Transmigration Wood Working Frame

I was the very happy recipient of one of Matt's custom frames.  Last Christmas, Tammy and Richard gave us a print of one of their son-in-law Colby Sanford's pieces.  Colby is making quite a name for himself in the art world.  I was thrilled to receive one of his prints.To make the print even more exciting, the original will be hanging in the US Embassy in Geneva, Switzerland.

The inlay on both the front of the frame and on the edges is all recycled skateboard.  And the interesting pattern in the wood is something called ray fleck.   I had never heard of it but Matt gave me a quick tutorial!

Most of the small wood cells in a tree run up and down in the stem, conducting fluids from the roots to the leaves.  A few cells run in and out from the bark to the center of the stem.  These cells, that primarily store starches and sugars in the tree, are called ray cells.  When cut a certain way, these ray cells make interesting patterns called 'ray fleck'. 

What a blessing it is to have such talented young men in the family!  

An artist with painting and an artist with wood! 

Getty

After our fabulous day at the Reagan Museum, we decided to make a stop at the Getty Center since it was on our way back to the airport. Unfortunately it seems that many people had the same idea!  The parking garage was a traffic jam of cars slowing descending to lower and lower levels in search of a parking spot.  Then there was a long line of people waiting to take the tram up to the museum.

 Once we got to the museum itself, we were not bothered by the crowds since it is huge with multiple buildings. The buildings themselves are works of art!

We took in two temporary exhibits.  One was Ruben's tapestries.

From the museum brochure:

Rubens drew on a wide range of classical and christian iconography, and traditional allegories of good verses evil, to express the spiritual victory of the Catholic church over its foes. Powerful figures in motion, rich color, and playful illusions abound, as Rubens created different levels of reality to engage and delight the observer. 

George and I were 'engaged and delighted'!

Since we are both interested in photography we decided to see the Josef Koudelka Photography exhibit. 

I'd never heard of him before but I'm always fascinated to try and figure out what separates an ok photograph from an award winning one! There were 140 of his works produced over 5 decades.  He does give lectures abut 'why good photographs are so rare."  I'd love to hear that!  My quick analysis is the photo needs to tell a story and bring some emotion.  Also I think that black and white images are particularly compelling.

We managed a quick visit to the impressionist gallery.  Who can resist a Monet?  

I was also captivated by the colors in this 1854 work by Richard Dadd  'David Spareth Saul's life'.  The soft colors are unusual for that time period.  Beautiful!

We both hope to go back to the Getty and spend the entire day.

Boise Cool!

Who says Boise isn't cool?

Just look at this....

Public art in an alley in downtown Boise....

Nice little walk after our Thanksgiving dinner....

The plan is to paint over and replace these murals every couple of years. 

And since it happened to be Jimi Hendrix's birthday how appropriate to end with this tribute to him.  I like the sentiments in this song.

"I used to live in room full of mirrors.

All I could see was me.

Well I take my spirit 

And I smash my mirrors

Now the whole world is here for me to see."