The reclining Chaukhtatgyi Buddha in Yangon is we are told, the largest marble Buddha in the world. It measures approximately 200 feet long and 2 1/2 stories high. It was built in 1966 replacing a somewhat smaller 1907 version that fell into disrepair and was demolished in 1957. It was difficult to get an image that included the whole statue, but these are my best attempts. The Chaukhatgyi Buddha is wearing a crown set with diamonds, rubies and other precious gems.  

From the other side and providing a little scale. Those splotches on the floor at the lower left of the image are actually people. Yes I felt rather small.

The bottoms of the feet, although not mosaic, are absolutely lovely with icons in gold relief representing the auspicious characteristics of the lives of the Buddha.

Detail of the mosaic on the robes of the Buddha.

More detailed.

Shwe Yaunghwe Kyaung Monastery is a beautiful wooden monastery near wonderful Inle Lake in Myanmar and one of my favourite stops on our trip. I would love to be able to provide information about the history of this site, but alas, it’s going to take more than a basic Internet search to find anything more than photos. If anyone can point me in the right direction, I’d be grateful.

A stunningly beautiful little Earth Touching Buddha statue.

Large chest covered entirely in colourful glass mosaic.

The site also includes an ornately decorated ordination hall and pictured above — the Shwe Yan Pyay Pagoda.

The pagoda’s long corridors that are decorated with hundreds of small Buddha niches as well as beautiful glass mosaics that are clearly very old.

One of the many mosaic characters, a little worse for wear but demonstrating how paint was used under clear glass to colour the image.

This one’s in better shape and far more colourful. It appears that coloured glass was used in this as well as paint.

There’s clearly a story being told here but sadly I’m unable to tell you what it’s about.

I have to digress once again from the mosaic theme of this post and show you the gorgeous hand painted tile floor also in the Shwe Yan Pyay Pagoda.

Thank you for stopping by, I hope to see you here again soon.

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My most recent activities have included a couple of visits to North Lake Tahoe. The first was a weekend to spend time with family in celebration of a birthday. During these two short days we took a seven mile hike along the lake on the Bliss Rubicon Trail. As usually happens while out in nature, I found myself photographing mosaic inspiration at every turn.
(click on images for an expanded view)
 

Beautiful Lake Tahoe from the Bliss Rubicon hiking trail.
 

Along the lake are some amazing rock formations that looked almost as though they had been intentionally sculpted. Anyone else see Venus is this one? My husband saw a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle from another perspective but I didn’t see it.
 

Healthy trees growing as a result of new sound forest management practices.
 

I think I feel another water feature coming on.
 

Rubicon Point Lighthouse at elevation 6,580 ft is the highest lighthouse in North America. It hasn’t functioned for over 80 years and then for only a few years, as costs apparently made it impractical to operate.
 

Some of the most striking views of Lake Tahoe can be found at Emerald Bay. The source of it’s name is readily apparent. The water is a warm blue green and amazingly clear. Now when I say warm, I’m referring to the colour – the water temperature is another matter.
 

I love this image. It almost looks like a mosaic already and is providing food for thought for a piece I’m currently working on.
 

A paddlewheel boat touring Emerald Bay harkens back to an earlier time – at least until another speed boat goes by.
 

The following day we hit the lake in kayaks. (That’s my toe in the foreground and my husband Jack in the kayak ahead.) The wind and lake effect were stronger that day.
 

Kayaking is not only a favourite way to get exercise but it’s also a wonderful way to experience nature up close. I usually think of it as a peaceful activity, but in this case we started too close to Tahoe City and found ourselves working to avoid being submerged in the wake of the multiplicity of boats and other contrivances speeding around and above the lake many with audio systems bumping. Let’s just say, it increased the exercise factor.
 
The birthday celebration was a delightful evening with friends and family, but where I also met a new acquaintance. This meeting not only resulted in fun and interesting conversation but also in my receiving an invitation to apply to participate in an exhibition called “Bits and Pieces” (coincidence?): a show including works in sculpture or mosaic at the North Lake Tahoe Arts Center, a twenty year old non-profit organization that supports the arts in the Truckee-Tahoe communities.
 

Our next trip to Lake Tahoe was the following weekend to drop off three table that have been included in the exhibition. Jack felt they needed a little polishing.
 
The show takes place until October 1st, 2012. I hope that if you’re in the neighbourhood you’ll pop in and have a look.

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So, what have I been up to? I have finished another table top. This one based on images and memories from hikes in California.
 

