Whenever my friends and I get together for lunch, especially if it's been a while, we begin to make an agenda of catch-up items. We don't want to miss any news and views! Or, if we meet often, we're likely to bring with us our latest clippings - physical or virtual - to share. Let's just say, in either case, we rarely if ever lack for conversational topics. Call this my Did You See? opportunity I'd like to share with you over lunch. Are you going to have wine? Let's split dessert.

1. The Math of March Madness

http://nyti.ms/1OfnJVV

"It turned out that, for all the intricate calculations people like to use to complete their bracket, some pretty simple math goes a long way." (Yay, math!) 

2. What Begat What

                                                             

                                                              http://nyti.ms/1HgLXKi

Then: Your mother.

Now: Auto-correct.

Then: Marzipan

Now: Kittens in Sinks

Then: God

Now: Free wi-fi

More.  

Funny.  

Probably true.  

Loose Ends, Henry Alford. 

3. What's New, Pussycat? Meerkat!

Well...okay. I'm posting this Maureen Dowd opinion essay not because of its relevance (but it is) but for this image. Oh, I have seen THAT face!

Amy E. Lrice/Getty Images

4. And, for all of the Smell of The Printed News Lovers like me:

The Curious (and Vital) Power of Print

http://nyti.ms/1BjoGmi

"Print readers love print. The affinity they have for it is astronomical..."

First things first. Happy  Birthday to my Best Best BBF, over 50 years and counting, Claudia.

Finally completed the February flower. (Yeah, I know....)  This was 3rd version of the beautiful camellias in our backyard...just couldn't love the other two. I will live with this one. I am assigning myself practice with the brush via a Calendar Flower series. I thought I had posted December and January but guess not, so they are below.

On to March flower before March leaves us...magnolias are blooming all over, beckoning me.

February. #3 in series. 

January. #2 in series. 

December. #1 in series. 

An anniversary of sorts.

This was my first post on Blogger seven years ago almost to the day. Just for a second look, okay? As old as this post is, it truly is in the category of buried treasure.

I had been blogging for a few years before that with the Mac web app that looked great but didn't work all that well and then was discontinued by Apple anyway. We Maccers had to scramble for something else. Which was fine; it was time. Except most of my genius was in those blog posts, ya know? Gone forever. Probably a good thing. You can't go home again.

From my bookshelf

I am reading Against Wind and Tide, from the letters and journals of Anne Morrow Lindbergh. I revel at how prolific a writer she was (several books of letters and diaries over her lifetime) and am enchanted by her reflections and insights. (Writing it all by hand? oh my gosh. I can't even imagine.) We share the same feelings quite often, but I suspect it is because she mirrors much of what women as a whole think upon.  

It is the compromise with the world that is so hard. The other day I was thinking of all the conflicts one lives in the midst of every day - real conflicts below superficial issues. I want a quiet and peaceful and serene living room - and I have five children with no very good place to play and no desire to starch them in discipline. I want to be pure in heart - but I like to wear my purple dress. I want to live so quietly that the flight of live swans over y head is an occasion for a hymn and yet I want to go out in the world and meet people. One cannot be half-monk. 

I am not a sappy gal, for  the good or bad of that. But, (and not to say it is sappy) her earlier work, Gifts from the Sea - still in print - meant a very lot to me as I wrestled with a painful time in my life after the sudden death of my young husband. She and a few other eloquent writers (and quite excellent friends) helped me through it. Good books and good authors and good friends do that, don't they? I am beholden to them.

I don't like Charles much, though.

This lengthy obit summed her up quite eloquently.

And from the introduction by Reeve Lindbergh, her daughter:

The material collected...was written between my mother's fortieth birthday and her eightieth, and follow a period of substantial growth in her life and thought, as well as some marked changes in her relationship with her husband and in her sense of who she was as a woman and an artist....as a writer she was honest, eloquent, and deeply reflective, always seeking to understand life as it unfolded before her, always wanting to share her understanding with others....she struggled with issues women and men have to face in every era: what to make of a complex, difficult marriage...how to reconcile the impulse toward creativity and the need to work with the practical demands of home and family; how to respond to the larger events and issues of the day; how to give and receive friendship and love throughout a lifetime; how to meet old age and the certainty of death, first the death of those we love and cannot bear to lose...and then one's own old age and inevitable death, the end of life.

Friday Finds and Buried Treasure

1. I still enjoy visiting Carol at Tall Tales from Kansas. I check her blog often.

wallpaper page Carol painted

Lawrence, Kansas

Hi, my name is Carol. I live in Lawrence KS. I write Tall Tales. I tell about stuff that happened to me. Most of it is true.   

