Daniel Merriam

Tonight I had the honor and privilege of meeting and shaking the hand one of the nicest people and one of the most fantastic artists.  I bought one of his prints a little over a year ago along with his book, Taking Reality by Surprise.  I brought the book with me tonight hoping I might be able to get him to sign it for me.  And he did. Yay!

We even chatted for some time about his work and I was surprised at how many paintings he puts out a year, which he currently estimates at about 30 or so.  I thought that was a lot, but he said previously he probably put out 40-60 a year.  That just seems like a lot, roughly 1 a week on average!  I would love a chance to be able to sit and watch him work.  He was so kind to spend so much time chatting with me, I really enjoyed it.

Le Petit Trianon

I have watched some of the online videos of him working and I found them fascinating, but of course, they are speeded up, so it is a bit of a distorted way of watching him work.

Flying Dreams

The print I bought last year was Le Petit Trianon and I still enjoy examining every single detail in it.  From the tiny little glass of red wine in the upstairs window to the veining in the butterflies wings to the tiniest architectural detail.  Every single item has the most intricate and delicate details.  I love the colors in it.  His coloration is superb.  The gradations are done so gradually, so smoothly and so seamlessly they almost appear airbrushed.  The original is huge, something like 4 feet by 8 feet.  My print is half that size.

Falconess

When I look at the copy in the book with a magnifying glass it appears 3D.  I just love it.  

Madame Blanche

They have had others in the gallery I really like, Madame Blanche, High Altitude (really love this one, too) and Lake House.  He has a couple of new ones that I really like as well, the Falconess and Flying Dreams, both of which are calling my name . . . LOUDLY!  :)  He hasn't made any prints of Flying Dreams yet, but I hope he does someday.

High Altitude

Here are a few links if you would like to explore his work a bit further.  If you have a gallery in your area who represents him, I hope you get a chance to stop in and see his work in person.  I think you would really enjoy them!

Lake House

Daniel Merriam's Website

Daniel Merriam's Facebook Page

Exclusive Gallery's Webpage

AFA Gallery New York Webpage

I really like this one, as well. . . Ok, it seems I like all of his work, really well!  What a magical world he lives in!

Built on Dreams Alone

Congratulations!

Yayyyyy!  My friend, Dennis, sent me an invitation to the opening reception of the "2011 All Media" juried exhibition for this past Friday evening at the Irvine Fine Arts Center.  It was a larger exhibit than I expected and they had a pretty nice turn out.  One of his photos was used for the announcement!  I thought that was pretty cool!  :)


Ceramics, paintings, photography, metal work, mixed media . . . a little bit for everyone.  There was a lot of really nice work there.  At 6:30 we gathered for the awards ceremony and as they announced the winners, we kept hoping his name would be called.  Nope, not the first one, nope, not the second one . . . but . . . when we finally got to the first place award, there was the briefest pause to build the suspense a bit, and then "Dennis Doran" was announced as the first place winner!  Yayyy, Dennis!  Way to go!  Wooo hooo!  * throws confetti and blows horn *


I am really enjoying his latest work!  I'm loving the light!  I can't wait to see more!  Hopefully he'll get some of it posted on his website soon!  ;)  But, in the meantime, you can see some of his previous series here!  I have a permanent link to his site in the blog list on the right hand side of my page also!  Please visit and feel free to leave him a congratulatory comment!


The exhibit runs through January 7, 2012, so if you are in the area and get a chance, I sure hope you'll stop by and check it out!

Now, for a little news of my own . . . and, I am a bit embarrassed to say, *ahem*  I'm a little late in posting about this.  I have been so busy with painting my dining room and a few other little projects, that I'm afraid I have been MIA from my posting for a while!  But, I got home one day after an especially long day at work and sat down to catch up with my blog friends.  I was reading about SpecialK's very first blog award and feeling very happy for her, and as I read, a very familiar name came up!   MINE!  I was so surprised I had to reread it to be sure she really meant me!


She was such a sweetie, she passed the award along and gave me my very first blog award, too.  *blush*  THANK YOU!  :) If you haven't already checked out her sweet little blog, A Day with SpecialK, I hope you will stop by and say hi!  She has such sweet little inspirational posts and videos to bring smiles to your face!  I hope you will take a little time to poke around and check out her whole blog!  (Oh, and a little secret about us bloggers . . . we thrive on comments!  So, leave her a note to say you dropped by!)


Now, I have to take a few minutes real soon to figure out to whom I should spread the love!   Hopefully, I won't take another week and a half to get that done!  :)


Ok, until later, lovelies!  Hope to get back here soon!

Da Vinci Exhibit

Well, I managed to pick the hottest day of the year (so far!) for this little adventure.  Really, when I googled the directions, it didn't even occur to me exactly where I would be headed, even though I should have known!  I should have known!

