Blog post alert: Maybe Frieseke's parasol isn't quite Brat green, and Kamala Harris's campaign is certainly more energizing than relaxing. All the same, doesn't it suddenly feel like a happy summer? If you can't get out into a garden of your own, visit Barbara Wells Barudy's blog post on Late 19C Women & Gardens & Parasols to enjoy Frederick Carl Frieseke's sunny take on the topic.
Picturing a World
Medieval Chinese marionettes
January 18, 2024
I was gobsmacked on Wednesday when I stumbled across this painting of a marionette theater in a garden by Liu Songnian. Even after editing four books on the Song Dynasty, I had no idea such puppets existed in China at that time! What I was looking for were reminders of late-medieval Western toys for my fantasy-in-progress. Now ideas are popping about some sort of magical Silk Road on which puppeteers might travel. Serendipity for sure.
Cabinet of curiosities—and more!
June 29, 2023
Blog post alert: Cabinets of curiosities, gardens, elegant glass instruments, paintings, frames—the post Science, gardens and the Baroque frame has everything! Or anyway scads of related topics and images that reflect my particular fancies. For a hi-rez version of this painting, click here.
Sydney Gardens, Bath
September 9, 2022
Blog post alert: A post at Jane Austen's World, Sydney Gardens Restoration in Bath, provides information on an upcoming celebration of a restored garden in the English city of Bath—and much more. I loved the video on laying out a labyrinth and followed the links to renting Jane Austen's house (£165 a night for the end of September 2022). The image is from an article, The History of Sydney Gardens at The Bath Magazine on-line. It shows the bandstand as Jeanette and Edward might have seen it if they visited on their honeymoon (for a larger version, click here).
Hidden garden emerges
July 26, 2022
Post alert: The drought in England has revealed many features in the landscape, including the bones of a 1699 garden built for the 1st Duke of Devonshire. The BBC story, Chatsworth's hidden 17th Century garden revealed in drone footage shows intricacies that have become visible. Many people are attune to the layers of time in a landscape. How suggestive these haunting emergences may prove!
Wildness and wonder
January 10, 2022
Michael Garrick's photograph of exuberant, overflowing, flowering, abundant life taking over an abandoned greenhouse (used here under a Creative Commons License) was just the tonic I needed on a very cold morning in New England . Sure, there's the pandemic, worrying political news, and the terrifying prospect of all that climate change will bring. And still, wildness breaks through our structures, constrictions, and failures to bring subversive glee and wonder.
Importance of dialogue
November 25, 2021
The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber and David Wengrow is full of interesting discoveries and arguments. One idea grabbed my attention. Neuroscience, they say, seems to show that self-aware thoughts on a problem generally last about seven seconds. "[T]he great exception to this is when we're talking to someone else. In conversation, we can hold thoughts and reflect on problems for hours on end" (p. 94). Graeber and Wengrow point out that many ancient philosophers framed their writings as dialogue. I would add, think how often writers have written as though there were a devil and an angel or two sides of personality arguing with each other when they want to depict a mental struggle. The device can seem contrived, but maybe it arises out of more than convention.
Clearing the Clutter (4): Writer in library
September 10, 2021
Oddly enough, I remembered this watercolor as "Lady Pole in Her Library." Nope, the artist was Thomas Pole, an American transplant to Bristol, England, a doctor and Quaker preacher—no titled lady involved. Still, you know me: it's all about using images to prompt story ideas. And quiet as it is, In the Library has some suggestive clues.
Tudor garden heraldic beast
June 29, 2021
As a follow-up to my previous post about a potted-plant ornament, here's a detail from a portrait of Henry VIII and his family by an unknown painter of the British School. Glimpses of gardens through doorways and windows always lure me, but maybe you'll be more drawn to the monkey, the crewcut, or the man purse!
Decorative plant stake
June 26, 2021
Surfing the web, I've just come across this painting of a young girl by Rotius. The costume is worth studying; but with my interest in garden history, what struck me most was the figurine on a stake in the potted carnations. It reminds me of Tudor heraldic figures on poles, but I've never seen a miniature decoration like this. Does anybody know anything about such them?