This year on the East Coast the month of March was not only a lion, but a raging, biting, rabid beast. It was a wet, wet month. Snow that came down in
February and March as a thick, luxurious blanket of beautiful quiet, turned insidiously destructive. Writing about it now, only a month after the worst storm, surrounded by all sorts of trees and bulbs that are perfuming the spring air with their glorious creations, seems surreal.
February and March as a thick, luxurious blanket of beautiful quiet, turned insidiously destructive. Writing about it now, only a month after the worst storm, surrounded by all sorts of trees and bulbs that are perfuming the spring air with their glorious creations, seems surreal.
March's lions strained so many trees, already soggy from a snow saturated ground, that many giants fell right over. Morning's daylight revealed neighborhood devastation. Beautiful, sky high pine trees had fallen right over, shocking people with their shallow, shallow roots exposed.
Within days of each other torrential rains further weakened the grip of tree roots. Across the street one huge tree fell across the neighbor's driveway, just missing the house, and right nextdoor another fell- luckily downhill, away from the house it would have smashed. Power lines were down and roads flooded. It was a fugue of devastation. Even sunny days later as I walked near the woods there was the crash of a tree giving in to gravity's pull. Our curbs are still piled with cut up trunks and branches in front of nearly every home. Some yards are still littered with storm debris. Yesterday, April 16th, the phone rang with an automated message that our town has been officially declared a "disaster area" with instructions on where to go to file for some help.
Within days of each other torrential rains further weakened the grip of tree roots. Across the street one huge tree fell across the neighbor's driveway, just missing the house, and right nextdoor another fell- luckily downhill, away from the house it would have smashed. Power lines were down and roads flooded. It was a fugue of devastation. Even sunny days later as I walked near the woods there was the crash of a tree giving in to gravity's pull. Our curbs are still piled with cut up trunks and branches in front of nearly every home. Some yards are still littered with storm debris. Yesterday, April 16th, the phone rang with an automated message that our town has been officially declared a "disaster area" with instructions on where to go to file for some help.
And yet today the bulbs bloom, the empty window boxes beckon, the dogwood trees are dressed to the hilt, and birds fly busily gathering nesting material. They must be having an easy time finding broken twigs this year! Temperatures have been in the 80's for days in a row. As I pulled piles of loose downy fluff off the panting dog I wondered if any of those birds would choose to line their nests with that soft insulator. It could make a nest as quiet as the big snow that hushed us through the raging white lion. That beast could not even postpone spring's insistence on creating. If there is a lesson to be learned it seems it would be: Creation follows its sibling Devastation, every time.
RIVER DRAWING, ©JoyKREVES '10, ink, graphite and watercolor on newsprint.
This is an old theme, but it recurs regularly with variations across the world as it does in my art-making. Like the birds in search of nesting materials, I have loaded my car with a few especially lichen and moss covered branches that have potential to be sculpture materials. I wouldn't be able to create art from them if Devastation hadn't played with them first.
In another variation of the twin's collaborations a work of art often begins auspiciously, then turns problematic. I often find that attempts to cure or "fix" the problems are dead ends. Instead, if I either transform or even highlight them they become an integral, rich part of the piece. There is a Japanese ceramic technique of highlighting cracks in ceramic bowls with gold. The flaws become the beauty, the character, increasing the value of the piece. This is a lesson art can teach everyone who creates. Mother Earth had fraternal twins and named them Devastation and Creation. We must all negotiate with both of them to succeed in life and in art.
In another variation of the twin's collaborations a work of art often begins auspiciously, then turns problematic. I often find that attempts to cure or "fix" the problems are dead ends. Instead, if I either transform or even highlight them they become an integral, rich part of the piece. There is a Japanese ceramic technique of highlighting cracks in ceramic bowls with gold. The flaws become the beauty, the character, increasing the value of the piece. This is a lesson art can teach everyone who creates. Mother Earth had fraternal twins and named them Devastation and Creation. We must all negotiate with both of them to succeed in life and in art.