Arggggh!  Can you guess from the picture above?  Saturday morning, on the hottest day, at the beginning of tourist season, I was smack dab front and center in the heart of the tourist mecca known as Hollywood.  People were EVERYWHERE! ! ! 

Grauman's Chinese Theater, where the famous leave their hand and footprints (and sometimes, hoof, paw, nose and/or cigar prints) in cement, the Hollywood Walk of Fame where people come to see the stars on the sidewalk of their favorite stars, the area where throngs of people mass to view these things as well as all the people trying to nab as many tourist dollars as they possibly can.  They sell trinkets, food, tours and photos.  There are so many people down there dressed as look-a-likes, with whom for a price, you can get your picture.

There was one "gentleman" who was very tall, dressed in black and I do not have a clue who he was supposed to be.  Anyway, he was standing there talking to someone else, blocking my shot of the theater to show where I had ended up that day.  I probably should have taken one that shows the masses of humanity that were before me, but I like my shots uncluttered with that sort of thing, so I held my camera up as high as I could and tried to get a shot without people in it.  Well, Mr. Ego thought I was trying to snap his pic and very loudly proclaimed, "Oh, Hell NO!  YOU are NOT going to get MY picture!" and promptly whirled around so his back was facing me.  I just wish he had been close enough to hear me reply, "I am not sure who or what you are are, but I would have preferred that you just duck down, because you are ruining my shot of the building"!

Ah, but on to the subject of my post!  The Da Vinci Exhibit, which closes in Hollywood July 4th.  I believe it moves on to Louisville, KY next.  I think Leonardo would have been an extremely interesting person to know.  He had such a wide range of interests, and must have had an extremely lively mind to have come up with all these myriad and diverse ideas.  Watching him tinkering and coming up with all these things would have been vastly entertaining.  Who knew he actually designed the first car!  Move over Henry!

During the day, you can usually come up with a pretty good idea of the time by checking the position of the sun.  But, what about in the middle of the night?  That handy sun isn't going to help you much then.  And, even if you turn that trusty hour glass over just before you retire for the evening, it only helps with the first hour.  500 years ago was a little too early for those handy-dandy pocket watches or mantle clocks, so what's a person to do, when in the middle of the night you awake with a burning desire to know the time?

Leonardo figured it out.  He created a candle, experimenting with different waxes, wicks, sizes of candles etc, until he could reliably measure exactly how far a candle would burn in one hour and marked one hour increments on the candle holder.  Then, all you had to do, is know what time it was when you lit the candle and do the math from there.  

For example, you go to bed (lit the candle) at 9pm (I'm thinking we may have been early to bed types, then - the sun and hour-glass would have helped you figure out bed time), you arose in the middle of the night to a terrible racket and see 5 hours have passed, by the amount of candle that has melted away, so it is 2 o'clock in the morning.  You can now holler at your neighbors and say something like, "Do you know what time it is?  It is 2 o'clock in the morning!  I'm trying to sleep!"  And know you are giving them the correct time!  What a relief!

I didn't realize he had designed so many different things for warfare.  I don't remember that from my days as an art student! 

And, he apparently designed the first robot to entertain his wealthy benefactors and patrons!  And this sketch of a bicycle has been attributed to one of his students, but it was found glued between the pages of one of da Vinci's journals and is thought to have been a sketch of something seen in the da Vinci studios.

I do remember his fascination with flying and flying machines and his predilection for doing illegal autopsies to see how the body worked.

And, I remembered he was obsessed with water, water shoes and other inventions to help man conquer the watery realm, but I didn't realize he had come up with an idea for a type of diving apparatus.

He was also preoccupied with coming up with all sorts of inventions that we still have in use today, such as the differential, which is used in cars, the flywheel, and an early version of the inclinometer, which is still in use today on ships and airplanes to measure the vessel's position relative to a "perfect horizontal orientation".

I know it looks like a gallows, but it really isn't!  Honest!  Click on the
image for a larger peek!  It is actually supposed to depict a diver
below water with air hoses as his lifeline, not a noose!  :-)

Anyway, I did enjoy the exhibit, though I thought these things were going to be life-sized mock ups, so I was surprised to see they were smaller models.  The price of the show wasn't too bad, $18, but when you factor in all the other costs associated with it, I may not have opted to go!  $10 parking, plus $3 tip for the attendant, and my $12 souvenir matted print of the famed "Mona Lisa" (which I somehow lost between the show and the car.  I hope whoever ended up with Mona gives her a good home)!  I wouldn't know how to factor in the cost of trying to wade through a sea of hot, sweaty people trying to make my way to and from the show, or the initial disappointment when the first person I asked to help direct me to the venue told me they had closed the show early, but the store was still open.  He kindly walked me to the stairway and got me going in the right direction.  But, thankfully, he had been misinformed about the show closing early.  And, we'll skip the cost of driving, and the traffic nightmares, so the actual monetary total for this little adventure was $33.  

