Pamela Wilson

Pamela Wilson, Antechamber of Regret
Oil on Canvas, 42" x 21"

Read Feathered Hopes and Intriguing Dreams: Paintings By Pamela Wilson in Ramshackle Review 1.

Ramshackle Review 1

Ramshackle Review's first issue is up. Thanks to all our contributors for allowing us to share your work, and for making this a great collection. Special thanks to Sheldon Lee Compton for Intruder, and the introduction to Pancake and his work; to Pamela Wilson, for the new artwork and her generosity at a busy time; and to Phil McCray, whose memoir Ulysses In Ithaca closes the issue.

Submissions for Issue 2 are now open.

Updates

Ramshackle Review's first issue is taking shape. Included: Jessica Hollander, Stephanie Austin, Howie Good, Sam Rasnake, Pamela Wilson, Susan Tepper, Felino A. Soriano, Bill Yarrow, Robert Malbin, Karen Keating, Ernest Williamson III, Julie Innis, R. S. Bohn, Phil McCray, James Gurney, Michelle Reale, William Doreski, L. Ward Abel, Sheldon Lee Compton, and others. Friend Ramshackle on Facebook, and stay tuned.

Building: A new website for Finger Lakes printmaker and metalworker Paul Dudley Bishop. If you like the look and need something similar, art & photography friendly etc, email your requirements for a quote.

Cutting: Firewood. Catching up on: AMC's Rubicon. Re-reading: John Crowley's Endless Things.

Paul Madonna

Amazed and marveling at Paul Madonna's All Over Coffee. Read Charley Parker's Lines and Colors post.

Ramshackle Review

For those who may not already know, I'm editing a new online lit & arts zine called Ramshackle Review. Our Submissions page is up, and we're listed on Duotrope. More on what we're looking for here.

Email subs & queries to: ramshacklereview (at) gmail (dot) com.

Better Days

'Better Days', another from the series of flash that began with 'String Money', is up at Ink Sweat & Tears. Links to segments published to date are in the preceding posts and in the Recently Published links at right. My thanks to IS&T editor Charles Christian.

No Adjectives

'No Adjectives', another from the series of flash that began with 'String Money', is up at Black-Listed Magazine. My thanks to editor Mike Meraz.

Freakuccino

'Freakuccino', another segment from my current series of flash, is up at Camel Saloon. My thanks to editor Russell Streur, who offers preferential treatment to contributors who include a photograph of a favored locale. Here’s mine.

Kilz

'Kilz' is up at amphibi.us. Stay tuned for more from the series, and my thanks to amphibi.us editor Shannon Peil.

String Money

'String Money', the first of a series of flash, is up at A-Minor Magazine. Each segment will appear in a different zine; more links as they're published. My thanks to A-Minor Editor Sheldon Lee Compton.

Django

A great time last night catching up with our friends Phil McCray & Jean Callahan at Loudeac Tile Studio in Newfield- And when we got home, we found this tucked in the backseat of the car. So cool. Thanks, Phil!

Check Engine

My flash 'Check Engine', a followup to last December's 'Blue Pinto', is up at Word Riot. Thanks again to editor Jackie Corley and fiction editor Kevin O'Quinn.

Good To Go

Collegetown, 9.5.2009

I took this snapshot last September from a table at Collegetown Bagels. Where, not coincidentally, they have the world's finest oatmeal rasin cookies. Dispute this if you like, but bring proof.

Enfield Glen

Enfield Glen, 6.5.2010.

Doctor Eyepatch

With apologies to Tim Etchells, whose Dictionary is otherwise most comprehensive, and should be on every dreamer's nightstand:

"Waking, Sarah consults the Dream Dictionary, but no entry explains the doctor’s eyepatch. That contraption he’d invited her to pedal though, somebody oughta market one of those. The closer you got the harder it got, and her feet kept slipping off the pedals. It was maddening."

Read the rest of my flash 'Doctor Eyepatch' at Postcard Stories.

Taughannock Falls

Taughannock Falls, 5.16.2010.

Norm Never Says

Norm never says what he sees out the window. We like to think he respects confidences.

He was supposed to be a garden gnome. Give pause to the squirrels, keep an eye on the impatiums. We found him at Wegman's. He looked hopeful and observant.

We put him in the cart with the lunchmeat and yogurt but he slid around and I took him out and carried him. His hat was poky. He didn't seem frightened. I turned him around so he could see things. When the cashier saw us coming she laughed.

She was a tall thin talkative girl. Mornings she milked cows for two hours before she came into work at Wegman's. The gnome liked her too.

What's your name? she said.

He looked like he hadn't thought about it.

