Blue China

  

I have not forgotten you my Bloggin' Friends! It's just that my mother's personal life resembles that of a mid-twentieth-century movie star that I am having fun just writing about it. As for my own images, my life resembles that of a fifth-century Christian hermit making up theology in the desert. Who would you want to read about, sunglasses, kerchief, and all? If I want to publish this memoir of Mama I'll have to edit it carefully. These blue designs are inspired by old-fashioned crockery that would be your "ordinary" dishes. I so rarely make a circular design it's nice to try it out again. Grandma, may I have another piece of apple pie?

Markers and ink on sketchbook page, 8" x 7", February 2021.

Winter in Virginia

 

And here is Virginia in the dead of Winter, lots of date stamps and nothing to gain. These are realistic colors, there is always some bushy red or chrome green thing even in the most monochrome scene.

Photoshop with markers on sketchbook page, 8" x 9", February 2021.

Date Stamp 13: Dead of Winter

 

Get de-worded and eat something warm and vegg for this low point, this Feb-dead of winter, where I keep my Doodles in almost monochrome. Squirrels and foxes are hiding in their lairs and I am hiding in my dusty dust-cupboard, wondering whether I will ever get back to sipping at a cafe. Seems like the night lasts forever.

Watercolor markers on sketchbook journal page, 8 1/2" x 3", February 14, 2014.

I want it to be over

 

The whole world feels this way, including you. and all of us are living in privilege. I might as well do a little blog action to show that I have not abandoned the By-Product. Just think, in spring these magnolia leaves will be hosting big fragrant white flowers the size of crock pots. And maybe even I will actually cook something edible. Meanwhile I left some verbiage on the date stamp before I go fill myself with tasty but hostile substances like whole wheat cookie biscuits, fudge, and mini-candy bars to distract myself from the world. Well there's a little bit of real apple somewhere too, it can't always be my enemy. I wield the Apple Peeler!

Black tech pen and markers on sketchbook page, 3 1/2" x 2 1/2" (size of a credit card), February

2021.

Not So Much Hiatus for the By-Product; "Groundless" shows up and sees his shadow

 

I stayed up well past even my usual ridiculous hour of going to bed so that I could see the ceremonial presentation of "Punxsatawney Pete," the weather-predicting groundhog of Pennsylvania. Other than his pseudo-Masonic handlers, Pete was sent to social-distancing and the cuteness was by remote control. I enjoyed the "Pennsylvania Polka." Well here's "Groundless" with his message to the world. Stay cold, vaccinators!

Esther Geller: Galleries in the War Years

"Folk Dance" (Encaustic, mid - 40s) 

No artist succeeds alone, by him-or-herself. They always have someone whose contacts and networks give them an opportunity to advance. This is true for Esther as well. In the mid-thirties she worked in the ancient textiles and antiquarian department of the Boston Museum and this connected her with many antiques, arts, and crafts specialists, including the renowned Boris Mirski Gallery on Boston’s art-centered Newbury Street. In the mid- 40s and later, Esther pieces were shown there.

Another Esther helper was very practical: Harold Shapero, who had carpentry skills, helped her assemble frames and reinforced hardboards for the larger encaustic pieces. You can still see their handwork on the back of the big panels, as well as Boris Mirski’s elegant ancient Greek adhesive design identifying the piece.

But the most important thing in Esther’s early career, besides the fundamentals of art-making, encaustic, and studio techniques, was the art colony culture that she entered in the 1940s, at the “MacDowell Colony” (now called just “MacDowell”), and elsewhere, which gave her great networking opportunities as well as lifelong friends.

Publicity photo of Esther, mid 1940s. You can see some of the folk and antiquarian pieces which were featured in the Boris Mirski gallery. 

Black beret...Vive la Resistance!

 

Gardendoodle 1

 

Join the "Ivy League" with my little page accent for Plantworld 2021! Drapery and a rag do the job of making things greenish. There's an infinite amount of gardening to be done in all those other universes. In fact, there's one exactly like yours, you just don't know where it is nor could you reach it if you tried. But don't worry, a devoted green alien is watering it for you.