On the way home, I stopped at an Olive Garden near my home for a late lunch/early dinner and a tall, cool glass of wine to "recuperate". ;-) All in all, it was a good day!  Funny, how a glass of wine can change your perspective on these kinds of things, . . . just like that!  :-)  Well, hope you enjoyed this little adventure!  Until next time!  Arrivederci!

Notice the power saw at the top?  Water-powered, that is!  The water-wheel powers
the gears to make the saw go up and down.  The saw is the thin black thing
hanging between the wood supports at the top. 

San Diego Museum of Art - Art Alive Exhibit

Wow!  It's taken me long enough to get back here, hasn't it!  :-)  Remember wayyyyyyy back in my last post, AND the one before that, I mentioned that I was going to San Diego the next day and would be posting about it real soon . . . yeah . . . well.  I got sidetracked by all the other things I should be working on around here!  Sorry!  :-)   So, anyway . . .  here it is!  Better late than never, right?

Hmmmm . . . w-w-we-e-e-el-l-l-l-l . . . I don't know what to say about it!  I'm a bit gobsmacked at the moment.  It wasn't at all what I expected . . . for the most part.  Not that that means that I didn't like it, or that I didn't enjoy it, because I did . . . I did.  It's just that I expected it to beeeee . . .  different.  I thought the floral designs would be more like the art works they were supposed to depict.  The arrangements were all very nice and I did enjoy them, but I just expected . . . a bit more resemblance to the art.  Some of them were spot on and I thought captured the essence of the work very well.  Others used the same color combinations, but outside of that I couldn't really see much of a resemblance to the artwork it was representing.  Of course, the ones I thought were the best did not win any ribbons!  Go figure!  But, I am not professing to be an expert on art, or flowers or anything really!  I just like what I like and may not have a very sophisticated taste in these things, but that's me!

That said, I had visions of getting all these great floral pics to share with you.  But, alas . . .  no photography was allowed in the galleries! ! !  Although I did see several people snapping surreptitious shots now and again, and I was sorely tempted, but I try to play by the rules, so I regretfully resisted that temptation.  Just.

Just walking into the museum, your nose told you to expect something wonderful.  The scent of the lilies was nicely overpowering.  There were literally walls of flowers.  Not to mention the faux stained glass window (at least that is what it reminded me of - seen a few pics above) I was happy to find out I would be able to take pictures of the floral displays in the lobby/rotunda, but so very sad to find out I would not be able to take any pictures of the floral displays and their representative artworks to share with you.

The floral pictures you see below are "borrowed" from the San Diego Museum of Art's website since I couldn't take any for myself!  All of the others above are those that I was able to take in the lobby/rotunda area.  Hope you enjoy!

 

 

 

Balboa Park is always such a treat to visit.  It makes me wish I lived close enough to spend more time there.

There are so many interesting architectural details, museums, and gardens to explore.  So, I am including a couple more pics from the area.  And I loved the way the green tree trunk above looked surrounded by all those ferns!

 

I also got a chance to stop and listen to Mitch play his digeridoo and a few other instruments all at the same time.  This guy is amazing!  I would have loved to have stayed to listen for as long as he played!  Here are some links to some YouTube videos of him!

See you soon!

Bowers Museum Day Trip

First, I just want to say my heart goes out to all the people who have been affected by the devastating tornadoes that are tearing apart so many lives this year.  I hope the terrible waves of devastation are over, there has been more than enough suffering.  

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I received an email the other day reminding me the exhibit at the Bowers Museum, Gemstone Carvings: The Masterworks of Harold Van Pelt was ending this weekend.  So, I made sure to scurry over there this afternoon to take a peek.  When I got there, I discovered there were also a couple of other exhibits that looked very interesting, so I was very pleased I had made the effort to get there.  But, it is going to make for a bit of a long post!  ;-)

It was a gorgeous day, the sun was shining and the slight breeze was soothing and cool.  If you've never been to the Bowers, you should make sure to visit someday.  It is a little gem of a museum tucked into the heart of Santa Ana.  It's grounds are sometimes used for weddings and wedding photographs.  In fact, as I was leaving and taking pictures of their gorgeous roses, I was the sole spectator for a wedding photo shoot that was going on on their lawn, while half a world away, there was another wedding taking place that the entire world was watching.

I must apologize in advance that my photos came out blurry.  I was allowed to photograph in two of the galleries, but was not allowed to use flash or tripod, but I did the best I could without them.  I was also shooting through the glass of the display cases and trying to avoid the reflections as much as possible.  The photos looked much better when reviewed on the camera than they did when I got home and got them all downloaded!  . . . Funny that!  ;-)

Anyway, this post is going to be a bit heavy on photographs, even though they are not the best quality.