Well, you'll figure it out, she said. You want to ride in a bag?

G-Day

Yesterday La Petit Chou tried out a Trek 7100 at the Bike Rack in Collegetown. No decision yet but she looked fine and happy on it.

Graduation Day at Cornell is a spectacle. We cooled off awhile in CTB and I shot this happy grad.



A stop at Green Star for some bulk spices, then out to the Pines for Pinesburgers (only one apiece; we're not Challengers). A good day.

Dare Greatly

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

- Teddy Roosevelt

Morning Prayer

Morning Prayer
Charcoal & Graphite Drawing, 6 1/2" x 3 1/2"
Matted & framed to 14" x 11"
$925.00

Dio

R. S. Bohn's 'Loom'

Morning reading: R. S. Bohn's 'Loom'. New to her work and blog and enjoying both immensely.

Moon Milk Review

Me and Joe Satriani in the new Moon Milk Review. My thanks to MMR editor Rae Bryant.

Spring Cleaning

Postcard From A Dream
Ink, Graphite, Charcoal; 4" x 2 1/2"
2004

Here in Rural Northern Appalachia it's cold and windy and a good day for some website cleanup. Stop by and refresh in your browser as needed and if you find broken links or other problems give me a shout.

Dispatches

Phil McCray says very kind things about my work. If you don't read Phil's blog, you should. This is a good place to start.

From the notebooks:

Once the edge of the known world
Now a storefront for rent
Faded sign from another time:
Radios Repaired, Dispatches Sent...

xTx: Yet, I Kneel. I Tie

Where Dragons Sleep
Ink, Graphite, Charcoal; 2 7/8" x 4 7/8"

I remember the first time my drawings hung in an exhibition next to an artist whose work I'd admired for awhile. Long time ago and I'm jaded and cynical but maybe not entirely because when one of my drawings appears alongside an xTx story like Yet, I Kneel. I Tie it feels a lot like hanging next to Marty Poole. Again, big thanks to Prick of the Spindle editor Cynthia Reeser.

Here & There

My drawings Rorrach's Glen and Home Is The Sailor are featured in Water, an exhibition of small works at the ARTS Council of the Southern Finger Lakes. The show will be up through April 28 at The ARTS, 32 West Market Street, Corning NY. Thanks to exhibit curator Marc Dennis.

My drawing & flash Last Bell in the new Full of Crow. Thanks to FOC editor Lynn Alexander.

Enfield Glen

Treman Park, Ithaca.

Preston Reed

Rolling & Tumbling

Robert Plant from a 2007 Rolling Stone interview, on Led Zeppelin's film The Song Remains The Same:

I didn't know it was posing. It's only now with an older head, I go, "Oh, God, did that actually work?" But of course it worked. It was as genuine as the day is long. I didn't preen in front of a mirror. My mother said, "You shouldn't pout, it looks stupid." But I pouted because I wanted to be like, "Come on!" I wanted to be Steve Marriott, for fuck's sake. But in that environment, I was way past all that. I was part of some kind of new animal that included everything you see in that film. And I can't get embarrassed by it. At that point, in the film, I was yet to be twenty-five years old. And the group was dead when I was thirty-two. How can any of us have any critical overview about what we do? We were just on fire, rolling and tumbling — and most of the time, incredibly civil to each other.

Led Zeppelin's 02 Arena show was of course pro-shot and recorded but Jimmy Page seems in no hurry about an official release. In the meantime Wendy Records 2cd boot is the best I've heard.

Tim O'Brien

"The purpose of writing is to enhance mystery, not solve it."

-Tim O'Brien, 1991, from the Artful Dodge interviews archive. Read it here.

Express Lane

First cashier: “Giovanni’s blowing up my phone.”
Second cashier: “Which one’s Giovanni?”
First cashier: “He’s like, why won’t you date me?”
Second cashier: “Wait– He’s the short one, right?”
First cashier: “Yeah he’s tiny. I said grow and we’ll talk.”

GC Myers: Night and the City

Yesterday I was surprised and delighted to become the new owner of this painting, our friend GC Myers' Night and the City. It was an unexpected and wonderful gift and hangs this morning above my computer desk where I can look at it and smile. Which I am happily.

When I took the painting from its wrapping, I thought Hey I know this guy. I've been writing about this guy. Hey, guy. Good to see you...

Night and the City is from Gary's Outlaws series. Read about it on his outstanding blog redtreetimes.

This is so cool. Thank you, Gary.

Prick of the Spindle

Several of my drawings are featured in the new issue of Prick of the Spindle. More here. My thanks to PotS editor Cynthia Reeser.

