More Chihuly Dreams in Silica

Blue Icicle Towers

The Denver Botanic Gardens 
is currently showcasing 
the first major outdoor exhibit
of Dale Chihuly's glass sculptures
in the Rocky Mountain region.

Chihuly's awe-inspiring
glass installations
have graced gardens,
museums, and cities
worldwide.





The Ever-Patient Terry and I 
took in the Chihuly Exhibit
several weekends ago 
on a beautiful autumn weekend.

The scale of Chihuly's exhibit is hard to grasp,
so I will focus on his 
Blue and Purple Boat & Walla Wallas.
This installation is located in
the Denver Botanic Gardens'
serene Japanese Garden
in the northwest corner of the botanic gardens.

Chihuly in the Japanese Garden

Chihuly's Blue and Purple Boat & Walla Wallas

Chihuly's walla wallas 

are onion-shaped glass globes

inspired by the walla walla sweet onions

that grow in Washington state's

Walla Walla County.

Chihuly says of his art:
"My work to this day 
revolves around a
simple set of circumstances:
fire, molten glass, 
human breath,
centrifugal force, and gravity."
Source:  Exhibit Sign

Chihuly is credited with revolutionizing 
the studio craft movement 
that developed in the USA after World War II.

He made his greatest discovery in 1963, 
when he accidentally blew a glass bubble
and found his life's calling.

Chihuly transcended the traditional methods
and forms of glass making,
and he moved from 
one glass blower forging a piece 
to a collaborative and communal approach.
source

To me, glass is one 

of the most beautiful art mediums of all,

and Chihuly is my favorite glass artist.

The Lansdowne Letters: Kitche Shemaganish

It's Friday, which means
another post about my father's adventures 
in the northern bush.

After a week in Lansdowne House,
my father was settling into life
in the tiny and isolated community.

For the most part
things were going well.

Dad had gotten to know 
the small group of white people,
settled in with his new roommate
in their two-room cottage,
eased into the Roman Catholic Mission's meal schedule,
and started his school year.

Don MacBeath and Brother Bernier

Mission Kitchen ~ Lansdowne House

Fall, 1960

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

Dad's commuting challenges continued though,
and he wrote of further misadventures
in his Hudson Bay canoe
on Septemeber 21, 1960:   

"Well, I finally came to grief on that canoe today.  
It was quite rough when I went across to school,
and it was considerably rougher when I came home for dinner.

"After dinner I set out with much apprehension; 
and before long, it was justified, and my fears were realized.  

"I was blown off course, 
and before I knew what was happening, 
I was hard aground on this large rock.  

"I tried for about ten minutes 
to see if I could work it off, 
but with no success; 
and all the time, 
I was in grave danger 
of having the canoe upset and throw me in the water.  

"The waves were hitting the canoe broadside 
and rocking it pretty badly.  
I wasn’t too scared though, only cross, 
for the water was only up half way between my knees and my hips. 

"None of the white people could see me 
and come and help me.  
Only the Indians on the Island saw me, 
and all they did was sit on the bank and laugh like hell."

Hudson Bay Canoes 

at Chats Falls on the Ottawa River, Canada, 1838 

Wikimedia

"Finally, I had to jump over the side of the canoe 
and walk ashore dragging my canoe behind me.  

"I was wet pretty much to the waist 
and had to change all my clothes.  

"By the time I got changed 
and talked an Indian into taking me across, 
(I had had enough of the good thing by this time), 
I was about forty-five minutes late for the school.  

"However, all my students were waiting for me.  
They all knew what had happened to Shemaganish, 
and they were getting a great kick out of my discomfiture."

My Indians

Photograph by Donald Blair MacBeath

Fall, 1960
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

Dad's Classroom
It was Ojibwa custom to separate boys from girls.
Photograph by Donald Blair MacBeath

Fall, 1960
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

"Shemaganish is the nickname 
that the Indians have hung on me 
since I arrived on the Island, and in Lansdowne in general.
  
"It means "soldier," 
and they named me thusly 
because I have been wearing my old Air Force battle dress 
after school and on weekends, 
and I wear the Air Force winter hat all the time.  

"I quite frequently get Kitche Shemaganish 
which means “Big Soldier,” 
because I am easily the largest man at Lansdowne.  

"None of the Indians are very large, 
and all of the white men are smaller and/or lighter than I am."

Big Soldier ~ Kitche Shemaganish

(I couldn't find Dad in Air Force gear ~

I know there's a photo somewhere, but where?!) 

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved 

My Father with His Army Sherman
Camp Borden, Ontario, Canada
February, 1952

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved 

My father's Ojibway lessons with Father Ouimet continued.

I find his choice of words to learn funny.

Dad wrote in the same letter:

"Incidentally, I have been learning some more 
of the Ojibway tongue from the Father.  
Here are the new words that I have learned:

Shemaganish----------Soldier
Tcheman----------------Canoe
Assin---------------------Rock
Mamangashkaw-------Wave
Kitchi---------------------Large, big, or great
Pangi--------------------Small, little, or a little
Notin---------------------Wind."

A Northern Lake

Artist Unknown, 1911-1912

Wikimedia 

Old photos and Irreplaceable Stories

Do you have piles of old photographs
stashed in boxes and drawers
or in ancient albums that are falling apart?

Do you have stacks of mystery photos
that you can't identify in any way?

I do in spades!
I'm in the midst of
corralling my massive collection.

Fortunately, in the summer of 1968,
I organized Acadia University's
collection of historical photographs.

I know I can corral 
at least five generations of family photos,
even if the prospect is daunting.

