Extravagant Beauty
The weekend was intense. Like a remembered Christmas morning when I was 5 years old, with so much under the tree, — my child’s mind was suffused with delight.
A friend, Peter passed on a tip that a extraordinary four person female band would be entertaining at the Buffalo Creek Brewing on Saturday night. Peter said that he’d be there. What better way to spend a Saturday evening than with a friend, listening to a new band. The Fox Crossing String Band knocked me out! The harmonies were superb, as was the musicianship,– acoustic guitar, mandolin, violin, banjo, dobro guitar and bass fiddle. The songs were on the traditional side of pop music. They are billed as a bluegrass band. No matter how many times I hear June Carter Cash’s Ring of Fire, I never tire of hearing it. Nothing comes close to music for strengthening the links with recurring, common human experience and the emotions of sorrow, loss, joy and love. Therapy, that I’ll happily pay to receive!
On Sunday we planned to visit the Art In The Barn exhibit held on the campus of Good Shepherd Hospital outside of Barrington. I love art shows. I enjoy being stimulated by the various art forms. Most enjoyable is the opportunity to be educated about the sources of inspiration and the process of discovery that comes with a brief discussion with some of the artists. Art In The Barn is an annual fund raiser held by the hospital auxiliary. After many years of awareness of this event this was our first occasion to attend.
A ceramics display caught my eye almost immediately as we began our tour of the outdoor exhibits. Lou Pierozzi was the potter. His signature piece of work was a out-sized bowl displayed vertically showing to good effect the glazed surface pattern. The pattern was two dimensional being slightly raised from the surface,–displaying a rough regular undulating form, like the waves on a wind swept lake. It was as if I could feel the caress of the wind forming the wavelets. I introduced myself to Lou and he was happy to talk at some length about his work. I cannot remember the asking price, but I would have paid it. Lou kindly gave his permission for this photo of himself standing next to the work.
Another memorable encounter took place when browsing at the booth of a printmaker. Print making is something that I encountered when living in Japan, a life-time ago. My eye fell upon a long narrow framed print of a single translucent wave against a dark sky with a whimsically rendered small sun in the sky. There was not much else in the spare rendering. The plain simplicity of the sea and the sky spoke to me. I introduced myself to Ken Swanson, the printmaker, asking him about the background story on his work. We must have talked for twenty minutes. Ken conveyed to me his experience of working in close relationship to the sea while in the Marines and then afterward off the coast of California. I told him about my eleven day experience on a freighter loaded with supplies for the Vietnam war, from San Francisco to Yokohama Japan. As we told and listened to the stories, it became clear that we had some things in common.
On account of these encounters and more, I left the Art In The Barn show knowing that I was a better person, that the best of other lives had been communicated to me.
Perhaps I’ll have further contact with these two artists. We did swap email addresses.
