Playground V
The Sketchbook Project — Journeys
The journey through the Sketchbook takes a turn looking at the hills. And the flames. And the smoke. And the charred remains.
This invented itself on the thoughts of wood — the woods and forests — and the hills of Washington State. And naturally I thought of my wood carvings — so many of them have been called Journey Bowls because I have let my chisel work its way across the grains of various woods, finding mountains there and a pattern that is as high and low as the mountain ridges.
Here’s an example of a “Journey Bowl”, as it was in its own journey of being carved and assembled. The finished vessel had a leather cylinder to connect the top with the bottom.
Our state is one of the western states now, horridly, “on fire” — massive fires all over the western USA this year, in the midst of an extensive dry spell that has even the wooded places parched and tinder dry. Every year we have fires, but this is apocalyptic. Epic, like the other weather.
Someone I spoke to today was even wondering about the origins of these fires, given the current political turmoil. I think a simple lightning strike is enough to spark a fire anywhere right now. Bad guys? Well, I suppose anything goes with those people. I’ll not speculate about it, but I did read arson as cause-of-fire of one of out WA state fires.
In any case the sky is full of ash and smog, and my Sketchbook, again, is journalistic. What a streak of heavy history we are going through right now!
There will be changes to the small sized work in the Sketchbook. I have plans for some simple moderation. But the concept is where I was going, and says what I’ve been trying to process in my mind about our “purple mountain majesties” in America the Beautiful.
by SGHolland © 2017 Sept 7
