Santa Fe Indian Museum, New Mexico Skies
Sometimes, I am compelled to take NJWILDBEAUTY readers into my ‘memory bank’, especially on gloomy New Jersey days. The entire sky this morning is filmed with grey, –somewhere between fog and soot. It’s hard for me even to remember sun. But it was ever-present in Santa Fe and Taos in the spring.
STORYTELLER, BY A. E. HOUSER, Santa Fe Indian Museum
Two of ‘my’ Intrepids and I, as you know, undertook a Georgia O’Keefe pilgrimage in Santa Fe and Taos. Janet Black and Jeanette Hooban were part of this quest. Carolyn Yoder is the fourth — not present in O’Keeffe Country at that time. Sometimes we call ourselves The Four Musketeers — Janet (of Manhattan) being d’Artagnan; as in not always near enough to partake of every challenge. All for one and one for all, and always seeking — art, history, courage..
In Houser’s “Storyteller” above, a man’s image of a strong woman inspires us, “stiffens our spines” in the urgent causes on every side in thus 21st Century.
Motherhood statue at Pearl S. Buck Estate — Buck adopted six children of mixed race, spent her lifetime insisting upon honoring what we now call ‘diversity’
“Gone, but Not Forgotten” — Pearl S. Buck’s being and ideals
Here, she rests in her beloved Bucks County, PA,
surrounded by bamboo and lilies.
All four of us, as you well know, require regular doses of strong women, Eleanor (Roosevelt, of course) above all. Abigail Adams. Pearl S. Buck. And Georgia, always Georgia, — modern in art and dress and life, before there was much ‘modern’ in the United States. As this interweaving of strong women unfolds this morning, I sense that each, that all, would insistently approve of the motto of Al Gore’s splendid new film on climate change: “BE INCONVENIENT!” (This has become my motto for my upcoming birthday year.”
All of these women lived by strong and high ideals. Each engendered practical change, against all odds, from the 1700s through the 20th Century. They stood against prejudice and insularity, for compassion and courage. They took bold actions; wrote strong words; painted reverberant works to convey the truths by which they lived. We honor them, especially by visiting their sites, for courage, for being the original Intrepids.
Augustus St. Gauden’s Statue in Washington D.C., which comforted Eleanor in her travails.
Eleanor Roosevelt Memorial, Riverside Park, NYC
Prayer, by A. E. Houser: Santa Fe Indian Museum
When I began this blog, I thought it was going to be about wallowing in the wild, complex, ever-changing sunlight on the mountains and adobes of New Mexico.
Sun on Simple Adobe, so very Georgia! (Indian Museum, Santa Fe)
The Universe had other ideas. I need to enshroud myself with strength and courage.
Iconic Georgia O’Keeffe by Alfred Stieglitz from Internet
The world as we know it is being altered exponentially, by political forces seemingly beyond our control. I’ve ‘been there’ before, as Hitler, Mussolini and the Japanese sought to rearrange the world. I never understood how the Germans or the Italians could go along with those tyrants.
It never occurred to me that our own country could be usurped and taken in directions with which most of us do not agree. Politically and climactically, we are poised to lose everything we hold dear.
Abigail and Eleanor and Pearl and Georgia stood firm against currents of their time. For women, for freedoms, for children of other lands, for art, for feminine dress itself, in Georgia’s time, and against prejudice..
It’s up to us to do likewise.
“John, remember the women,” Abigail Adams 1770’s –As Declaration of Independence and our Constitution, were being composed…
In the lexicon of Alfred Stieglitz, publicizing all art, especially Georgia’s, ” The spiritual was opposed to material and modern art was materialism’s antidote,” insists the catalogue from “Georgia O’Keeffe, Living Modern”, [Brooklyn Museum exhibition]. Brilliantly authored by Wanda M. Corn, it goes on to assert that “Stieglitz described his artists, not as ordinary beings, but as gifted modern seers.” He found their avant-garde work “healing and therapeutic for those living in an age dominated by commerce and business.”
Realize that Stieglitz and O’Keefe’s first command of the art stage took place in the 1920’s!
As the values of our Founding Fathers and Mothers, our powerful authors, out iconic artists are increasingly trampeled, “BE INCONVENIENT!?
The Harsh Southwestern Landscape seems a breeding ground for strength:
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