“Hidden Objects,” watercolor by M. Deskins, charcoal by Sally Deskins, 2014

The above carries on my series of drawings with childhood imagery, examining the dichotomy of womanhood and motherhood. This is a topic that could be discussed at length but for now, I will say on this last post of Women’s History Month 2014, every piece of mine is always inspired by Wanda Ewing, and I post this one today because she really liked this series. She didn’t get to see this one but I think she’d smile.

Here’s a quick review of my posts from this month celebrating women in art!:

I started the month with some tributes to Wanda and her “Black Catalogue” series. Day one with some kid scribbles; day two with Car painting; day three with some nice water colors.

Day four I used crayons to tribute Louisiana-famous artist Ida Kohlmeyer for Mardi Gras.

Day five I had fun cutting up art-bodies from ArtNews to honor Noelle Fiori.

Day six I kept with the collage honoring Hannah Hoch with a juxtaposition of women and art from ArtNews as well.

Day seven as the Les Femmes Folles: West Virginia group show I curated opened at Monongalia Art Center, I copied and cut up art from all ten of the exhibiting artists to make a bra-collage! (Show is up thru April 5! Details femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events)

Day eight I switched gears, looking at Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit and emulating her drawing style to start thinking about trees for my upcoming project with poet Laura Madeline Wiseman.

Day nine my daughter and I looked at Helen Frankenthaler’s beautiful use of color and made some trees with bright-hued watercolor.

Day ten I designed my poster for Micol Hebron’s Gallery Tally Project, exhibiting the gender disparity of gallery representation worldwide!  (The show debuted in LA March 29 at For Your Art and runs thru April 25!~)

Day eleven I went back in time and looked at portrait artist Elisabeth Louise Vigee-Lebrun as I sketched my daughter.

Day twelve I went 3-D making some paper sculptures after after Lynda Benglis!

Day thirteen I looked at myself, making a self-portrait after Joni Mitchell, too thinking of the tenacity of Eva Hesse.

Day fourteen my daughter and I make some mixed media shells after Georgia O’Keeffe.

Day fifteen we went with Audrey Flack, rooting thru my jewelry to make a still-life photo.

Posted about Les Femmes Folles Books for a break on Day sixteen!

Day seventeen for St. Pat’s we did some fun watercolors after the abstract expressionism of Irish artist Nano Reid.

Day eighteen we admired the play with perspective of Adriana Varejao with a photo of my daughter’s hand and foot.

Day nineteen I honored playful artist Yayoi Kusama with some breast-fish.

Day twenty I found an artist who used turtles in her work, Alison Weld, and created after her.

Day twenty-one I went back in time again to make a frog after wildlife illustrator Maria Sibylla Merian.

Day twenty-two we went outside to be with nature a la environmental artist Barbara Roux.

Day twenty-three I honored poet Kayla Sargeson, scripting her text onto a body print.

Day twenty-four I went to the window to honor Ana Mendieta.

Day twenty-five, I celebrated the incoming of friend and collaborator Laura Madeline Wiseman, with a script of one of her poems onto a breast-print!

Day twenty-six I made light of feminism with a fish on a breast-bike to honor Gloria Steinem.

Day twenty-seven I honored Roxanne Swentzel with a tribal-inspired turtle.

Day twenty-eight I came home to West Virginia, honoring the WV known artist Alvena Seckar with some renderings of the Monongalia River.

Day twenty-nine I wrote about art historian Nancy G. Heller, honoring her and others thru my Les Femmes Folles anthologies.

Day thirty, yesterday, I honored Sutapa Biswas’ Evilbird with my own breast-bird.

Here I am! Round again always with Wanda on the mind.

Artists I didn’t get to: Judy Chicago, Faith Ringgold, Mickalene Thomas, Berth Merisot, Alice Neel…every other artist I’ve interviewed…and will interview on the future…on my journal Les Femmes Folles.

Again these are not meant to be serious, amazing masterpieces, but a fun way to celebrate these artists throughout women’s history month, and encourage anyone who might read this to read more on the artists mentioned!