It has a somewhat softer feel than my previous work and I now wish that I had considered a lighter coloured grout to enhance that softness. That, however, will have to wait for another one – and there will be more.
Yesterday we picked up the table bases that I had commissioned to hold my mosaic table tops. They were forged and hand shaped locally to my specifications.
 

 
There are two sizes; 15″ as well as 18″ and I expect I’ll be adding larger ones soon. We went through a number of iterations trying to design a table base that would compliment rather than compete with the mosaic as well as work in a number of settings and with existing furniture. These have still to be painted, but I’m pleased with the simple clean design. I really have my work cut out for me now, and as soon as I complete the lamp I’m currently working on, I will start another tide pool inspired table top.
 
Another recent activity has been continuing education. Everything I know about making mosaics I’ve learned through books, and once the Grotto water feature (see previous post) had water flowing through it, I started second guessing myself.

It would be heartbreaking to discover that something I had done or neglected to do might put the longevity of the fountain at risk. So when I discovered that the Institute of Mosaic Art (IMA) in Oakland was offering a two day class in exterior and garden applications, I signed up. I am ecstatic to report that my books didn’t fail me and that the fountain should survive for a very long time.

The images above are of the stepping stone I created during the class. It was created with high-fired ceramic tile on a cement paver. I love the intense colour of the ceramic but cutting the stuff was literally a pain. If our instructor Delaine Hackney had not offered the use of a pair of good double-geared nippers I would never have completed the project on time. We had approximately four hours to complete our projects so that they would be ready to grout the following day. Somehow I managed and only exceeded the allotted time by about 10 minutes.

I’m so happy that I took class, not only because it allayed my fears but it was great to be able to ask specific questions, to have questions answered that I didn’t even know I had and to meet and spend time with other mosaic artists. I enjoyed it so much in fact, that next month I’ll be attending a three day mosaic intensive at the IMA instructed by Sonia King; an artist whose work I greatly admire and the author of one of those books that didn’t steer me wrong. I look forward to reporting back.

Update – Since I posted this Jim from True West Media located a plugin that gives you the option of checking a box in the comment section if you want to be informed when a reply to your comment is published. It looks like it might be working. Thanks Jim!

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Creating a water feature provided new challenges for me. The surface material was one I hadn’t worked with before, it was larger than I’d previously attempted, and must be able to withstand a constant stream of water flowing over and within it. I am so grateful to the many mosaic artists who provided answers to my questions by including them in their books.

Like my previous work, the first design step was to find images from which I could draw inspiration. I had decided some time ago that I would like to base my first water feature on a grotto. They, like tide pools are a part of the amazing natural beauty that drew me to this part of the world. I poured over photos from hikes we’d taken in the Santa Cruz Mountains, San Francisco Bay Area and in Hawaii finally settling on two images to use as the basis for the work.

I started laying down glass using my usual organic method, trying to depict water flowing over earth as well as the foliage around it. I tend to use the images I choose as a starting point and once I get going refer back periodically only to look for a new shape or colour combination.

When cutting the tile I try to ensure that there is a variety of shapes and sizes. I lay them down in clusters that both radiate and fall. Lines go in multiple directions and slice across other sections, all in an attempt to give the impression of motion.

Although I love the greens and earthy tones of a grotto, as I worked I found myself including floral elements suggestive of some of our beautiful California native plants. The delight and risk of working organically is that the finished piece rarely bears much resemblance to the one I had in my head when I started.

One of the difficulties I’ve encountered in making mosaics is with grouting. For some reason, I can’t seem to get a piece grouted without leaving behind air bubbles and strange divots. Because I know when I’m licked, I enlisted the help of my wonderful husband Jack – a graphic artist with almost infinite patience – to do the grouting for me.

Once the grouting was complete I took over again, cleaning off the excess grout. When the remaining grout was sufficiently cured I went in and detailed every tile, making sure there was none of it left where it shouldn’t be.

I then put it back in Jack’s hands, who dug a trench to lay conduit from the pump to the wall outlet, did the necessary wiring, leveled the ground where the fountain was to sit and anything else that needed to be done in order to get the thing running smoothly.

At this point it was time to add the water and plug in the pump.

Unfortunately the supplier of the pump didn’t have the right size in stock and this one proved a little too powerful for the fountain, but, ever resourceful, Jack used a cork to narrow the passage from the pump to the spigot and so…

This grotto it is now happily bubbling away. Next we need to landscape around it, but that’s a project for another day. Spring perhaps.

