Heading for summer camp

I have such happy memories of summer camp -- six 2-week stints at two different girls' camps in the years I was aged seven to twelve. What was so memorable, over fifty years later? Living in the woods in tents or cabins, swimming every day, hanging out in a relatively egalitarian environment, singing songs from around the world (Take it from the top: "Waltzing Matilda." I know all the verses and even the meaning of "jumbuck" and "billabong"). Maybe what was best was stepping outside the routine, doing different things just for fun.

And in this spirit, I decided it was time to go off to summer camp -- every morning, in the studio. All kinds of preliminary plans for paintings routinely drift in and out of my mind and sketchbook (I'd just finished a big one that I'll post next time), and I'm putting this mental list on hold for a while. Instead, I'm going to play, just for the fun of it. Oh, some of this will be painting, but maybe I'll try some odder ventures than usual.

My first session at camp started two weeks ago. I cracked into an unopened pack of modelling clay and summoned up the spirits of Campfires Past. By the solstice, I'd assembled a tent's (or teapot's) worth of little girl campers.

This was not without its challenges. The clay began to dry within the 45 minutes I worked on each figure and would dry further with each passing day. This meant that the first figure, securely anchored to the edge, lost its balance overnight -- and required firmer seating on a little deck chair (and a hat to hide her embarrassment).


I had to invent some odd poses to connect the figures to the teapot.


One small paddle-like hand broke off and had to be reattached with a
"towel" -- leaving this camper looking like a snake-handler.

And I admit, even for little girls, they all look quite asexual.


I thought I'd have clay enough for only four figures but saw, with some scrimping, I could manage five -- but she's pretty anorexic.


So what camp-in-a-teapot is this, anyway? I could borrow a page from the book of my friend B, tea drinker and out-of-the-box leader extraordinaire, who did a whole employee recognition riff with custom-made tea boxes with labels like sereni-tea, facili-tea, curiousi-tea, flexibili-tea. But these girls (and their counsellor) seem to occupy another dimension. In fact, they strongly resemble extraterrestrials. Maybe it's a place called Camp E-Tea. ??

Rembrandts rule!

A few years ago, I came across an article about tulipimania , the 17th-century Dutch rage for exotic and hugely expensive tulip bulbs. The phenomenon is now billed as one of the first economic bubbles since fortunes were lost when the inflated tulip market collapsed. What's more, the intriguing tulips of old Dutch paintings owed their stripes (called "flames") to a virus -- so they turned out to be a botanical bust, as well. The flames in today's versions have been hybridized (no virus), and once I understood that the now so-called "Rembrandt Tulips" are easily and inexpensively available, I had to have some and I had to paint them!

Serendipitously, I found them in my favorite mail-order garden catalog, and while the bulbs wintered in our garden, I had a chance to consider what I'd do with those stripes in the spring. (You know my methods, Watson. If one patterned object is good, two or more must be better...) Some months later, the tulips, a Gala apple, and some striped fabric converged in "Rembrandt Stripes" (copyright 2008).


This year, there's been a further convergence. The Rembrandts again bloomed in our yard, my series of "Plate" paintings was on my mind, and meanwhile, I'd discovered the most marvelous book and author/art historian:

The time was right to haul out that striped fabric and do something more with the Rembrandt tulips and a golden-yellow plate. I adjusted my original set-up, changing the plate's placement vertically (more fabric at the bottom) and reversing the colours of the fabric's stripes. Here's the outcome: "Yellow Plate Special" (copyright 2011)-- you can watch it materialize here.


I see it as the middle portion of a triptych, with "Blue Plate Special" to its left, and "Orange Plate Special" to its right. And for now, I'm putting the "Plate" series to rest.