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated show at Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV!  See pictures from the opening of Les Femmes Folles: WV on the blog! The show runs thru April 5; other events  happening in Omaha April 21 and 22. Details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events! Intimates and Fools is also available on amazon.

Celebrate National Poetry Month with me on Les Femmes Folles starting tomorrow! Art and poetry about Our Intimates and Our Fools!

“After S. Biswas/Breast-bird,” acrylic and ink on white board, Sally Deskins 2014

As I was searching for women artists painting fish, I found many who paint birds, but one stood out in particular, Evilbird (Uraegin Thusangolensis), 2006 by Sutapa Biswas. Reads the Sackler Center Feminist Art Database:

“Sutapa Biswas was born in Santinekethan, India, in 1962. Her poignant films and poetic artworks have been shown in museums and art galleries worldwide. Biswas studied at the University of Leeds from 1981-85, at the Slade School of Art from 1988-1990, and at the Royal College of Art between 1996-1998. She works in a wide range of media including installation, film and video, drawing and painting. Her works are conceptual and since the mid 1990s Biswas has been interested in exploring themes of time and space particularly in relationship to gender, identity and desire.  As the curator and critic Guy Brett writes, “Biswas’s recent work is a device for awakening memory, gaining a foothold in the flux of time and conveying an insight into human lives”. ”

You can also view many of her “Untitled Bird Drawings” on Luxonline.com. Though they appear quite simple, their coloring is rich, and also, with reading her statement, perhaps bring a breach between earth and humanity. Maybe, maybe they are just lovely renderings; either way, my breast-bird is a fun tribute to Ms. Buswas who currently lives and works in London.  Read and see more of her work on the links above.

Again these are not meant to be serious, amazing masterpieces, but a fun way to celebrate these artists throughout women’s history month, and encourage anyone who might read this to read more on the artists mentioned!

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated show at Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV!  See pictures from the opening of Les Femmes Folles: WV on the blog! The show runs thru April 5; other events  happening in Omaha April 21 and 22. Details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events! Intimates and Fools is also available on amazon.

Stay tuned for my last installment tomorrow; and the start of celebrating National Poetry Month on my own website, Les Femmes Folles!

Today I’m celebrating author Nancy G. Heller of Women Artists: An Illustrated History, one of the first art-books I remember looking through as a child and now in my own collection! It is thanks to books like these that we now begin to study the women artists of our history as they have been overlooked, ignored or simply erased.

As art historian Diane Radycki writes (Paula Modersohn-Becker: The First Modern Woman Artist, Yale University Press, 2013—a wonderful book not only about this artist but about examining women in art history itself, which I reviewed for Bookslut earlier this year.): “Long before women artists may meet any obstacle internal to themselves, they met an inarticulate disconnect in the vocabulary of art history.”

With that I make my LFF anthologies, and for that I created the LFF blog–even today, scouring art magazine reviews and art texts, you will see the overwhelming majority is written about men–and that is not because there is a lack of female artists, or lack of quality female artists–in the slightest. It is because of the tradition of not taking them seriously.  As the Guerilla Girls did their work in the 1980s, and as now Micol Hebron takes reign with her Gallery Tally Project (which I’m so honored to be a part of, and which debuts TONIGHT in LA at For Your Art; read more on her interview with Hyperallergic here), and with little people doing tiny things, like me!

I get some very wonderful support, thank goodness, because the overlooking and rudeness still remains, the expectancy of getting work for free. Though recognizing this IS a labor of love, it is amazing how much slack is received, how much disrespect–but thanks to those who appreciate it, who support my support, and for the history, for the growing number reading the blog and sending me kind notes, for anyone out there wanting to share their voice and finding inspiration even one time–that is who I do it for!

So above you’ll see my labors of love–from years and months of unpaid work–I cherish them, and if you don’t, that’s okay! But to me, they are works of art, just as Nancy Heller, as Diane Radycki, Guerrilla Girls and Micol Hebron– as anyone out there studying women in art and getting the word out there–this is real. This is happening.  Look up and see. I don’t think I can put it better than Rhiannon Johnson (Ivory Owl Reviews) who kindly wrote about Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013:

“Rather than lament the inequalities faced by women artists, Deskins shines a light on them. By doing this she (and her fellow artists) is/are pushing back against the patriarchy of the art world by carving out places for themselves. These women aren’t waiting to be accepted on pre-defined terms, they are creating their own terms, their own stories, their own art. And that is legendary.”