To you lovely people who leave comments: I always respond to your remarks but unfortunately with previous articles, you weren’t informed when a reply was posted. I believe that bug is corrected and you can now make the choice to be notified when I reply or someone else remarks on your comment. Comments by e-mail, I’m afraid, will continue to come only to me, at least for the time being. I’m working on adding the option to have them posted to the blog as well.

Unfortunately it appears that notifications are not being sent. Still at the drawing board. My apologies.

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Santa Fe is such a beautiful city in part because of the strict building codes. Building is required to be done in territorial or Spanish Revival style and there are no high rises to obstruct the view of the mountains that surround the city. This is a residential subdivision – can you spot the houses? Clicking to enlarge the image may help, but maybe not.

Cactus mixed in with pine and juniper as well as various deciduous trees and shrubs make the landscape in the hills above Santa Fe look as though they’d been planned by a garden designer.

Pinion nuts. My husband discovered that extracting them from the cone is a sticky and tricky process.

A flower behind snow fence. I just liked this shot.

On the rocks near the Santa Fe River is a site containing hundreds of petroglyphs created by early Pueblo Indians and later Spanish colonials. Clearly this part of the world has been inspiring artists for hundreds of years.

One of my favourites. I’m not sure exactly what this ‘bird in a box’ is supposed to represent but it’s a great image.

This definitely looks like a frog.

Not far from the petroglyphes is a rare tin can tree. Apparently these are a very threatening species as it’s fruit is full of bullet holes.

Breathtaking Bandelier National Monument. Like the petroglyph park, choosing only a few images was exceedingly difficult. This is a shot of Tyuonyi Village from the trail leading to the many cliff dwellings.

From inside one of the cliff dwellings – talk about a room with a view.

The image isn’t one of the more spectacular views of Bandelier but entering this room literally brought tears to my eyes. The wood protruding from the smoke blackened ceiling (shown) and depressions in the floor were there to support large looms on which were created ceremonial weavings. It made me feel very connected to artisans who went before.

One thing I didn’t expect to see in New Mexico were vineyards. We were delighted that Vivác Winery outside Taos offered not only some very respectable wine but also my other favourite antioxidant: chocolate.

The leaves were just starting to turn colours the third week of September but there were still many fields bursting with wild flowers. I also couldn’t resist throwing in one more dilapidated building.

Goodbye for this visit with a beautiful New Mexico sunset.

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I’ve been puzzling this past month over how to turn the experience into a post. At last I decided to just show you a little bit of a lot. This doesn’t come close to covering our week long journey or to explaining just how inspiring this corner of the world is, but it’s a start.

The New Mexico sky was the most beautiful cerulean blue usually contrasted by fluffy white clouds, but also by whitewashed adobe structures like this freshly painted archway. This is part of the wall surrounding the San Francisco Catholic Church in Golden, NM on the Turquoise Trail from Albuquerque to Santa Fe.

We found ourselves drawn to visiting many of the omnipresent churches, most of them hundreds of years old. Above is the Santuario de Nuestro Señor de Esquipulas in Chimayo. Dirt from a back room of the church is claimed to contain powers that can heal physical and spiritual ills. This is highlighted by the massive parking lot with the majority of spaces being “handicap” parking.

The churches we stopped into were all adobe structures with hand crafted woodwork both inside and out. This is the exterior balcony of the Church of San Jose de Garcia in Las Trampas on the High Road to Taos.

You likely recognize San Francisco de Asis Mission Church in Taos from Georgia O’Keeffe’s many paintings of it. Is there any wonder that she was inspired to paint it?

The interior is equally inspiring.

I fell in love with this little building near the church. There’s something so sculptural about the way it was boarded up, it’s difficult to believe it wasn’t done with art in mind.

Inside the churches was an amazing array of folk art; some of it beautifully crafted, some adorned with delicate painting or hand carved embellishment, some with plastic angels or flowers. It was also interesting to see icons and imagery containing Christian, Pagan and a combination of influences. This example is from the Church in Golden.

Of course the churches with a ‘tourist’ following are flanked by shops and galleries. This funky establishment is near the the Santuario de Nuestro Señor de Esquipulas in Chimayo.

The High Road to Taos is also a great route for finding art and artists. In addition to the churches, the adobe buildings returning to the earth and the sculpture of abandoned metal work there are a number of art galleries including the Anna Karin Gallery in Truchas where I had a very inspiring conversation with Jeane George Weigel.

The whole region is rife with art. This is the Shidoni Foundry north of Santa Fe were we were able to watch the creation of some glass pieces.

Yes, it was as hot as it looks.

