Valentine's day Crafting project with "Art Angels" in your own home

Are you looking for something fun and magical to do on Valentines day? 2pm on Sunday, February 14th join us on line for a little dreamy fun.

Art Angels, my dear friend Lisa Marie and I, will present a cozy crafting virtual Valentines event in the privacy of your own home. It is a perfect opportunity for both individuals or couples who would like to manifest the life they've been dreaming of. We will do this by collaging colors, words and images onto a 3D, made from recycled cardboard, bird house or "Love Shack" if you will.

February 14th is the traditional day birds look for their mates and start to prepare a nest. Our crafting session will begin with a short meditation embracing our intentions for our Love Shacks (love birds optional) You will be provided with a template to make a 3D "birdhouse/loveshack", or you can channel your inner architect and fashion one on your own. Then we will treat the surfaces as if they were a vision board! Using magazines, colored paper, pens or any coloring agent you have, we will decorate our "love shacks" with the intention of manifesting all our dreams. This is a powerful move and it really works!

So join us for the fun as we share tidbits and advice while you work! Spaces are limited but you are welcome to do it on your own or have a lover or friends in your own house. This will be fun. In addition, we can guide you with a recipe to make your own love bird sculptures with whatever you have in the kitchen.
Email your interest and Paypal donation to Tillystudio@aol.com, then we will send you the link to join us.

Supplies for everyone: Recycled  thin card board (cereal boxes: preferred)
Scissors, tape, Glue, Colored Tissue paper, Magazines, something to color with.
Dough love bird recipe (upon request)
Cost: $0 - $10.00 Donations accepted

Calendar 2021

 I've been able to print a limited edition of 2021 calendars for purchase this year. Called "Better Late than Never" the thirteen art images are those of mine that transport me to different places. It seemed an obsession with the current lack of our ability to travel freely or make plans. The last year, with the Covid-19 virus, the fiery mean-spirited politics and the intense global weather, was one we all would like to see behind us. There were many silver linings to be sure, but I think it fair to say that it was hard for all of us. So let us start anew together!

The calendar sells for $25 (shipping USA included) and is easily purchased thru Venmo, PayPal or checks in the USPS. Email me directly for yours (tillystudio@aol.com) and be sure to include an address for shipment. 

They are shipped in hand printed envelopes carrying the inspiring images of flight.

January features an acrylic painting done on site, plein aire. It is a snow covered creek at the edge of our property. In civil war times, (1870's), the creek fed a saw and gristmill, upon whose crumbling foundations I sat when I painted this. I love the way the water eats at the snow bank, and in the spring and summer we watch for red efts and listen for frogs. It must have been a lot busier 150 years ago. Hard to imagine but great to try!

February features images from my dad's sugar shack- another place that for three weeks of the year, transports you to an alchemists den. He stokes the fire under the evaporator and after the sap boils we pour the sweet syrup into bottles!

These are just two of the 13 works of art included in this year's calendar. Supplies limited. Hoping to sell out by the month's end.

 

Why I collect art?

 To be totally truthful, I can't answer this.

But there is some history and a flash point I can share.

I've grown up among artists and always enjoyed walls, cabinets, shelves and lawns full of art. My parent's friends and my grandparents all had amazing collections or were creators themselves. So there was always lots of art around. Not only did it tone the atmosphere of the settings, but a surplus lay stacked under beds, lined racks in the basement and moldered in rolls up in the attic. 

Then there was my Selina Trieff moment. 

I was 20 years old and living in Boston, and it was a weekday I had off of my gallery job. Suddenly, with no plans, I took the Provincetown ferry out to Cape Cod. Strolling along the shops, I found my way into the Berta Walker Gallery where there was a show of oil and gold leaf portraits by Trieff, a mysterious artist who lived and worked from 1934 to 2015. Looking at the picture above, a painting I eventually had to buy, I had a visceral reaction: shivers on my limbs, a spinning in my head. I left the gallery for fresh air and spent the rest of the afternoon looking at other pieces of art in other galleries. No matter what I was looking at, this painting of Trieff's kept floating in front of my eyes! I had to have it. I had fallen in love. Negotiating with the gallery I set up a plan for installments and soon was able to bring her home. It has been almost 40 years and 4 homes since then. I love looking at it everyday. I wonder at the texture and the mark-making, the way her dark shape fills the frame. I wonder at the character, "what is she thinking?". I marvel at her hat. And the eyes! The eyes still look deep inside me and seem to ask me, "what are you thinking?"

This Trieff piece has been joined by a second one, given to me as a gift by one of my sisters, who also owns a delightful sleeping pig painting by Trieff.

Look at the attitude of that Goat!!

There is a movie, Their Lives in Art:Robert Henry and Selina Trieff, available for schools and institutions through Vineyardvideo.org, that I would love to see someday.