Wait, It'll Come To Me

Last night I dreamt a small bird with a kitten's face ate crushed peanuts from my hand. An old friend told me what the bird was called, but I've forgotten.

The Nightingale's Garden

The Nightingale's Garden
Charcoal, Graphite; 5" x 9"

A series of in-progress scans and comments on this drawing are the subject of today's post on WestEndTalk.

No Broken Wings

No Broken Wings
Charcoal & Graphite drawing

Robert B. Parker

Robert B. Parker died last month. I didn't know until today.

If you haven't read Parker's Spenser novels, 1980's Early Autumn is a good place to start.

Parker wrote detective fiction. But the heart of his stories was his characters and their relationships, their love and loyalty and honor.

Heart is what set Parker's books apart, why he's the only writer of crime fiction I've read regularly for twenty-five years. Define heart anyway you like: Parker had it, understood it, made it central to his work.

I've never read another writer like Robert B. Parker. God bless his wife and sons and all who loved him. I miss him already.

GC Myers: Finding Home

A short film by our friend GC Myers. For more, visit Gary's blog.

Home Is The Sailor

Home Is The Sailor
Charcoal & Graphite Drawing
5 7/8" x 3 1/8", matted & framed to 11" x 8 1/2"

Third Shift

A poem, Third Shift, is up at amphibi.us. My thanks to editor Shannon Peil.

Aleta Wynn Yarrow: Catching The Dream

Aleta Wynn Yarrow, Catching The Dream
Paper collage, mixed media

Congratulations and best wishes to our friend Aleta Wynn Yarrow, who's been named the new Director of Interpretive Programs at the Everhart Museum of Natural History, Science & Art in Scranton PA.

I first saw Aleta's Catching The Dream years ago in West End Gallery's old space upstairs at 97 West Market. I remember climbing the back stairs, light slanting through the tall window on the landing, and arriving at the top to find this piece hanging on the far wall of the North Gallery. Catching The Dream was my introduction to Aleta's work, and suffice it to say it made a lasting impression.

Aleta's work has always been as personal and uncompromising as any artist I've known. And whatever she does, it's always positive.

The Everhart's gonna like what she brings. She's got all the tools & experience you could ask for- And most importantly, she cares big.

If you know Aleta, these things- especially the latter- are evident. If you don't know her yet, I hope you get the chance.

Parnilla at the Plantations

Two of La Petit Chou's Cornell Plantations drawings are the subject of today's blogpost at westendtalk.

All That Remains at Blink/Ink

Blink/Ink Editor Lynn Alexander chose four of my drawings and a poem for this month's Featured Artist Gallery at B/I. Thanks, Lynn.

Lost Roads

A recent flash, Lost Roads, is up at Ink Sweat & Tears. Again, my thanks to IS&T editor Charles Christian.

Chapel Bell

Chapel Bell
Charcoal & Graphite
3 ½”” x 2”, matted & framed to 7” x 5”
$450.00

It’s been awhile since I’ve worked this small and tight, and with West End’s annual Little Gems show coming up, a true miniature sounded like fun. I began this drawing by laying out the chapel’s belltower on a clean sheet of Strathmore Bristol Board with a very sharp #3 Dixon Ticonderoga graphite pencil. These pencils are a couple grades harder than the yellow #2s we all used in school, and create fine lines that erase cleanly. With the layout established, I lightened the lines with a kneaded eraser, and shingled the brightly lit surface of the roof with the same pencil. For the shadowed slope I switched to a very sharp, very hard HHH Wolf’s Carbon pencil that’s harder to keep sharp but produces marks a little darker than any of my graphites. The deepest shadows were darkened with HB General Charcoal pencils.

For me, the process of stippling is about adding a little, taking a little away, adding more. When a mark or area becomes too dark, I lighten it with a kneaded eraser shaped to a fine point- Essentially, stippling in the negative. Not quick work, but continuing to build up and adjust marks as needed creates layered surfaces with texture and depth.

The chapel’s roof and walls were created the same way. For the foreground evergreens I used a softer 6B General Charcoal pencil, lightening with a kneaded eraser, softening and blending with a Q-Tip, darkening again, definining further. The foreground wall, bushes and ground cover were established with charcoal pencils, refined with graphite. To create the effect of the farther trees receding into bright mist, I used only graphite pencils to keep values in those areas lighter. The trees’ shapes and mist, the lawn and path were refined and smoothed with kneaded erasers, progressively harder graphite pencils, finishing with a Staedtler 6H.

