Pomegranates and Greek Goddesses . . .

There are times in our lives when we feel restless, without purpose or direction. Often these occur at decade-birthday milestones—most of us remember how OLD it felt to turn THIRTY! We find we are reevaluating how we spend our time, wondering what we should be doing to extend our achievements beyond ourselves to include a spiritual dimension. We question how quickly the years are passing.

In her new book, TRAVELING WITH POMEGRANATES: A MOTHER-DAUGHTER STORY (Viking 2009), Sue Monk Kidd, author of best-selling The Secret Lives of Bees and The Mermaid Chair, has collaborated with her daughter, Ann Kidd Taylor, to write a fascinating memoir and travel journal. Their story explores the power of travel to birth spiritual connections and inspire creativity, and it gives us a generational perspective on a series of events the two experienced during travel to France and Greece over a period of years.

Sue’s journey begins as she approaches her fiftieth birthday and begins to realize she is ending an era as a younger woman and entering a transition period that will move her toward her eldest years. She finds herself seeking spiritual guidance from feminine symbols and icons, hoping for new directions in her work, greater understanding and closeness to her daughter, and a graceful entry into the next stage of her life. She writes about how she came to write The Secret Lives of Bees after years of writing nonfiction.

Ann’s journey is also a period of transition,
one from loss and rejection that culminates in a search for the work she is meant to do, to finding her path amidst many. The icons and symbols that guide Ann are different from her mother’s but in their mutual search they discover each other as adult women and find surprising fresh means of communication and friendship.

Traveling with Pomegranates is an inspiring book, thoughtfully written, and one I very much enjoyed. It provides a framework for seeking transitions and destinations for any woman who wants to enhance the meaningfulness of her years.

For more on the two authors:
http://www.suemonkkidd.com/
http://www.annkiddtaylor.com/

--Rosemary Carstens
Carstens Communications

Renowned Italian Photographer Teaches Boulder Workshop

My friend, colleague, and artisan BARBARA HARDESTY, had a dream. For several years, as we each kept our noses to the grindstone with our “day” jobs, she spoke of her longing to create a business to help people experience the joys of her family’s native land of ITALY. Not just as a traveler/tourist, but in the manner of Leonardo Da Vinci—to immerse themselves in life’s creative pursuits as he did, with writing, art, food, nature, and photography, as well as the language and the people of one of the world’s most romantic destinations. That dream has come to pass and DA VINCI CAPERS is now in its fifth year. Italian dreams DO come true! Now, Barbara is bringing one of her Italian maestros to Boulder, Colorado, so that others can experience just a taste of what Da Vinci Capers has to offer. -- Rosemary

SHOOTING ON-SITE: GETTING UP-CLOSE AND PERSONAL ~ Capturing your subject's story

Da Vinci Capers hosts “A Personal Renaissance Journey” with Massimo Bassano, a freelance international photojournalist, for a one-week photographic workshop, July 17–24, 2008, in Boulder, Colorado. There are 4-day and 8-day options.

In his first Colorado appearance, Massimo shares how photographers capture exceptional photos when they become part of the scene they are photographing and “touch” the lives of their subjects, rather than just watching them through a lens. You will learn that the location's “story”—becoming familiar with the history, the culture and the social context of the people—is the secret to taking great photos. You must follow where the story leads.

Each day of this workshop will be an adventure. Capturing the morning light and coolness of the day, you will shoot together and independently. In the afternoons you gather for discussions, return to do more shooting and download or develop film overnight. There will be discussions on all aspects of the shoot: issues of light, composition, technical points, preparing for a shoot, how to research an area, problems of approaching people or property, how and when to use a small strobe and other types of equipment. As with all Da Vinci Capers’ adventures, you will practice sfumato—the flexibility that allows for unexpected creative opportunities, varied photo skills, and the weather.

Massimo’s authentic approach of “getting up-close and personal” is a proven success. In Calabria, Italy, he was the first photographer to be granted permission to live for three months among the Carthusian monks. He was able to document the 900-year-old brotherhood, resulting in the award-winning book THE COLOR OF SILENCE. It was the first time that the Chartusians allowed a photographer to record their private lives.

Massimo’s words and pictures have graced such major magazines around the world as National Geographic, GEO, Ciclismo, and MAX France. Working as a freelance photojournalist since 1990, he has worked alongside many of photography’s greatest talents, including Bob Sacha, William Albert Allard, David Harvey, and George Steinmetz. Presently, Massimo is working in Rome with Bob Krist for National Geographic Traveler. In addition to working with Da Vinci Capers, he also teaches for National Geographic and Maine Media Workshops.

