Scanner art by Craig Cramer, gardening & more
Garden art, PhotoShopped images, etc.
I got an nice note from quilt artist Lisa Ellis (website | blog) today to let me know that a quilt she made inspired by a pretty mediocre picture I snapped is currently on display at the University of Michigan, and will hang permanently in the bone marrow transplant ward there.
Find more floral and other inspirational quilts at the Healing Quilts in Medicine and Fiber Artists @ Loose Ends websites, as well as Lisa’s website and blog.
Son Nathan is on a month-long adventure in China. He posted this iconic bridge picture on his Facebook page. I’m sure I’ve seen it before. But what’s up with that firetower-like structure in the background.
Nice collection of melon sculptures via another one of my favorite eyecandy sites, Environmental Graffiti.
One of the rites of early spring here is Dragon Day on the Cornell Campus. Every year, on the Friday before spring break, first year architecture students create and parade a dragon across campus, to be met by a phoenix constructed by engineering students.
In the past, the dragon was ceremoniously burned on the Arts Quad. This year, in order to comply with environmental regulations limiting open burning to wood and agricultural wastes — the dragon was spared the pyre. Instead a wood and straw nest was offered up to the gods.
I’m fond of Dragon Day not just because it’s a harbinger of spring, but because it gives the students a bit of a creative outlet mid-semester: According to the Cornell Chronicle, “Dozens of costumed student revelers — in outfits including orange highway cones, the bunny from “Donnie Darko,” and a lithe reptilian figure in head-to-toe green Spandex” joined the parade.
Wikiepedia has some great images of Dragon Days past, going back to the ’20s. University Photo pulled together a video montage that captures the spirit of this year’s event. Below are some screen captures from the Cornell.edu website celebrating recent Dragon Days.
On the NYTimes Measure for Measure blog, Suzanne Vega explains What’s a Melody For? I won’t say she buried the lede, but the post ends with Tom Chapin singing his testimony in Albany to protest cuts in state funding for the arts:
Vega concludes:
The right combination of words and, yes, melody at the right moment can have a powerful effect. The latest news is that $50 million has been allocated to the N.E.A. as part of the recovery package, in part because of the organized lobbying efforts of arts advocates across the country.
Just think of a world without art, without song — how would we celebrate? What would we dream of? What would set our imaginations free? How could we express our emotions for our husbands and wives and children? Celebrate a birthday? A melody is for expressing emotions: delight, passion, sadness. It reminds us of what we have felt and experienced before, in our own personal code of emotion and history. Priceless!