I began the drawing’s remaining background by loading a cotton ball with powdered charcoal, scrubbing off most of it on scrap paper, then applying what was left very lightly, barely brushing the paper. It’s a technique that borrows something from drybrush, creates a kind of dry wash that's not as smooth as watercolor, but provides a good foundation for a somewhat similar effect. I avoided the finished elements, and developed adjacent areas- along the chapel’s roofline, and at bottom left- with the Staedtler 6H.

And yes, I did remember to use my magnifier this time.

The thumbnail above should load an actual-size jpeg at most browser settings. Here's an enlargement.

Chapel Bell and other recent Mark Reep drawings will be available at West End Gallery’s Little Gems exhibit. The show runs from February 5- March 12; opening reception is Friday, February 5, 5:00- 7:30. If you're interested, call Lin, Hedy or Bridget at 607.936.2011.

Crossposted to West End Gallery's new blog WestEndTalk.

Around The Bend

Parnilla Carpenter, Around The Bend
Colored Pencil, 3" x 4 1/2"
Matted & framed to 8" x 10"
$150.00

Morning Bell

Morning Bell
Charcoal, Graphite; 3 1/4" x 5 1/2"
Matted & framed to 8" x 10"
$450.00

Amanda Palmer

My flash Amanda Palmer is up at Girls With Insurance. I am such a fanboy.

Amanda's blog.

Stace Budzko, Shannon Peil

Morning reading:
Stace Budzko's flash Hands, from the Smokelong Quarterly archives
Outside, a poem by amphibi.us editor Shannon Peil

Blue Pinto

My flash Blue Pinto is up at Word Riot. Click here to listen to the podcast.

My thanks to WR publisher Jackie Corley, and especially to fiction editor Kevin O'Cuinn. If you get a chance to work with Kevin, make the most of it. Everything I've written since has benefitted, too.

Honk

Parnilla Carpenter, Honk
Colored Pencil, 5" x 7"

Sure, Parnilla's my girl. But even if she weren't, I'd still love this goose.

This drawing is available at West End Gallery, Corning. Call Lin or Hedy at 607.936.2011.

Loch Traignarry Light at Ink Sweat & Tears

Loch Traignarry Light- a drawing of an imagined place, and a fictional history of that place- is up today at Ink Sweat & Tears. My thanks to IS&T editor Charles Christian.

The original drawing is available on my website, and at West End Gallery, Corning.

Blue Light Phone

Looking north from the Sackett Footbridge. Up the steps, North Campus and the Observatory.

Two Kat McElroy pieces- one fiction, one non- from Eclectica’s archives: Laying On Hands, Best Ever Christmas.

Plantations After Dark

Cornell Plantations, 11.29.2009.

Sackett Footbridge

Sackett Footbridge, Beebe Lake, Cornell, 11.22.2009.

Summer evenings, when the sun is in the north, the bridge falls into shadow before sunset. But these too-brief autumn afternoons, the day's last sunlight still warms the stones. Up on the path, La Petit Chou makes friends with a cat.

Letter From Exile

Letter From Exile
Charcoal, Graphite; 5 1/8" x 5 1/8"

Outfall

Outfall
Charcoal; 7 1/2" x 11 1/2"

I've wanted to work like this for awhile. Less finished, more suggested- More room, you could say, to dream. Sounds easy, doesn't it: Just loosen up.

Flash links:

E. K. Entrada's Morris Sees A Furrier: A Love Story, Keyhole Magazine
Pamela Painter's Office At Night, Smokelong Quarterly

Crossing

Crossing
Charcoal, Graphite; 7 3/4" x 6 7/8"

Available Light

Tom, 1989
35 mm photo

A favorite portrait. Tom was a great subject: A (much more accomplished) photographer himself, he understood available light, and he could sit very very still.

No Sorrowful Way

No Sorrowful Way
Charcoal, Graphite; 8 1/2" x 11"

New drawing, first I've finished since late July. This one's been on the drawing table awhile, lingering at various stages. Much as I do, actually.

The title intends no disrespect; I expect Jesus has had his fill of sorrow too.

Hasp & Pin

Hammered Hasp & Pin
35mm photograph, 1989

Looking lately through a box of old photographs, most circa 1989. I was shooting that year with a newly purchased Minolta 7000 35mm SLR, a 28-70 wide angle zoom. Bracketing like a bastard, making detailed notes of exposures– Mostly, burning a lot of film.

The barn this door opened onto is gone now, fallen in a 1993 blizzard. There wasn’t much worth salvaging; I reused some siding on another building, and planks from the big sliding doors became a benchtop. Dunno what happened to the hasp and pin; wish now I'd kept them. But there’s this.