Thankful to be a teacher

My Classroom in Zermatt was in a hotel, with tables lined up for a dozen students in each of the 4 classes. We covered the development of art and it's reflection on human's search for meaning, from prehistory to the Baroque periods. The students came from all over the United States and were high-achieving, brilliant, kind kids. They soaked in all the information and then, because we lived together, I was able to witness the real life application of their knowledge in conversations over dinner or walks in the village, and in the field trip to France. We moved in pods to keep clear of the virus and were together 24/7. Between classes we were with them as we traveled, hiked or skied.

I am so grateful for the opportunity to improve my teaching. I had a co teacher, Nicki D'Onofrio, who really knew her Italian classics and shared her passion for mythology. Together we bounced through the material and learned from each other. It was great having a partner so young and vivacious... as an exercise freak, she was nicknamed by the kids, "Quadzilla". I was called "Bob Ross" as my radio label, perhaps because I could seem pretty calm no matter the incident?

The sweetest part of the whole gig was being able to teach live.We did not resort to screens or virtual environments. The kids were stripped of any technology- no phones or computers, and they wrote everything out in pen or pencil! Research involved library books. Very old school. 

It took a lot to write out essays and make note cards and read 20 pages of text book a night. So the rapid hikes over mountain passes and to trail huts really did keep the body in check and help the focus. 

The schedule for a school day looked like: early breakfast and pack a lunch, three-hour-long morning classes within the hotel, a 5-hour break where we skied or climbed or hiked, followed by three more classes in the evening, a quick sit down dinner, a two-hour study hall and a 15-minute break before lights out! This went on for days, and days, regardless of the calendar! Then suddenly there would be an announcement of brunch, followed by a two-day hike or a 70-mile bike trip or paragliding options. 

While I was teaching, I was learning. A lot.

Swisssemester.org equals learning, persistance, endurance, and endorphins

 I was pretty quickly shocked by the daily athletic requirements of the program, but with persistence I was able to cut my lag time from over an hour to 5 minutes behind the rest of the 48 teens! It felt like that was a wonderful achievement. I can only hope to get even more fit. Swiss semester put me out of my comfort zone and gave me the hiking bug! Seriously, it was a gift to be able to thrash my body against the natural elements and reduce the scope of my worries to the next couple of steps or the next breath. I felt all my worries about American Politics, family health, a purpose in life, etc, just fall away. Each day was planned and assigned.  Outside of classes, all I had to do was follow directions, read the trail markers and make it to the meeting places. You had to be flexible and open to changes. A lot depended on the weather and us keeping Covid virus safe.

#newhobby #athletic #challenges

Took a teaching job in Europe and high-tailed it out of here!

Lufthanza flight from JFK (ny) to Frankfurt Germany

One of 4 trains across Switzerland

First view of the Alps ahead, my new home for the next 3 months.

 I've been offline for the last few months. Had an amazing opportunity to work with some superb teenagers in a foreign country. I hiked, and skied and taught art history and watercolor painting. #swisssemester 

FABULOUS TIME

Dignity for Jo Davidson

This is personal family history, art history and American History!

Taken from text written by Bradbury Kuett:

The Centerpiece of the Louis I. Kahn designed FDR Four Freedoms State Park on Roosevelt Island in New York is a triumphant bronze head of FDR, sculpted by the renowned artist Jo Davidson, a fervent supporter and friend of the president.

At the park's entrance there are engraved the names of the architect, the founder of the Park Conservancy, and the donors, but Jo Davidson's name is nowhere to be found.

Appeals to the board to engrave Jo Davidson's name have been met with silence. This unfortunate oversight, inconsequential in the view of the board, is a slight that, in effect, denies Jo Davdison his rightful recognition in American art History. Whereas Jo Davidson should be heralded as an American success story of consummate artistry, the board's silence is an outrage thrown onto the great heap of innuendos and falsities hurled upon Jo, a native son of the lower east side.

Jo Davidson should be celebrated beyond prominence as an artist. Chairman of Independent Voters' Committee of the Arts and Sciences for Roosevelt, and vice chairman of Emergency Committee to Save the Jewish People of Europe, Jo chose with a colleague the site of the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial Piaza in Riverside Park.

While Jo was under constant surveillance during the Cold War, the government targeted his two sons. Jacques (Tilly's note: my stepgrandfather) a Voice of Freedom (VOA) to the French under German occupation, was blacklisted, fired from CBS radio without cause. U.S. agents urged without success, Agence France Presse in D.C. to fire Jean.

Of note, Danielle Benedite, brother of Jacques wife, worked with Varian Fry in Marseille France, and saved some 1500 people from Nazi capture.

We ask that the Park's Board Chair Barbara Shattuck Kohn, Vice Chair Katrina vanden Heuvel and President Sally Minard redress this unjust situation by engraving the name of Jo Davidson on a plaque at the Park's entrance, similar to the one honoring Loius. I. Kahn. And we ask your support in this effort

Facebook: DignityforJodavidson

contact dignity4JoDavidson@gmail.com