See more of Nancy G. Heller’s amazing books on women in art here.

I recognize my anthologies are nothing like in-depth scholarly written publications mentioned, but they are, similarly one more (albeit home-made) book dedicated to highlighting women in art.

Les Femmes Folles anthologies are available for purchase on blurb.com and there are two coupons currently going on–30% off purchase of 2 or more books using YOURGIFT code at checkout expires Monday 3/31/14; and 15% any purchase using code 2014BOOKS expires 4/30/14.

If you’re in Morgantown today, you can buy one at our LFF table at Bring on Spring! Art Fair to benefit the Mon River Trail Conservancy, at Terra Cafe, 425 Industrial Ave in Morgantown, 11am-6pm. Do come by if you’re in the area! We’ll have Les Femmes Folles Books, art and more!

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated showat Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV!  See pictures from the opening of Les Femmes Folles: WV on the blog! The show runs thru April 5; other events  happening in Omaha April 21 and 22. Details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events! Intimates and Fools is also available on amazon.

“Mon River,” crayon & marker on white board, M.Deskins; “After A. Seckar/Mon River,” watercolor and pencil on white paper, H. and Sally Deskins

I was introduced to West Virginia artist Alvena Seckar with an art talk at the WVU Art Museum by Art Museum Director Joyce Ice and Judith Stitzel, professor emerita of English at WVU and founding director of the WVU Women’s Studies Center.

“Seckar (1916-2012) was born in McMechen, W.Va., to Slovak immigrant parents, who lived in a company town near the coal mine where her father worked. From an early age and with only minimal encouragement, Alvena knew she wanted to be an artist, and despite physical and economic impediments throughout her life, her commitment never wavered; nor did her deep involvement in issues of social justice. A first-generation college student, she became an activist at the University of Pennsylvania, eventually completing degrees in art at New York University. Seckar bequeathed her home and many works of art to WVU.”  – (wvutoday.wvu.edu)

Secklar, it seems, was perhaps known in her time for painting the “grimmer side” of coal mining life and living in the hills of West Virginia.  She was also known as a writer–“Trapped in the Old Mine,” “Zuska of the Burning Hills,” and “Misko” too speaking for growing up in the coal mining communities, as immigrants and during the 1950s time period.

We created this  pieces to honor a West Virginian artist, but also because we’re going to have a booth tomorrow at Bring on Spring! Art Fair to benefit the Mon River Trail Conservancy, at Terra Cafe, 425 Industrial Ave in Morgantown, 11am-6pm. Do come by if you’re in the area! We’ll have Les Femmes Folles Books, art and more!

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Again these are not meant to be serious, amazing masterpieces, but a fun way to celebrate these artists throughout women’s history month, and encourage anyone who might read this to read more on the artists mentioned!

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated showat Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV!  See pictures from the opening of Les Femmes Folles: WV on the blog! The show runs thru April 5; other events  happening in Omaha April 21 and 22. Details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events! Intimates and Fools is also available on amazon.

“After R. Swentzell/Breast-turtle,” acrylic and ink on white board, Sally Deskins 2014

There are so many inspirations behind art that you just swallow and don’t necessarily realize or recognize or can name outright. Things you see or experience indirectly while living and it comes thru in your work later.

Today I wanted to make a lightly tribal-styled turtle. In realizing my short sketch is merely playful and I am not of Native American descent to my knowledge, I do want to acknowledge the plethora of significant Native American art around me and in our history as Americans. I remember going thru the Native American galleries of the Joslyn Art Museum growing up and in various galleries while visiting other cities, seeing the intricate weaving and beading, passion and traditions evident with their quality and detail.