First Frost

First Frost
Ink, Graphite; 4 1/8" x 11 1/8

Inking with Marvy LePlume watercolor pens, and a white gel pen, don't remember the maker. I tried a number of gel pens, didn't like the results I got with most. This 2000 drawing was a satisfying exception.

Pony Hill

Pony Hill Road, Jackson Center, 10.18.09.

In The Gathering

People tell me I stack a tight woodpile. I say well you don't want it to fall down, you know? Yeah but it's so, it's like, like a. Sometimes I say comes from laying stone probably. Oh, you've laid stone? Yeah a little, here and there. Sometimes I say drawing stone's a lot easier. Like a lot of small truths, it's good for a laugh. If you've got good stone though, the laying's easy too. Like firewood, most of the work's in the gathering.

A Calming Effect

La Petit Chou learned yesterday that an old friend had passed away. I’d never met Ron, and in the course of telling me a little about him, she said, ‘He had a calming effect on people.’

That’s stayed with me. I’ve been thinking this morning: How many of us have that kind of positive impact? Not nearly enough, I guess, or it wouldn’t seem remarkable. How do I impact those around me? How should I? No new questions, and the answers aren’t easy.

I told a friend recently that I want my work to be intriguing, encouraging, inspiring, to bless viewers- buyers or no- in at least some way. Today I’m remembering that I should have added calming to that list of qualities.

Calm doesn’t sound like much, does it. It’s not exciting, it doesn’t get you up on your feet, pumping your fist, throwing horns, screaming your throat raw. But even the most adrenalized dream-driven wired of us need calm sometimes. The tighter we’re wound, the more we need somebody like Ron in our lives. So even though I didn't knew him, I know he’ll be sorely missed, and the world’s a little poorer now he’s gone.

From Amanda Palmer’s blog:

life will break you.
nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearnings.
you have to love.
you have to feel.
it is the reason you are here on earth.
you are here to risk your heart.
you are here to be swallowed up.
and when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt,
or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree
and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness.
tell yourself that you tasted as many as you could.

- Louise Erdrich, The Painted Drum

Near Dusk

Near sunset– nearer dusk, descending the south path, but with sunlight still warming the treetops across the gorge- we met a ranger making his rounds. He’s a tall rangy guy, probably in his fifties, but his pace along the trails is that of a man twenty years younger, thirty. We’ve talked before, over at Buttermilk; if you listen, you’ll learn something. When I remarked about the quality of the light, he said, You notice the light. A lot of people don’t, and then it’s dark, and they don’t have a flashlight. They’ve got a cellphone, they think that’s all they need. Yeah, and they call you, I said. He smiled, turned, was on his way again. At the next turning, I looked back, but he was already gone.

At The Drawing Table

Fall housecleaning today- too windy to do much outside- and dustfree, the drawing table looked so good I grabbed a shot. Handheld and a little blurry, but.

I built this table while recovering from a heart attack in the fall of 2001. I can still remember how good it felt to get back in my shop again, to be doing something, however little, however carefully. Some days, you know you're not on top of it, better stay away from the table saw. All good now, and good to remember, to be grateful for where I am today.

In the years since, I've spent countless hours working at this table, and for the most part, it's held up well. The wall's messed up from all the stuff I've stuck up and taken down; I don't like to look at anything- my own work included- for long. Today, two things went into the wastebasket- A scrap of paper with the words Old North Road; and scrawled in charcoal on a strip of cardboard: It's never that I can't draw anymore. I just can't draw THIS, TODAY. I can still relate, but I wasn't in a can't frame of mind today, I was in housecleaning mode, and it went.

Treman Park

Filing photos from a Sunday walk, we found it's been a year nearly to the day since we last walked Treman Gorge. Where'd this summer go. Where all summers go, I suppose, and all- for my liking anyway- too soon.

Paul McMillan

Summerdays in Ithaca, we usually want mostly to be outside, walking the gorges, photographizing, etc. But with autumn arriving cold and rainy this week, we decided yesterday might be a good opportunity to get in touch with an artist whose work we've admired for some time, Paul McMillan. When we called, he was at work in his Enfield studio, the historic former Methodist Church building, and he was happy to give us a tour. It's a unique and impressive space, well suited to both the creation and presentation of Paul's work. On his easel was this night scene. For more on this painting, click here.


Paul McMillan, Oak Tree, Hay Bales and Moonlight
Oil on Panel; 20" x 16"


Photo: Parnilla Carpenter.

The Architecture Of Dream

Another unearthed scan of nearly forgotten older work. Haven't turned up any accompanying documentation, but I likely made this drawing in 2000 or 2001; media was ink and graphite.

Listening to: Syracuse's Ledyard, Sky Burns Red.