Black tech pen and marker on journal page, 2 1/2" x 3 1/2", January 30, 2021.

Sam, the Jedi Baby 1985

 

Sam's mother was a huge STAR WARS fan and probably still is. Here is the Jedi Baby in his overalls and hood, sitting on his mother's lap gathering enough Force to trust. What, don't Jedi Knights wear little striped socks? Sure they do. His baby fingers move in hidden ways. Only 6 months old and he knows how to work the Force.

I think that Blogger is working today. Why don't they just make up their minds and either get it going right or scrap it for something else, or I should scrap my stuff instead, if the pandemic logistics weren't too horrible to contemplate. It tempts me to use Bad Language but we don't do that at the By-Product.

Black tech pen on sketchbook page, 5" x 7", January 15, 1985.

Leafy Border 2

I've been in domestic urban captivity for about 8 months now and I must admit I am getting weary. Yeah, that's the word. There must be many people just like me. I go out only to get food and supplies, I haven't ordered delivery because I am from another era where this is not done, and no one delivers stuff at 4 AM.

I've faithfully posted to the By-Product all through this dreary era in my life, and I'm working on my biographical project about my mother and her life and work, but both of these are based on Blogger, the blogging software you see now. I may have to put things on hold in order to continue. I also have to save my blog archive (which must be huge by now) because it is a masterpiece of western culture. (NOT)

I managed to retrieve the address for this posting from Facebook. I need to try another operating system, Firefox. What happens when your computer fails due to obsolescence while maintaining social distance rules? Why didn't I learn this stuff when I was a kid? Because there wasn't any of "that stuff" going on when I was a kid. I stuck with comic books and classic TV shows.

I better stop now. The leafy border above is in the "wine decoration" style and I sure wish I had some wine right now but I don't, so if you don't see the By-Product please excuse my technical difficulties.

Black tech pen and marker on sketchbook journal page, 4 1/2" x 6 1/2", January 27, 2021.

More Sam

 

In these sketches, "Alien Basketball-Head Sam" is already a growing boy at five months. I pushed him through the streets of Cambridge in a stroller. I was his Auntie as he grew older. If he were your son, you'd do the same. I'd rather be an aunt than a mother, but since I can't be an aunt (no siblings) I'll be fine by being someone else's family memory.

Black tech pens on sketchbook page, 5 1/2" x 7 1/2", December 22, 1984.

Steve Client Sketch 1984

 

I made a few non-fantasy dollars at conventions drawing portraits. These were usually miniatures used as portrait ID's. If there was time, I would sit my client down and do a sketch like this one and then work it into a color portrait when I got home. Given the date of this picture it's likely that I drew him from life. The portraits had the wearer's name ("Steve") and were about the size of a credit card, though I only took cash.

Black tech pen on sketchbook page, 5" x 5", November 1984.

Leafy Border

 

This 2021 plant-image border is properly "de-worded" for public consumption. I  am still having technical difficulties here, simple operations are taking long minutes and I may have to resort to another operating system. This slowdown is frustrating. Meanwhile I am working on my mother's "biography." She sure did paint a lot!

Tech pens on sketchbook page, 8" x 3", January 23, 2021.

Esther Geller 1940s: Root People

 By 1939 Esther Geller was engaged to a military gentlemen named Chester Susskind. In 1940, Chester went off to war...and never came back...or so they thought. There were plenty of admirers and studio parties left in the Boston area. Harold Shapero had been declared unfit for military service ("4F") due to emotional instability. 

Meanwhile, Esther was not just having fun at the Museum School. She was a member of an elite group under the direction of Karl Zerbe, a German immigrant who was bringing back the thousands-year-old painting medium of encaustic. This medium had been used in memorial portraits due to its durability. Encaustic is pure pigment mixed with beeswax strengthened with natural resin. Zerbe used this highly technical means to create paintings with gloomy ethnic and surrealistic themes, influenced by the horrors of war. 