Her blog is funny (she's the sister of Mary Ann Moss, Dispatch from LA, so it apparently runs in the family!), full of photos, insights, recipes, and cool links,

"A working knowledge of the location of the best coffee hang outs in my geographical area is something I consider my duty to possess.  So whenever I hear about a spot that I haven't been to, I make it my business to get there.  What follows is a thorough report on two places that have recently been brought to my attention..."  From her latest post. 


2. such as her friend, Jeannette Sclar, whose fresh watercolors you'll find on her Flickr page. She does flowers and leaves deliciously - I find painting leaves very challenging meself - but I enjoy her urban sketching as much.

Jeannette Sclar

3. And one link leading to another as it happens, I got to this video, Maira Kalman Explores Art and Existence. I spoke of her before. And probably will again. Love her.

If you can't get enough of her, find a whole slew of Kalman videos here.

4. I discovered Nate Williams this week, although I cannot remember what path I took to get there. Such is the bramblebush highway of the internet,  yes?  Love the lettering he does. 

Nate Williams

5. I am playing with lettering styles through Skillshare.

Do you know about Skillshare? It's an online course site.  It's a pretty inexpensive way to get quick courses on lettering, calligraphy, mapmaking, photoshop, and other such treats. I signed up for the monthly subscription so I can get anything that comes down the pike (and there are regular additions to the "catalog") with no additional charge (the fees are small for those who want to taste one or two.) They are set up like mini-courses, with even "assignments" and projects, but I dabble in the ideas on my own as I like. There's no deadline, everyone's projects are posted who wish them to be, and, as usual, the work of "classmates" is as valuable as the course itself for inspiration and just general pleasure of viewing. If you go and stay, tell them Diane sent you! 

Friday Finds

This week's Friday-but really  Saturday I suppose- Five includes a museum exhibit, a clever video, and three artists I learned about while out and about. 

1

"Impertinent Collection...Re-imagining the masterworks of MOMA"... Irreverant - but perfectly suited- take on modern art at MOMA.  Article in March 1 NYTimes. Amuses me.

2

Yayoi Kusama.   Patterns. Color. Love. Read about this artist here and here.

Artist Yayoi Kusama with her latest work. Photo: Gautier Deblonde
from an Architectural Digest article

3  

If you haven't discovered this one yet, you should.  You really should.

4

Melinda Tidwell. Her Pinterest site. You can tell a lot about an artist surveying their Pinterest interests! I suppose that's the point somewhat, yes?  At Art and Soul Retreat, Jane Davies told us about this artist. Jane is very cool. Love her artistic and teaching style. More on that later.

This is a small part of larger piece by Melinda Tidwell 

5

Tom Judd. Everyday.  Amazing sketchbook journal, dozens of quick images sketched for each day of one year.  Check out the sketchbook flip in the video. 

A still, captured from video of Everyday. Tom Judd.. 

Buried Treasure: Jerry Gretzinger

This was an phrase I read recently as it relates to blogging. Buried in my blog, as is true of everyone's, are posts you have not seen, BUT YOU SHOULD :)  Posts get buried pretty quickly. I am reposting...resurrecting...one of these each week. There are artists, artwork, resources, and amusements that need a second life.

Jerry Gretzinger Exhibition at Palais de Tokyo

At the Palais de Tokyo in Paris, there is currently an exhibit of the amazing Imaginary World Map by Jerry Gretzinger. This made me pull out my post of August 28, 2011.

From a Guy Kawasaki tweet, I learned about this extraordinary gentleman who started drawing and painting little imaginary maps in 1963 and has never stopped, building entire worlds into three generations. The mind boggles. Read the short article here then enjoy the video. If you're not wowed, then my name isn't Jack Sprat. 

 
Jerry's Map from Jerry Gretzinger on Vimeo.

Hey, I retweeted this, posted it on my Facebook page, and emailed to friends and colleagues. This is one of the most interesting things I've seen anyone do. It never ceases to amaze me what people are up to. 

Translated text from museum site: In 1963, Jerry Gretzinger (born 1942, lives and works in Maple City, United States) drew the first element in the map of an imaginary world. Every day this drawing has been increased, extending a world and drawing the physiognomy of an unknown land, which gave rise to cities such as 'Plaeides' or 'Ukrainia.


Fifty years later, the cartographer is always working on the same document, which morphed into a space consisting of more than three thousand sheets of A4 paper. Every morning, Jerry Gretzinger draws a card from a game he created himself. It tells the transformation should realize: Add a building, remove roads, create fallow lands.

The world that he mapping arises from the development of the card itself, at the discretion of the superposition of layers deposited on the paper. These metamorphoses are collected in an inventory, memory of the successive stages of construction and modification of this universe.