Madder Red
Crimson Red
Scarlet Crimson
French Plum
Beetroot Red
Spiny Lobster
Barnwood Red
Peachwood Red
Fast Yellow
Woollen Yellow
Bark yellow
Gold Yellow
Dead Leaf Yellow
Ochre yellow
Lemon Yellow
Green Yellow
Orange yellow
Pale Orange
Apricot Orange
Tumeric Orange
21 March marks
World Poetry Day &
International Color Day
The Shaker Sisters at Harvard MA recorded coloring (they wrote collouring) in their Journal. Coloring meant dyeing. Dyeing is making color. Dyeing is possibility.
This poem uses text from their Journal and will be part of an upcoming exhibition, ‘anything but drab’ at Fruitlands opening in May.
we collour
we color scarlet on stormy days
we color indigo when we are indefatigable
we color butternut roses blooming abundantly
we color prusy blue pick some pease
we color logwood smelling lilacs
we color fancy blue to match azure skies
we color slate silk with sicily sumac to match slanted rain
we color blue spirits for drab woolens
we color cochineal pink roses
we color purple standard
we color considerable
somewhere between
today & tomorrow
on that illusive Leap Day
Mother Ann Lee was born
29 February 1736 — 8 September 1784
Mother Ann Lee embodied cosmic feminist karma bringing a new religion into the world founded on principles so radical that they endured persecutions
One could say her broadsheet was verbal;
she being illiterate to written words yet literate in all realms cosmic
.
The written Testimonies of her contemporary believers
and works of the later visionists- scribes themselves of hearts and leaves and maps and flowers and trees--
scripted scrolls brought down from spirits’ energies spoke to her cosmic energy.
[excerpt from meetinghouse, Brece Honeycutt and Miriam Cantor-Stone]
[image, detail An Emblem of the Heavenly Sphere by Polly Collins, 1854]
[image, detail, From Holy Mother Wisdom…To Eldress Dana or Mother by Miranda Barber, 1848]
color
on pages
in pigments
in dyes
in jars
on yards of thread
been reading Shaker
manuscripts account books
and journals of work performed
been looking at collected
colors in jars
been working on a new book
project needing a rainbow of
threads
reds of cochineal and crimson
yellows of bark gold brown yellow green
greens invisible olive pea and myrtle
blues Prussian deep royal slate
drabs red sandy silver sage salmon and dove
purples crimson deep marron logwood lavender
browns fast damson fawn olive and claret
greys bark liver dark smoke batwings and doves
sending new year’s rainbows
joy and radiance for 2025
and thanks for your presence here
[studio doodle | work in progress for 2025 project
dye book from Harvard Shaker community]
gathering gold—
glistening glittering mica chips
dandelion rainbow strands
molten orange M initialed
pleated dress of worship & work
golden orbed dawn
palest lemon goldenrod tuft
waves frozen, seedhead
mighty morning orb
looking for brightneess
in rainbows and revision structures
on hand knit shawls dyed with goldenrod,
gathered at wasteplaces
stitched into circles emanating sunlight
Miriam Cantor-Stone and I are thrilled to have our collaboration, meetinghouse, published in Early American Literature.
Thanks to Moonbow for inviting us to make this collaboration.
Thanks to Shaker Heritage Society for giving artists support and the space to do so.
Thanks to Early American Literature -- it has been a true pleasure to work with all of you.
And a podcast to follow -- with interviews and performance excerpts.
five summers ago
harvested dahlias
stuck between sheets of paper
simmered, steamed
stacks of silhouettes, waited
suddenly, this summer,
their sense seeped in
was it seeing the blots of
Mary Gartside, seeking
flower essence through color?
fifty seven washed with
gouaches and watercolors
Inks of—daffodils, pine cones,
black walnuts, marigolds
Thanks to Alexandra Loske for alerting me to Gartside.
Her book, Mary Gartside:
Abstract Visions of Color at Thomas Heneage Books
Thanks to Naumkeag for the Artist Residency in 2019
where the dahlias were gathered.
text & typeface
words on the side of the road
as in the Shaker “Wayside Pulpit”
words found in advertisements
as in the work of Corita Kent
words about to be printed
at Melanie Mowinski’s studio
words printed, read, used, perused
aptly, just begin
--Wayside Pulpit included in 'Unexpected Shaker' a pop-up show in Kinderhook, NY until 8/25
--Corita Kent, ‘bell bound’ found in ‘Corita Kent and the Language of Pop’
--Melanie Mowinski, Press:LetterPress
plants as prints as watercolors as thoughts as sky as poetry . ‘Verbal creation, he [Seamus Heaney] writes, is an archaeological dig, “a dig for finds that end up being plants.” ‘ From Elaine Scarry’s book, Dreaming by the Book and Heaney's book Feeling Into Words: Selected Prose 1968-78 Caretaker Farm CSA flowers and summer ‘dahlia series’ plant inks and gouache on dahlia mono print
“Painting is a form of poetry Colors are words Their reflections rhythms. The completed painting, a completed poem.” Sonia Delaunay [from Kunst Please podcast 9.20.2021] Substitute ‘painting’ for? stitching natural dyeing ……….. Images from ‘Sonia Delaunay’ catalogue from Tate exhibition 2015 Postcard from ‘Sonia Delaunay: Living Art’ Bard Graduate Center 2024