Esther continued to paint in encaustic and refine her work in the early 40s. She created floating waves and humanoid creatures whose limbs seemed made out of tangles or sheaves of plant roots. I call them her "Root People" and there are dozens and dozens of them, including watercolors as well. Zerbe's encaustics inspired black shadows and eerie moods which Esther would soon transcend.

Meanwhile, Harold, who graduated from Harvard in 1941, still was friendly with Esther. He wrote some of his best music when he was still at Harvard, such as his "Sonata for Piano Four Hands," or his "String Quartet." Esther painted Root People up until the mid-1940s.

"Dancing Family," encaustic, early 1940s

Robert Himmelsbach at DarkoverCon 1984

 

Robert Himmelsbach, master costumer and craftsman, has been my good friend in fandom for decades. He was a stalwart supporter of the Darkover mythos and its creator Marion Zimmer Bradley. I've designed costumes for him and he has collected many art pieces from me as well as posed as a (clothed) portrait model. Here he is at one of our best historical Darkovercons, slightly dressed up.

The usual art tools, the usual art size 5" x 8". I would have loved to do a graphic novel version of a Darkover piece, but Marion strictly rejected it. "I HATE COMIC BOOKS!" she yowled. Probably copyright issues as well.

The Goblet Club

 

Those of us who were old enough to drink alcohol at conventions held Scotch sipping parties (called "Quiet Gatherings") where we brought out our fancy drinkware. This is the silver-plated goblet I learned to drink Scotch from, when I was living in an artists' colony in Rome. The bottle is a single malt, which we artists couldn't afford. Our little sip meetings were called the "Goblet Club." This was almost 50 years ago. 

I still have my 1971 goblet, as seen here, but I can't drink from it. During the Virginia earthquake of August 2011, it fell to the floor and a big crack opened down one side. At least that's what I think happened. I keep it as a memory.

Black tech pen, 5" x  5", November 1984.

Knitter at DarkoverCon

 

The fantasy, sci- fi, and medieval fan communities are almost the same when it comes to taste, culture, and pastimes. Almost all the fans I have met do something "crafty" such as needlework, wood carving, knitting and crocheting, beadwork, or brewing. I stick with sketching my fellow fans at conventions. This tranquil lady is knitting a patterned sweater. I have many lovely pieces created by my friends and fellow fans just for friendship.

Black tech pen on sketchbook page, 4 1/2" x 6 1/2", November 24, 1984.

Potted Plant Border

It's the "Year of the Plants" for my theme this year, and in a few months it will be the "Damn 17-Year Cicadas" over again which I endured in 2004. I have dutifully de-worded the text so you can just look at the historic "Farmer's Almanac " design style. 

Brown inks on sketchbook journal page, 4 1/2 " x 6", January 2021.

Logan Airport on way to convention 1984

 

Here's a nice perspective study of the waiting room at Logan Airport in Boston. I am just about to get on a flight to end eventually in the Baltimore area for the venerable  "DarkoverCon" which started on Thanksgiving Day. That's why the room is empty. The people are all at home feasting with their families, so they're already where they need to go.

Black tech pen, 7 1/2" x 5 1/2", November 22,1984.

Logan Airport November 1984

November 1984, and I'm off to another convention. Even if it was not that far away, in Philadelphia or Baltimore, this year I took the plane. I think I had one of my art collector friends with me, but if it's as carefully drawn as this one, maybe not. As you know, I'll draw anything. It's been a long time since 1984.

Black Tech pen, 8" x 5", November 22, 1984.

Modernist Colorforms: Black Lighthouse

 

Time for a winter Colorforms, in a modernist homage to Rumanian artist Constantin Brancusi. He is well worth looking up as he revolutionized 3D modern art for us space fans. You'll find the hidden image of Brancusi all sorts of places and certainly he is a big deal with me. I have never worked in 3D (sculpture) but I do love looking at it.

This Colorforms fits the formula I have been using: black background, 4 basic geometric shapes in 4 basic colors, each a different size. One non-formula accent. No bottles of wine.

Photoshop, 5" x 4", January 17. 2021.