Tag: artist

The Captivating Amaryllis

Symbolic of success, strength and determination, the Amaryllis’ name means “to sparkle” and so it does!

Pink Amaryllis, colored pencil

Symbolic of success, strength, and determination according to FTD.com, the amaryllis is a captivating flowering bulb. Gardener’s Supply says the Greek meaning of the word, “Amaryllis” means “to sparkle” and details the mythological love story Amaryllis and Alteo. Gardener’s Supply also states that an amaryllis bulb can live for 75 years!

The exotic winter blooming amaryllis has become a part of the Christmas tradition for many people.  For me it began in my grandmother’s last years. She was mostly housebound in those years and my mother decided watching a beautiful flower grow would bring her joy.  My mother was right.  Both my grandmother and her caretaker, Betty, quickly became enthusiastic about the fast-growing bulb.  They kept the yard stick near the pot and made daily measurements of the growth, delightedly reporting every inch. Each year we gave her a different variety and each year the enthusiasm would build as the amaryllis came closer and closer to bloom time. What color would it be? How big would the bloom be? When the bloom day finally arrived friends and family made a visit to observe the amaryllis in all its glory. My grandmother and Betty would show off their gorgeous flower like proud parents whose child had just won the spelling bee.

Those memories came flooding back this year when my dear friend, Celeste, gave both me and another friend, Caroljeanne, amaryllis bulbs for Christmas.  Celeste works with the University of Tennessee Agriculture Center which has an amaryllis yearly sale where she was able to get some wonderful varieties.  The three of us made regular text message reports on the progress of each bulb. Caroljeanne’s delicate pink flower arrived first.  I realized immediately I would have to begin a painting to mark the three bulbs. Celeste’s gorgeous variegated red and white flower arrived second. And finally, my beautiful salmon-colored double petal variety, “Double Dream” made its dramatic presentation.

Instead of replicating my grandmother and Betty with their yardstick, I recorded the rapid growth with my camara. The preliminary work has begun for a painting of the three beauties with a colored pencil drawing of Caroljeanne’s lovely pink flower pictures above.  Next will come Celeste’s variegated beauty. “Double Dream” will bring up the rear as it did with its blooming.  In the meantime, I couldn’t resist showing off the progress of the growth in a slideshow.

For more about buying, growing and caring for Amaryllis bulbs follow these links:

Gardener’s Supply

FTD.com

University of Tennessee Agricultural Center, Jackson, TN

A Catfish Among the Mackerel

As artists, isn’t it our role to be catfish nipping at the fins of life?

Chickadee Mischief, oil on canvas

The movie Catfish brought that word as a descriptive into the general language where it has found a place in the Urban Dictionary.  IMDb quotes the character, Vince Pierce from the movie as he describes the term:

“Vince Pierce: They used to tank cod from Alaska all the way to China. They’d keep them in vats in the ship. By the time the codfish reached China, the flesh was mush and tasteless. So this guy came up with the idea that if you put these cods in these big vats, put some catfish in with them and the catfish will keep the cod agile. And there are those people who are catfish in life. And they keep you on your toes. They keep you guessing, they keep you thinking, they keep you fresh. And I thank God for the catfish because we would be droll, boring and dull if we didn’t have somebody nipping at our fin.”

Reading about the movie brought back to me an incident from years ago that still brings a smile at the memory.  While traveling through the beautiful Cotswold region of England, we encountered an elderly gentleman working hard at cultivating his status as “local character.”  He was sitting on a bench just outside the gates to the churchyard obviously waiting to waylay any tourists coming to view the historic church.  He called himself a catfish among the mackerel because, as he told us, he was a relative new comer to the village only having lived there twenty years.  As new -comer he was not able to be one of the local mackerel so he had relegated himself to nipping at their fins by ambushing tourists.  He went on to give us a detailed description of the town and the church.  I never forgot him or the village.

That village in the Cotswolds will always stand out to me because of a curmudgeonly Catfish who brought it to life by nipping at the fins of the local mackerel.  Artists spotlight life in many ways from many angles. Life would be pretty dull without artists bringing out the color, the energy of our world. As artists, isn’t it our role to be catfish nipping at the fins of life?