So I came across Roxanne Swentzell (born 1962, Taos, New Mexico), renowned Santa Clara Pueblo ceramic sculptor.  I recognize Swentzell’s rounded figures of indigenous people, primarily women but cannot pinpoint where. I love her masks, especially, the various subtle expressions, using patterns as well. The artist is also involved in the environment, as director of The Permaculture Flowering Institute; “Permaculture is the study of patterns in nature that create healthy ecosystems. By recreating these design patterns in our own lives, we help to create sustainable lifestyles.” Learn more about Swentzell and her artwork and environmental work at roxanneswentzell.net.

Again these are not meant to be serious, amazing masterpieces, but a fun way to celebrate these artists throughout women’s history month, and encourage anyone who might read this to read more on the artists mentioned!

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated showat Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV!  See pictures from the opening of Les Femmes Folles: WV on the blog! The show runs thru April 5; other events  happening in Omaha April 21 and 22. Details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events! Intimates and Fools is also available on amazon.

“Fish needs the breast-bike/After G. Steinem,” acrylic, ink and watercolor on white board, Sally Deskins, 2014

When I was searching for an artist who is a woman painting fish, I kept coming across the “A Woman without a man is like a Fish without a bicycle” quote from years ago that is attributed feminist all-star Gloria Steinem but supposedly actually Australian writer Irina Dunn who coined the term. The quote was made into t-shirts, posters and the like. I remember seeing it on t-shirts in the 1980s, specifically this one by Ray Dunn. Maybe my mother had the tee, or I did, or I saw it in some gift shop somewhere, but I remember being confused, and my mom amused.

Yesterday was Ms. Steinem’s birthday. The feminist activist founded Ms. Magazine in 1972 and so much more. She’s still active–and is also a proponent for the arts. Recently she tweeted “Artist Rights are Human Rights” in favor of paying musicians when their music is played on the radio. (irespectmusic.org)

Anyway so this is just a fun tribute to Ms. Stein who has done so much for women its really silly to try and write it all down here, or in a quickly done art piece. But my wild breast-prints serve as the bike wheels, so the woman here is actually the bike, taking the little wide-eyed fish for a ride. Make of it what you will! Read more about Ms. Steinem at gloriasteinem.com.

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated showat Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV!  See pictures from the opening of Les Femmes Folles: WV on the blog! The show runs thru April 5; Another event and reading is happening in Omaha April 21. Details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events! Intimates and Fools is also available on amazon.

“After Laura Madeline Wiseman/Blots” acrylic and ink (and some shadow spots!) on white board, 2014, Sally Deskins w/poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman

Tonight is the night here in Morgantown! My friend and collaborator, poet Laura Madeline Wiseman, travels east for her Morgantown debut as featured reader at the Monongalia Art Center! The event is a Les Femmes Folles’ Books event in conjunction with the Les Femmes Folles exhibit. Also of course, our book, Intimates and Fools, is the theme of the reading!  Poets Marjorie Fuller, Kaya Stitzhal, Judith Stitzel, Kayla Sargeson and Bernadette Ulsamer will also be reading, with open time for the Morgantown Poets as well! Its going to be a fabulous evening (details here/ femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events).

Madeline and I met awhile back (something we will discuss in a journal forthcoming!) and a year ago, she came to me with a collaborative idea and so Intimates and Fools was born (read more about our inspirations in our interview with Wild Women Rising; and Blotterature). Coupling body art and poetry, Intimates and Fools intimates the complicating pairing of the female form and cultural notions of beauty while playfully seeking to bare and bear such burdens of their weight. Laura Madeline Wiseman’s poetry explores notions of the bra and its place near the hearts of women, while contemplating literary and pop cultural allusions and illusions of such intimate apparel. Sally Deskins’ body art and illustrations make vivid and bright the female form while calling into question the cultural narratives on such various shapes we hold dear, be they natural, consumer, or whimsy.