For more information about this rare, adventurous photography workshop, contact Barbara Hardesty at (303) 284-1383 or barb@davincicapers.com. For full details about Da Vinci Capers programs in Italy, go to http://www.davincicapers.com—don’t forget to look for LEONA, the DVC traveling chicken!

Art, Artists, and Hanging In . . .

We are fortunate to have as our latest guest blogger the best-selling author and actor RON MCLARTY writing today about art. Art as the centerpiece of short trips to some of the finest museums in the US is an exciting way to frame a travel adventure. In addition to the refreshment found in new surroundings, your imagination is sparked with bold palettes, fresh and traditional ideas, genius, and, for a writer, original connections to inspire your work. Welcome Ron!

--Rosemary Carstens

BRINGING ENDURANCE TO THE TABLE

By Ron McLarty

Even with the plethora of exciting exhibits around New York, my wife, Kate Skinner, and I are occasionally drawn away from our traditional haunts to those one-of-a-kind presentations in other cities. A few years ago for example, we took the train to Philadelphia for the Museum of Art’s exhibit of some rarely shown works of Andrew Wyeth. We loved the drawings and watercolors, which displayed his gift for portraying the quiet simplicity and beauty of both interiors and landscape. And we had a ball playing hooky from our regular daily grind at the Ritz. So, a few months ago, when Kate read about two major exhibitions at the National Gallery in Washington D.C., we didn’t need to think twice about another few days of picture viewing to see their exhibits of Edward Hopper (1882–1967) and JMW Turner (1775–1851).

We traveled by train, which is quite nice as long as you steel yourself against the cell phone bores that are proliferating at an alarming rate—even in the “quiet car,” where you have to be asleep not to notice all the NO CELL PHONE signs, not to mention announcements regularly made by the conductor! I suppose it won’t get any better but it does make you think back to not so long ago when the tools of disruption weren’t in the hands of the traveler or the theatergoer and a little peace was possible.

We stayed at the Hotel George, a small hotel we first stayed at on the book tour for my novel, The Memory of Running. It’s an excellent base of operations as it is within walking distance of Union Station and the Mall and has a superb restaurant, Bisto Bis. Kate has appeared in 11 plays in D.C., including 8 at the Shakespeare Theatre and knows the Capitol like the back of her hand.

We began our tour of the National Gallery with their permanent exhibition of Small French Paintings, which is filled with small works by many well-known impressionists. Favorites included works by Berthe Morisot, Toulouse Lautrec, and Corot. From there we moved on to the Hopper upstairs. I was struck by how familiar all his work feels, even the many works I had never seen in any other venue. I had heard references to his arrangement of space and especially light but didn’t understand it until I stood in front of those paintings his wife posed for. He seemed to be saying that everything we take for granted can also be viewed as abnormal or even bizarre. And though his work is unlike Wyeth’s, they both understood the power and simplicity of the world around them to a profound degree.

That many of Hopper's astonishing paintings were completed while he earned his living as an illustrator was particularly thrilling to me. He didn’t sell his first painting until he was over forty. I was fifty-five before I got my first novel in print and while I’m not foolish enough to ever compare my efforts to this giant, it’s inspiring to know that along with his amazing artistic vision he brought substantial endurance to the table.

Even though Kate and I were quite overcome by Hopper’s life’s work, we took the stairs to the underground passage connecting the newer wing to the older part of the National Gallery to view the life’s work of that great English master, JMW Turner. I was put off at first by the exhibit because of what seemed to me super-patriotic depictions of events such as the Battle of Trafalgar. But Kate’s deep and delicate eye for art pointed out how his later work was the obvious precursor for the impressionists yet to come, and his work evolved right up to the end. He, too, brought endurance to the table though, as opposed to Hopper, he gained fame and fortune right away. In 1798 at the age of twenty-three he was elected to the Royal Academy. It’s nice to know that when he died he willed the English people all his paintings and left his fortune to “the maintenance and support of poor and male decayed artists.”

The following day, we set out to see the Impressionists by the Sea exhibit at the Phillips Collection. Phillips was a major collector of mostly modern art and the museum is housed in his old mansion which connects to a newer wing. It was a lovely if not startling exhibit and, as always, a pleasure to view the collection at what Kate considers one of the finest small museums in the country.