I love to play with old photos
to see what I can discover.

Who?  Where?  When? 

This is a dangerous 
because hours of my time
can vanish down a black hole.

Black Hole

Wikimedia

And, sometimes,
the answers pierce my heart.

Yesterday I came across 
two 2½ by 3 inch bits 
of black and white mystery.

The photos were stashed in an album 
my sister Barb lent me,
and they were unrelated 
to any others in the album.

But I was hooked 
by the boats on the water
and the fishermen at work.

Six:  One Moment in Time

Not a clue on the back of the first one,

but on the back of the second:

That's where the marlinspike 

to the heart comes in.

It's my mother's handwriting,

and the date is the day

she and my father married.

They drove down Digby Neck

for their honeymoon

in Sandy Cove, Nova Scotia

on September 4, 1948.

From the correct album:

Don and Sara   

Honeymoon Cottage

Sandy Cove,
Nova Scotia

September 4, 1948

  




We've all captured those moments,
stoping time in its tracks,
so we can hold and remember them keenly.


My parents:  
young, hopeful, just starting out,
capturing the time and place of their joy.

Now, a fading image in black and white,
a trick of light and chemical fixed in time.

Irreplaceable and real people
behind mystery photographs ~
That's what drives me 
as I archive photos and write stories.

Doing this can be piercing,
but I always feel the love, 
the struggle,
the magnificence 
of those I love
who have gone before me.

A Honey Moon Postcard

from Long Ago

So pull out those photos
if you are lucky enough to have them ~

And write down their stories,
if you are lucky enough to know them.

Every human has a story,
and each story illuminates
our collective and complex human heart. 

Dreams in Silica

Are there objects of beauty
that make your heart sing?

If I've learned anything in my travels,
it is that humans are art makers
and they express themselves
with an astounding variety of mediums.
Yet each piece is unique.

When I look at or touch a piece of art,
I think of the artist who made it.
I try to imagine his or her thoughts and emotions.
I  feel a connection that transcends time and space.

My heart sings to dreams in silica.

To think that exquisite and fragile objects

are forged from sand in fire

is amazing to me.

Silica to Glass

Wikimedia

My heart sings 

when I see the imagination of Chihuly

take flight in fire.

To my absolute delight

a Chihuly Exhibit is gracing

the Denver Botanical Gardens this fall.

So last weekend Terry and I took in

the joyful and exuberant exhibit. 

Chihuly at the Denver Botanic Gardens.

A number of Chihuly installations,
large and small,
are dispersed throughout the gardens:
each different, each surprising
in its juxtaposition with nature's inventiveness.

Here are a few more images
of the first large installation we discovered.

If I ever win a lottery,
you know where some of my $$$$$ will be going.

The Lansdowne Letters: On Canoes and Procreation

No, the canoes and procreation aren't connected!

I'm sure somewhere, sometime
canoes have been used for such.

My father was having trouble enough
just trying to negotiate the strip of water 
between the Father's Island
and the DOT dock on the mainland
in his little Hudson Bay Post canoe.

The Father's Island from the DOT Dock

Photograph by Rev. Father Ouimet, OMI

Lansdowne House, Northern Ontario, Canada
Fall, 1960
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

It's Friday, and that means

another post based on 

my father's Lansdowne Letters

from long ago and far away.

I'm sharing two anecdotes 

from Dad's letter of Tuesday, September 20, 1960:

On Canoeing ~ in my father's words:

"I think I have finally mastered that confounded canoe.
Before yesterday I was having a lot of trouble in rough water,
especially if the wind was against me.  

"There were a couple of days 

when I just couldn’t get across to the mainland.  

Luckily this was before school had started.  

"The Father got me all straightened out though.  

It is all a matter of where you sit in the canoe.  

"On a calm day it is easiest to control it from the stern, 

but mostly you sit in the center.  

"On really rough windy days, though, 

you have to sit right up in the prow, or you just can’t steer it.  

"Yesterday I almost had my feet hanging over the front, 

but I got across, even though there were whitecaps on the water.  

"Whenever you sit either in the stern or on the prow, 

it is necessary to carry about fifty pounds

 of rock in the other end as ballast.  

"Shifting this ballast around is a lot of exercise in itself.  

I have taken over an inch off my waist already, 

most of it being sweated off in or around that confounded canoe."

Looking Toward the Hudson Bay Post

and the DOT Dock

from The Father's Island

Photograph by Donald Blair MacBeath

September, 1960
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

On Procreation ~ in my father's words:

"I had quite a long talk with the local Indian chief today.  

He does not speak a word of English, 

but he brought along his interpreter – big time eh?  

Just like a bunch of bloody diplomats.

  

"The chief is Protestant, 

and he is quite disturbed 

that I am living across at the Mission with the Father.

"I explained that it was the only place 

that I could find to stay."

  

Friends gather in the kitchen 

at the OMI Mission in Lansdowne House.

OMI:  Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate 

Center: Father Maurice Ouimet, OMI

Flanked by:  Chicago Bill (left) and Mr. Baker (right)

Back Row:  A Sleepy Uno Manilla and Brother Raoul Bernier, OMI

Photograph by Donald Blair MacBeath

September, 1960
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

  

The chief "was very pleased to hear 

that I was bringing up my family 

as soon as the government built a new teachers residence.

  

"He was also interested to hear that I had five children.  

He said that maybe I could work hard 

when I get my squaw up with me 

and catch up to him.  

He has eleven."

I just have to say,

"How can you not love men?"

They're the same everywhere ~

Here, there, now, then.

Fundy Blue signing off.

Canoeing in Northern Ontario

Wikimedia