.....

and as I was browsing in the webshop 'In praise of shadows' was recommended (you all know how that works) which looked/sounded intriguing, so I popped that into my basket as well. Agatha Christie's an all time favourite of mine and I'm always on the lookout for titles I haven't yet read...although this one 'Black Coffee' was originally written as a play, it has been 'novelised' by her grandson Charles Osborne.

The reason I buy rather than borrow is because I tend to read English(American) literature and the local library is badly stocked for my kind of needs, one has to order and then wait and then go into town and then return the books intact, too much hassle. Another thing is I'm not precious with my books, I make notes in them and read whilst eating and/or drinking, they travel with me, I fold the pages! Not something one does with books that don't belong to one.

Last week the mycelium gang visited De Pont museum in Tilburg for the Rafaela Vogel exhibition, which was quite a challenge as far as art goes; she's by no means an easy artist to understand, however she does get the little grey cells moving and shaking.....during our coffee-break in the museum garden we discussed all sorts of [art-related] subjects and what did we think of video-art and we sort of agreed we found that to be quite difficult most of the time, surely not our favourite but we had spoken too soon! We returned indoors and lo-and-behold found ourselves captivated by one of Rafaela's videos! At the end of our visit I ended up with two favourites: her video Uterusland and A Woman's Sportscar. I read in the newspaper that this car, a yellow Triumph, once belonged to the artists mother, how cool is that.....Of course we all went to the museum shop, where I bought two art books. One's an intimate portrait of Louise Bourgeois whom I adore. The other Women's Work, from feminine arts to feminist art is chock-a-block with female artists, some well known others much less so (to me at least) and it has a beautiful spine.

It was not until the next day I got to truly open the books and browse properly, I was treated to yet another surprise in the Louise Bourgeois book. It is basically a photo album full of intimate photographs of her studio and home plus several of her quotes, but guess what? Quote number two in this book is Gaston Bachelard's, a name I had not even heard of up until a week ago!

Talk about a small world, or moving in certain circles.....it's like yet another thread woven from continent to continent.

'At first, I felt proud when someone said, "Your work looks like a man did it." Then I realised that was stupid.' Annette Messager, in The New York Times, 2007

hahahahaha, cracked me up this did, oh how I recognised this from my artschool days

 

the intimacy is not just in this book, but here in my studio as well, where animals dwell and visit

Books on one of my favourite tables which is situated in the Dog-Room, I guess I've read half of them.

The table is one I remember well from two family homes: the one in Maastricht where my parents lived for 49 years and I spent 10 years of my life, the house before that in Brigg UK, where we all lived for 5 years (1966-71). I'm afraid I don't know that much about it, one of those things one forgets to ask. It stood in our nursery in the UK and we often turned it upside-down to serve as a ship.....back in Holland it moved to my brother's bedroom - we all got seperate bedrooms in Maastricht - and it stayed there up until it moved in with us. It's a sturdy piece of furniture, that has been in constant use now for as long as I can remember.

 

'snap' Grace

I spend a lot of time scouring the earth before my feet as I walk, always have done, in search of let's call them treasures or lucky finds........if I'm on a beach I'll be looking for shells with holes in them, or heart-shaped stones, on the woods paths tiny toads, where ever I am I seem to always notice a feather or two, I even collected rusty objects for a while. With two hunters in the family there is a sure supply of bones and whatnot. I once found Sally a pair of glasses. A few days ago something that resembled a tiny hand caught my eye and as I knelt down to take a picture I realised is was a hand, I think it belonged to a mole. Moles feature in my short stories and paintings, one Mr.Mole has moved into the Dwelling.

thank you Liz, your badge finally found the perfect recipient and place

the bright white mugs together with the milk and cream bottles were a present from my sister who came to lunch, now the Dwellers want her to come for tea too! 

has anyone ever seen grass curl up like this

I haven't

this year there have been so many damselflies in our garden!

 * I wasn't sure if I could mention our Gathering at the Well, but then I saw Grace touched upon it in several posts, leading me to believe it would be okay to share a doodle of mine; it was made during our last session August 12, where someone referred to Grace's invention the Meter of Desire in 'light hearted', my mind and hand tend to wander doggie-style...

the book so far

addendum: the quote in the book isn't mine, it's something I heard during Summer Camp sessions with Carla Sonheim (online zoom class I participated in this July)

I don't know if it's an age thing but I find there is so much to be grateful for these days, how 'bout you?