I’ve since been very busy in old New York, correcting the proofs of my third novel, Art in America (July 2008) and completing narration of the current season of “Murder By The Book” for Court TV. My series on Fox, ‘The Return of Jezebel James,’ debuts March 12. As time permits, we will continue to pursue our love of art and travel.

RON MCLARTY is the author of The Memory of Running (Viking 2004), Traveler (Viking 2007), and the forthcoming Art in America (Viking 2008). He is also a veteran character actor with a long career in films and television and one of the leading audio book narrators. He lives in New York City with his wife, actress Kate Skinner. For more information: http://www.ronmclarty.com/ .Photo of Ron McLarty by Jerry Bauer.

Guest Bloggers' Series Begins

FEAST is beginning a new program today featuring a series of special guests who will post about one of our five topics: books, art, food, film, or travel. Each will bring a unique perspective to the topics and I think you will enjoy reading them and seeing where their links lead. Be sure to sign up for the Atom or RSS feeds so you don’t miss a thing!

OUR FIRST GUEST OF THE SERIES is DONNA DRUCHUNAS, author, editor, and freelance writer, who is passionate about following her dreams and combines writing and traveling as a large part of her personal journey. Welcome, Donna!

Lace Knitting in Alaskan Villages Showcases Unique Styles

Thanks, ROSEMARY, for hosting the ultimate (as in last) stop on my blog book tour for Ethnic Knitting Discovery!

Today I'd like to talk about following your passions, even when they take you half way around the world. I've never believed in moderation. When I love something, I want to give myself over to it completely and enjoy the sensation of immersion. Although my interests change over time, I don't hold back when I fall in love with something new.

During my book tour, several people asked me if I traveled much to do my research. Although I do travel a lot, I admit that the research for Ethnic Knitting Discovery was done in my living room and at the public library. I just didn't have the money to go to Norway, Denmark, The Netherlands, and Peru in the time necessary to get this book written. But I do travel to pursue my passions and to do research for my books. I went to Alaska while working on Arctic Lace, and I'll be making several trips to Lithuania to work on a future book. Because I had more time to work on Arctic Lace, and because my book about Lithuania doesn't have a due date yet, the luxury of travel can be part of the process.

And yet it's not luxury. To write more than a page or two about the cultural motifs expressed through knitting in a region requires a personal experience with the land, the people, and the society. For me the challenge is twofold. How do I fund my dreams? How do I tie my interests, travels, and work into one life? Those are two questions I ask myself all the time. I've tried different approaches, and not all of them work for me.

To be honest, I have trouble with work. With mercenary work, that is. The things that I do just for money often irritate me because they take up too much time. I have to remind myself that the day job is a “dream funder.” It makes it possible for me to do the things I love. If I forget why I’m working, then I get in a funk.

For the past four years, I've been making a living doing freelance work as an editor of knitting books. I met all of my financial goals, and I felt a rush of success every time I looked at my writing plan and realized I was paying my bills by writing and editing. But eventually it wore me down, and I felt I was spending too much of my energy editing other peoples’ books, to the point where I wasn't able to write much at all this year. So next month, I'm going back to a day job working for a small software company. I still get to work at home, but my work hours will be limited. That's the key to finding a dream funder! It has to give you the most money for the least work. That way your energy remains at a high level for following that elusive dream!

**Donna Druchunas learned to knit before she could read. She combines her interest in knitting with her skill at writing easy-to-follow instructions. She is the author of The Knitted Rug: 21 Fantastic Designs (Lark Books, 2004) and Arctic Lace: Knitting Projects and Stories Inspired by Alaska's Native Knitters (Nomad Press, 2006). Her designs and articles have been featured in Family Circle Easy Knitting, Knitters, Interweave Knits, Creative Knitting, and INKnitters magazines. Visit her website at www.sheeptoshawl.com

Mapping our Imaginations through Books, Art, Food, Film, and Travel

September already. It doesn’t seem possible. Summer flew by in a blur of sharp blue morning skies and, from the plains where I live, beckoning jagged-edged mountain ranges. Riding my motorcycle into cooler elevations this month, the dry scent of pine swirls around me as I twist ever higher up the road. The sun warms my arms and I feel the exhilarating pull of gravity as I power in and out of turns. Each second brings a quick snapshot: a flash of blue and a squawk of jay; a whiff of skunk; a glimpse of elk huddled tight in a meadow. I leave behind the everydayness of work and words and enter a world of the senses, of intense focus on each moment. Each turn of the calendar the landscape changes and evokes renewed dreams of discovery, exotic sights, memorable images to recombine with the old. I lean into the uniqueness of each season and experience strong correlations between them and our human life spans—they express a comforting continuity and renewal.