This is a cool shop in Albuquerque. I had to post something with a ristra after all.

OK, so I’ve turned this into a travel-log, but I hope you find it inspiring as well. So inspiring perhaps that you’ll come back for Part II of Enchanted New Mexico to be posted in the near future.

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I had taken a few shots of the tabletop as I worked on it, but very few. In spite of that, I am going to try to show you how it came into being.

It all started with a patio side table that had seen better days. The table had a chip out of its plain glass top and seemed a prime candidate for a mosaic makeover.

One day while we were doing a little beach combing I realized that tide pools would make great subject matter for mosaic art. First of all, I’m a big fan of tide pools, but also because they are so beautiful and full of shape and colour and movement. I also thought they would lend themselves very well to work in glass, my new favourite medium. When I started work on the table, I knew it would be my first tide pool piece.

I had planned to follow what I believed to be standard protocol, and make a sketch or visual plan of what I hoped the finished piece would look like. I sketched it but realized that I didn’t have the patience to make a plan for every piece of glass. That’s when it occurred to me that sketches have never been part of my art making m.o. I have always preferred to work organically and let a piece develop as I worked.

I looked at various images of tide pools from my own photos and images on the web. Once I had some basic shapes, colours and textures in mind I set out cutting glass. I lay the cut glass out in little piles as I imagined I wanted to place them.

I began with an area that was to be a sort of purple anemone and started gluing down tesserae. By the time I’d finished that, all other plans were forgotten and I just continued to lay down glass creating elements as they occurred to me, occasionally going back and removing pieces that weren’t working. I referred back to the tide pool photos periodically and continued to build.

I should probably add, that the gluing was not quite as easy as I’ve made it sound. First was the process of selecting the proper adhesive for the job and that was a job in itself. I won’t bore you with the details, but I did find a clear glue that promised to hold glass to glass on a piece of outdoor furniture. So far so good.

Once I had finished the tabletop and was happy with the outcome I turned my attention to grout. I decided a dark charcoal grout would set the piece off well and be most appropriate for an underwater scene. I grouted the mosaic with a few whoopses here and there, but nothing that couldn’t be fixed. When the mosaic was grouted, cured and sealed, I secured the entire top into the frame of the table with a flexible grout, but not until I’d repainted the metal table base.

I am so excited to be creating again and I have to admit that I think this piece turned out rather well. The table now sits on our veranda where we spend some part of almost every fair weather day, and I’m always happy to see it.

I’m also happy to say that I have my next project well under way and look forward to showing it to you. Thank you for looking in.

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Until early 2000 art making was a huge part of my life. I had a lovely large studio and spent a good part of everyday and more frequently night working on projects both for exhibition and for fun. I attended classes, workshops and art retreats, sat on the board of art organizations, adjudicated children’s art and gave workshops. I painted in acrylic and oil, used mixed media in various ways and by the end of the 90′s, was principally engaged in making found object sculpture and jewellery. I was also part of an artist’s collective called The Coterie of Malcontents, working on group projects from exhibits to workshops. My artist friends and I spent a great deal of time creating beautiful or whacky (or both) gifts for each other that were presented at our not infrequent get togethers. Art made up a large part of both my work and social life.

In 2002 I moved from Manitoba to California. As beautiful as Canada is there are things that I confess I was quite happy to leave behind; chief among them the winter weather.

What I dearly missed, however, in addition to family and friends, was time and space for making art. I didn’t die or turn to stone, but clearly something was lacking.

Tide Pool Table
 
So how to begin the journey back? The lack of sufficient time and space made working in old familiar media unavailable to me but there had to be something that could take its place. With the help and encouragement of my sweetheart, it became apparent that the best way to sculpt and paint without the ability to do either was to create mosaics. Mosaic art makes it possible to build and sculpt using mixed media, to play with colour, to be expressive, and as traditional or avant-garde as I choose. It can be done in a relatively small space and doesn’t require concentrated periods of time. So, I bought some books and started breaking things.

Tide Pool Table
 
I began with a couple of smaller pieces as a means of learning technique and experimenting with media. I learned some valuable lessons about adhesives and grout and discovered that I really like working in glass. I also discovered that I can work much the way I did with painting and sculpture. I was never a big fan of making sketches or maquettes before I started a piece but preferred to work organically, starting with a picture in my mind and allowing it to develop as I worked. I am now working that same way in my mosaic creation – no pattern, just an idea and an image in my head with any number of places to take it.

It’s time to play again, and whatever the outcome, I’m having fun and feeling once again, like an artist.

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