EVERY DAY IS VALENTINE'S DAY--I

Envelope embellished with doily, stamped French script and printed hand coloured clip art.

My Cup of Tea card. 

Bookmark made with origami paper and recycled envelope.

Above: Envelope embellished with paper doily, lunaria and glue on crystal.
Below: Card made with origami paper hearts and hand tinted stamped image and tiny fan made from recycled gold chocolate wrapper.

                           Card and envelope made with paper doilies and stamped images.

Handmade mini notebook covered in burlap and decorated with plastic snowflake button and felt heart.

Mini notebook has endpapers made with from origami print.

Material used  to make bookmark and matchbook.

These are some of my Valentine's Day projects.More at the EVERYTHING PAPYREAN page.

PAINTED CLOUDS

                                                                               Sisley

                                                                              Constable

Lorrain

The human heart is a place of wonder. It has room for mineral vegetable and animal life. There is ample evidence of that on the Facebook wall of writer Joseph Finder, just below the photo of a  golden  Labrador retriever. Finders caption for the photo was,
"Unconditional live is so rare. "
Judging from the responses he got, the consensus is that dogs can be relied upon to love unconditionally. I know from experience that such is not always the case and I have the scars to prove it. Nevertheless,healthy dogs--the Chowchow that bit me was truly dysfunctional-- people are equally of living  love that " is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres."
Another writer, Louanne Rice, posted about her love of cloud watching, something many of us share I proposed that we form a club. Ideally, we would  fluffy lamb, that fierce dragon, that length of unravelling silk will travel. Ideally, painter Alfred Sisley would be part of that club. Many of his landscapes include fleecy clouds perhaps for that simple reason that that clouds were often present  present in French skies beneath which he worked.  Then again, it may be that clouds are an integral part of work of painters he  admired, such as Turner and Constable . The latter, in turn, was influenced by  cloud-loving Claude Lorrain.No matter. Sisley's death in 1899 might make it difficult to include him in the cloud watching club. The best I can do is look at his painting when the weather is inclement.

MAXING OUT

River Landscape with Ferry, by Salomon van Ruysdael, 1649. This is a new acquisition of the National Art Gallery, in Washington, DC.

Did you ever face a problem that seemed to expand until it touched every aspect of your life? How did you cope with it? At the moment, I am doing research for a story on credit card debt. I have just added a post on credit card debt, loan applications to Twitter, soliciting stories about loan applications. I would like to hear from people whose credit card debt had a serious impact on their lives. How did they manage? How did credit card debt affect the quality of their lives?

The story is in the seminal stage. Its crux is what happens when a society geared towards consumerism does exactly what it is programmed to do then crashes. More on this later.

Dutch painter Salomon van Ruysdael ( 1603-167t) lived during the Dutch Golden Age. Rampant affluence, courtesy of the West India Company spice trade, allowed greater social mobility New riches . Flush with profits from the Indies, the nouveaux riches elevated consumerism to a quasi-religious position. Paintings from that period reflect an affluent society represented by burgers bedecked in lace and jewels. Landscapes are tranquil and idyllic, still life paintings give an illusion of unending riches, posh brick houses are "as solid as ennui." Their iconic stability seems to speak for the entrenched power of Dutch bankers. But did poverty and debt lurk behind these fortress-like facades? I know that Holland occasionally exported its poorer citizens to the Indies. One of my remote ancestors ended up in the Caribbean along with several underprivileged fellow Jews--not all Sephardim did brilliantly in the spice and sugar trade.

Not all Americans got rich during our Golden Age. I wonder who will paint the America of the Eighties when abundance seem eternal. Will their art last beyond this century? Who will pain the anguish of those who were lured by the sirens of acquisitiveness only to see that prosperity was just a bubble on the verge of bursting? These are the people flocking to banks, begging for loans. How do they face the schadenfreunde of whose circumstances allow them to weather the crisis comfortably? The economy will rebound, according to predictions. By next year, the job market will supposedly improve. Credit card companies will no longer have as much latitude as previously. But at the heart of the problems is the American attitude towards ownership--I own, therefore I am. Will that have changed?

ART AND THE KNITTER

As a youth, Impressionist painter Renoir painted china dishes in Limoges, France. Later, he painted peasants and domestic workers. Set side by side with the rich folks he would eventually portray, these proletarians have the undeniable nobility conferred by honest work. That is not surprising. Writing about him, his son, filmmaker Jean Renoir, mentioned that his father railed against "stupid hands." He does not elaborate, but it is easy to assume that for him, stupid hands were those that would not plant a garden, sew a seam, bathe a child, cook a meal, set a table. France

Many of them women he painted had clever hands. He shows them shows them holding children, baking bread, harvesting vegetables. He revels in their solid earthiness, their nonsense approach to tasks his silk-gowned, carefully coiffed clients disdained. Gabrielle, the shown above is one of the women Renoir painted again and again. She had the down to earth approach to life, the luscious, abundant flesh, the luminous beauty he loved in his wife Aline. She joined his household to helped bring up his children and she became one of his favorite models. See her above, lovingly lit, extravagantly dressed. Note how unsuitable the extravagant collar she wears is to the homely chores she performed all her life. It is as if Renoir were saying that people with clever hands have the gift to tranform themselves. They can paint dishes, plant gardens, bathe children one day and they can dress up in some marvelous garment of their own making and go dancing at Bougival. Take a leaf from his book. Knit, crochet or embroider a Gabrielle collar. Put it on and go paint the town. It is Friday. Shabbat shalom!

Above, left, Junior wear a red crocheted cotton jabot.