As autumn arrives we gird ourselves for the holiday season, gear up for a last push to reach our year’s goals. Because for so many years September signaled a new school term, I often still feel a spark of energy that causes me to take on new challenges in the fall; it becomes not only a time of retrospection, of wrapping up, but also a time of renewed commitment to the passions of my life. Fall, then, is a time when the angle of light changes and casts revelation upon our personal landscapes, allowing us to see freshly our own geography.

Thinking about personal geography reminds me of a book I read some years ago titled A Mapmaker’s Dream: The Meditations of Fra Mauro, Cartographer to the Court of Venice, a journal translated by James Cowan (Shambhala Books 1996). In the late 1980s, Cowan made a visit to the island of San Lazzaro degli Armeni in the Venetian lagoon in search of unpublished materials of Lord Byron. Going through archives left undisturbed for centuries, Cowan came upon a copy of a journal written by a Venetian of the sixteenth century, a man named Fra Mauro, who lived in the monastery of San Michele di Murano. He became fascinated with the work and decided to translate it. It is a jewel! This simple journal proposes new concepts of “mapping”—not only geographic, but spiritual and intellectual territory—that is particularly applicable in the fall of the year. To quote:

The map we draw becomes a representation of these impressions, each one contributing to that sublime image we believe exists but so far have not yet discovered . . . I now realize that the world is not real save in the way each of us impresses upon it his own sensibility. More importantly, this sensibility results from a belief in the world being a measurable whole, rather than something that extends beyond time and place. . . . Such a world emerges not from the sea as an island appears to do after a long voyage, but from a state of enchantment inspired by the mind taking leave of itself. . . namely the elusive power of the imagination . . . (emphasis mine)

If we accept that the world is more than a collection of geographic or topographic features, of longitudes and latitudes, parallels and meridians, but is also a complex composition of human imaginings of destinations, lives, and perspectives, then our personal geography becomes a unique individual map. As we take in new combinations of images and ideas, and as they shape and mold our thinking, morphing into even more personal influences, our landscape, our map of the world, is altered. In the fall issue of our award-winning webZINE FEAST at www.CarstensCommunications.com/FEAST.html, which will be out in the next few days, I hope you will find some startling, satisfying, reinforcing, and revitalizing images and concepts that will change your landscape, your view of the world in small or even large ways.

Enjoy the Fall!

-- Rosemary Carstens

Editor, FEAST: Books, art, food, film, and travel

FEAST: Books, art, food, film, and travel . . .

Summer 2007

Welcome to an eZINE that will satisfy your appetite for books, art, food, film, and travel. It's a FEAST of suggestions for reading, viewing, dining, and getting on down the road to some less usual destinations. Issues come out quarterly and generally focus on a single topic. Click on the link below or on the right hand menu to access the full magazine. While all material is copyrighted, please feel free to pass the link along to anyone you feel might have an interest in these topics. We want to see how far FEAST can travel! Now to the summer issue:

These days, the topics of war and immigration generate a great deal of conversation about cultural differences and how to tolerate, absorb, and welcome that diversity into our lives in the interest of general human enrichment and, perhaps, peace. Since spring and summer are seasons we associate with warmth, new beginnings, and long days plumped out like juicy peaches, I thought it might also be a good time to consider a wider range of books, art, food, film, and travel options.

Some studies have shown that when we encounter something new or different, our brains attempt to “recognize” it by relating it to memories of similar events. How often, when exposed to foods, writings, and artistic creation from other cultures, do feelings and expectations derived or absorbed from our past prevent us from a direct, fresh experience? Can we learn to set aside those inclinations, to form new, positive memories, and approach cultural differences with curiosity and an expectation of pleasant discovery?

In the spirit of giving it a try, in this issue you’ll find a selection of novels by writers of diverse ethnic and national backgrounds. Each flavors the soup of English-language literature with a touch of saffron here, a bit of bitterroot, a pinch of salt, a touch of irony, a stir of laughter. There are also suggestions for films and art that explore an assortment of cultures. By stepping out of our usual Anglocentric choices, we honor the diversity of our country, we open the door to fresh views of universal topics, and we enrich our lives and stimulate our imaginations with previously unrevealed images. I hope you’ll pick one or two and open your heart to change.

-- Rosemary Carstens

NOTE: We've expanded this issue and have some new separate sections for food and art! http://www.CarstensCommunications.com/FEAST.html