one year with cassie

a new painting

i started this painting the night i read about pat passlof's passing.

sleepy time

sam and rocky catching some zees.

its a jungle in here

new picture of rocky

an empty easel

It all started the other night when Phil brought me a book he found in the lobby of my building. The book was on Arshile Gorky, the abstract expressionist painter.
Tonight i unwraped my last fresh canvas. before starting to work, i decided to take a look at some gorky sites, to sort of get back to my own roots in abstract expressionism. from gorky i moved on to rothko and some other favorites...including milton resnick.  resnick was married to the painter, pat passlof, who i studied with many, many years ago at richmond college.
One of the sites mentioned that pat passlof had died earlier  this month. She was 83.
Some of things pat taught me took me thirty years to learn. this painting will be dedicated to her.

kohl and rocky

rocky comes home from the hospital

rocky has a mass on his brain and is not expected to live long.  the vet said he had maybe six to eight "good" weeks. she suggested we bring him home for seventy-two hours to determine his quality of life.
so far, he's doing well-interacting with the other cats and being a total joy to have home.
last night he came out from his "spot" and back on the bed. he hung out with us all evening, which i took as a good sign.
sapphire was, of course, most thrilled to have him home.

prayers for rocky

rocky is very ill with a high fever.  he is in the intensive care unit. please send prayers and good vibes his way.

some new pictures of the ladies

photos by barbara over at Reading the Sky.

family photos

 sam & rocky

sapphire & rocky

 sapphire

 sapphire

 cassie

 rocky and sapphire

rocky and kohl

POEM

here is a little poem barbara and i wrote the other day.

 this afternoon

 the thunder crackles
 a light spirit appearing
 through blackening clouds

rocky at the computer

rocky and sapphire

rocky and sapphire

fostering

i am fostering this kitten for a month. his name is rocky and he weighs 2 lbs. i'm having lots of fun with him.

remembering 9/11

cassie and sam

playing with dolls again

i made my first polymer clay doll recently. she was made for a project barbara and i are working on....creating an autumn crone to celebrate the coming of fall.

i used an earring holder as armature; which is why she has shoulders like a quarterback. i made the head under barbara's direction. i had no idea how to even start to sculpt a face. much harder than i would have imagined.

the hair was fun, tho.

her skirt is made of hand dyed silk; the leaf is an applique cut from an old jacket.

waiting for the storm

sitting here in brooklyn, new york at 10 pm.,anticipating irene's arrival. the storm of historic proportions is due to strike this area around 2 am. already the thunder and lightening and rain seems abundant- can't even imagine what it will be like when it actually hits.
like many others, i'm hoping this is just a case of much ado over nothing much. however, the hype and evacuations are unprecidented. as far as i can recall the mta has Never ceased running in anticipation of anything...So this sounds like something the likes of which we've never seen before.
i expected to ride out the storm with barbara, but she went to stay with her mom. now its just me and the cats and i feel oddly vulnerable.

sapphire with her "baby"

coney island

i went to coney island the other day and it had me thinking how it seems every generation has its own take on the area. once a swanky resort area, coney island had faded considerably by the time i got to know it. i remember my folks discussing when coney boasted the famous amusement parks...dreamland, luna park and steeplechase. all of them were destroyed by fire, i believe, but a version of steeplechase still existed when i was a kid...and seemed as magical to me as the stories i heard of coney island's history. the conversations always ended with someone sighing wistfully...."it's not what it was when i was a kid"...

some of the new rides made me dizzy just watching. of course some of the old standards looked as intimidating as ever. most of the games and food were still the same.

coney island is still a fun place to spend the day....but, its not what it was when I was a kid....