SchragWall
As a teacher I spent my life as an agent of change. Moving students from lethargy to curiosity, leading to a life of positive action. I was a motivational speaker for an active mind and living an active life. It was, in a word, exhausting. I do not believe that those frenetic years led to my multiple myeloma, but I have decided that it is time to pass my "agent of change cape" to a younger generation, and put on the more relaxing garb of an “agent of calm.” This blog explores that new role.
Sunday, March 30, 2025
Horsing Around
Saturday, March 29, 2025
All the King's Horses
All the king's horses and all the king's men
Couldn't put Humpty together again.
- Mother Goose
Wednesday, March 26, 2025
There is Being There and Getting There
Sunday, March 23, 2025
Crane Flight 2.0
Saturday, March 22, 2025
Serendipity
Sometimes you start out doing one thing that turns into another. I started out to explore a background for Flight of the Cranes, as some of you suggested. I did that using a process that I have used before. You start with what Cezanne called "a terrible and wonderful thing;" a blank canvas. In this case just a 9x12 sheet from a drawing pad. Then you take a black marker and let it swirl over the sheet awhile until you satisfied. Then you fill in a few of the spaces of the swirl, again until you get an idea of whether or not you might use the idea.
Monday, March 17, 2025
Spring Break in Florence
However, it is the more hidden workshops and galleries in Florence that I find attractive. There is one on a street that I can neither remember or spell that duplicates carousel horses. A big lathe that has a reference rod that passes over a finished pony that guides a couple of cutting blades that carve the new horse. Later that afternoon we were resting in a plaza where a carousel was being packed up to move, I assume to another location, and I wondered if those horses had sprung from that backstreet workshop.
Sunday, March 16, 2025
Venice in the Rearview Mirror
[Being Part 1 of the necessarily incomplete reflections on our recent sojourn in Italy.]
Saturday, February 22, 2025
Flight of the Cranes 1.0
Hi All -
Thursday, February 13, 2025
Little Tiny Wall
While I always told my students to simply do their best, and not waste time comparing their efforts to the G.O.A.T. (Greatest of All Times), sometimes we should look to the goats for inspiration. History has it that Leonardo da Vinci tried to bring innovations, new ideas, to every project. Sometimes with mixed results when he would abandon "bad ideas" midstream. Which may explain why we have fewer than 20 paintings attributed to the brush of the master.
Tuesday, February 11, 2025
Forgetting What Came Naturally
I write and draw between a couple of screens and a drawing table, surrounded by a couple dozen of favorite images on the walls. Favorite images that I created over another few dozen years. They are good company - mostly. I say mostly because recently they have come to display a disconcerting side. Let me explain.
Sunday, February 2, 2025
Living in a State of Lovingkindness
The California fires, and the seemingly insurmountable challenges looming in their aftermath, are but one of the most recent reasons I hesitate to open my news sources in the morning. At least they are not examples of humankind killing each other off over some political, territorial, religious or philosophical spat. Still they serve as a devastating reminder of nature's ability to overwhelm our arrogant and ignorant attempts to ignore, or control, the forces of the natural world. In my old home state of North Carolina, folks would repeatedly insist on building lovely seaside homes despite centuries-long histories of storms that allowed the waves to gleefully tear them down. California's recent display of the awesome, unleashed forces of nature does nothing to lessen the frustrating impotent compassion we feel for those still in harms way.
Friday, January 24, 2025
Gateway to Unrepentant Gentleness
It was the end of some video we were watching - I forget which, but the father was sitting in a big stuffed armchair with a kid tucked in on each side. He was reading: