Greetings from the Mesa
It’s been a quiet past few days. We spent Valentine’s day eating cheese dip and working on the puzzle pictured above. It took three sessions to complete. We finished watching all three seasons of Foundation, and are just starting to get into watching some Olympics events. The weather has turned stormy so the wood stove is in full crank out the heat mode. I’m way behind in my Nix/86 daily drawings and in deep contemplative mode on the direction on this project. Busted out the fountain pens recently and enjoying diving into straight up journal writing again – needed a different kind of outlet for stuff right now.
Curiosities of the Week
- Just started following Amanda Close on Youtube. Enjoying her sketchbook tours and looking forward to getting into her arty videos. As a 40+ year journal keeper I enjoyed her deep dive video I kept a journal for 42 years and this is what happened.
- Discovered through above… The art of Kristin Texeira. I like her style of documenting moments. It resonates.
- Yesterday I got to try monoprinting on a ceramic tile. I actually used the basic technique but just freeform drew on the tile. It’ll probably be a couple weeks before I get to see the final result, but it was fun.
- Speaking of documenting moments – this caught my eye on Substack. In the ‘70s, I asked people if I could take photos of their daily life and they could write captions about them. This is my father, Sam, c. 1974.
- In the latest National Geographic there’s a short article about – Jazz kissa (Japanese: ジャズ喫茶), sometimes transliterated as jazu kissa, are cafés that specialise in the playing and appreciation of recorded jazz music. Unique to Japan, jazz kissa are spaces where jazz music is played for dedicated listening rather than as background music. A typical jazz kissa features a high-quality stereo system, a large music collection and dim lighting, and serves coffee and alcoholic drinks. (from Wikipedia) Really need these for all genres right now…
Consuming
Currently Reading: I Saw the Sky Catch Fire, The Burning God, My Favorite Thing is Monsters II
TV/Movies: Olympics
Music: Ólafur Arnalds live from Hafursey, in Iceland for Cercle