On the way to the gallery where the gemstone carvings were displayed, I passed by this glass sculpture by Loretta Yang titled, A Great Wish.  It is such a sweet sculpture, but I wish it had a better background against which to view it!  It is nice to have the light behind it, but it would be great if there wasn't the window/door behind it.

This little agate beastie with the little gold nose is actually a drinking vessel.  It sat prominently in the front display case to welcome you into the room.

He used a variety of materials, such as this petrified palm wood for this jar.

And agate for these spoons.

And amethyst for this sweet little cup.  Could you just imagine this in a blue sapphire, emerald green or ruby red?

I was amazed by the quartz items!  I thought they were glass pieces decorated with the gemstones, but no . . . they were actually pieces carved out of large blocks of clear quartz adorned with other bits of carved gemstones.

Here's a little bit of a close up of the one with the aquamarine base.

A quartz apothecary jar.

The quartz flower vase has little pink tourmaline flowers and green tourmaline leaves peeking out from the little cut out on the side of the vase.

Just look at these quartz eggs and the carved jewels!  How beautiful!

And a close-up of those delicious looking little jewels.

Ito Jakuchu - Rooster, Hen and Hydrageas

After visiting the Van Pelt gallery I decided to check out the Ito Jakuchu: A Man with No Age exhibit.  It's not the sort of art I usually get overly excited about, but I really did enjoy his work.  They didn't allow photography in that exhibit, so I am borrowing a few images from the book that I succumbed to buying from the museum shop; Japanese Masterworks from The Price Collection.  I learned quite a bit about their painting techniques that gave me new respect for their works.  Made me want to get my face right up to the paintings to inspect them even closer.  Too bad museums tend to frown on that type of thing!

Ito Jakuchu - Cranes, Bamboo and Flowering Plum

Apparently, they use extremely thin ink and never overlap their strokes, so the ink doesn't crack when the scrolls are rolled and unrolled.  Mistakes cannot be erased or corrected.  Everything has to be placed correctly.  There was also a display of the types of brushes (along with a video of an artist showing his brushes and sharing how they were made and cleaned) and a display of the types of pigments used as well.  It was all very interesting and inspiring.

Ito Jakuchu - Tiger

I just loved this little tiger!  The pose seems so whimsical to me.  Just a tiger taking a little bath, perhaps in preparation of a nice little nap!  If you could just see the detail, nearly every hair is individually drawn.

Then before I tottered off to Tangata to see if I could rustle up some dessert I passed by the Quilts: Two Centuries of American Tradition and Technique and couldn't resist popping in to have a look see.  I was also allowed to photograph in there, but again, no flash/tripod, so you can just get a bit of an idea of the quilts they had on display.  These were some of my favorites.

Star of Bethlehem Quilt c. 1840

This one is an example of the Star of Bethlehem pattern made of cotton by an unknown maker c. 1840.

Rose Wreath Quilt c. 1850

This example of the Rose Wreath pattern, c. 1850 was hand appliqued, hand quilted and hand set by an unknown maker.  I love the colors in it.  

Lace and Silk Quilt

I forgot to take a snap of the information card for this one, but I seem to remember that it was a lace quilt from the Victorian era.  I had never seen a vintage quilt that had incorporated lace in it before and I would have loved to take it home with me!

Signature Quilt c. 1930 - Pleasant Grove, Missouri

This pretty blue and white Signature Quilt c. 1930 hails from Pleasant Grove, Missouri and has dozens and dozens of signatures on it.  I wonder if any of your friends or relatives might have signed it?

Double Checkerboard Yo-Yo Quilt c. 1934 by Mrs. Grace Deane Anderson

I like yo-yo's and thought this quilt was really cute.  A lot of work, but really cute!  I especially liked the way she used the yo-yo's in the edging.  It was made by Mrs. Grace Deane Anderson c. 1934.

Glorified Nine Patch c. 1940 by Nancy Beard Webb

This Glorified Nine Patch was made by Nancy Beard Webb from Greenfield, Missouri c. 1940.  It was hand pieced and quilted.

I got delayed enough that I missed dessert at Tangata's, but the museum shop was still open, so I ended up buying more books!  I just can't seem to resist!  There was the one I mentioned above on the Price Collection, The Fine Art of Kimono Embroidery and a few others about American Indians.

I polished off the afternoon with a few snaps of the roses on their grounds.  They were just beautiful!

Oh, and I did finally get my dessert!  I stopped by Dairy Queen on the way home and treated myself to a chocolate dipped ice cream cone!  Yummmm! ! ! ! !

Well, I guess that is more than enough for one day!  I sure hope you'll come along on my next trip!  I am heading down to San Diego in the morning!  I hope to share that trip with you in a couple of days!  Have a great weekend!