But I digress! Beyond that, we have supported and enjoyed each others work in various ways throughout the last couple of years with reviews in journals and publications, but also creatively! In fact, one of the poems in her recently published Spindrift, “Death,” was written after my body print “Aggression” from her personal collection (we discuss this more in an upcoming interview as well!). I remember her sending me the original version of the poem and finding inspiration in itself! And so the cycle continues as I scripted it (first version) today on a small, gritty, darker, breast-print. The visual piece echoes the styling of Intimates and Fools in form a bit but its a bit heavier. I’m holding myself back a bit from saying too much about it, as I will be writing formally about Spindrift soon! But its just a tiny little fun tribute to Madeline, I hope you enjoy, and look up more of her work at lauramadelinewiseman.com–and join us tonight if you are in Morgantown!!

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated showat Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV!  See pictures from the opening of Les Femmes Folles: WV today on the blog! The show runs thru April 5 and there will be a reading featuring Laura Madeline Wiseman on March 25; details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events! Intimates and Fools is also available on amazon.

“After Ana Mendieta,” photo by S. Deskins 2014

Ana Medieta has been in the back of my mind this whole month. Mendieta (18 November 1948 – 8 September 1985) was a Cuban American performance artist, sculptor, painter and video artist who is best known for her “earth-body” art work.  Also dubbed a “feminist body artist,” writes Women Environmental Artists:

“One theme in her early performance art was violence against the female body. Later Mendieta focused on a spiritual and physical connection with the land, most particularly in her Silueta pieces, which typically involved carving her imprint into sand or mud, making body prints or painting her outline or silhouette onto a wall. In 1983 she won the Prix de Rome and took up residence in Rome, Italy. During the last 2 years of her life she started creating “objects”, mostly permanent sculptures and drawings, it was her intention to retain the connection with nature via the vibrations of the natural elements she continued to use in the works.”

Particularly of interest to me is her “Tree of Life” series. Writes Connie Holmes: “The pieces were transient, created and then photographed just before or during their destruction. The materials used were highly symbolic. In one work from the “Silueta” series, she outlined her figure with gunpowder, creating a shape reminiceint of prehistoric cave paintings. By setting it alight, she incorporates the ritualistic use of fire as a source of exorcism and purification. Mendieta also used flowers as mediums in her series, quoting the folk traditions of Mexico. Her primary material was the earth itself. In her “Tree of Life” series, she covered her naked body with mud and posed against and enormous tree. Ridding herself of her color and form, she is visually united with the tree, arms raised in supplication.”

This morning I actually just received an email about an exhibition of her work  at Museum der Moderne Salzburg in Austria. The press release used the image of Ana Mendieta, Untitled (Glass on Body Imprints), 1972. Which strikes a chord for me, as well, as I’ve always been interested in “women in the window” in art and literature. Moreover, as Mendieta died falling out of her apartment window, this image displays a deep sadness.

Mine, as usual, a light tribute. I played with the window and the flower, a playful pose where I’m disguised, and also sort of blend with the fabric. I like, too, how the room is dark, exhibiting my domesticity with the blur of the image below. Its fun and nothing exuberant as Mendieta’s, but I honor with this tiny fun tribute, and encourage you to look her up too.  A nice article on the Arts Index here and another on Hypoallergic here.

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated showat Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV!  See pictures from the opening of Les Femmes Folles: WV today on the blog! The show runs thru April 5 and there will be a reading featuring Laura Madeline Wiseman on March 25; details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events!

“Body victory after K.S.” acrylic and ink on board, Sally Deskins, 2014

I interviewed Pittsburgh-based poet Kayla Sargeson on my journal last week.  Kayla will be joining us to read Tuesday, March 25, 6pm, at the Monongalia Art Center featuring Laura Madeline Wiseman (details here/below). In the interview, she wrote about her process and inspiration, and I connected at once when I read this (warning: ‘explicit language’ below :)):

“…I was at a workshop once (with other women), and one of the participants said, ‘this poem would be really good if you took the sex out.’ I was about 20 tops and I just thought ‘fuck her. I’ll write what I want.’  I think every time a woman writes about her body, we’ve won a small victory as female artists.”
(Kayla Sargeson, Les Femmes Folles, March 21, 2014)

Yes! I’ve been given ideas for what I “should” create–not the body, or the body but not nude, or, not art at all–just write! But by honoring our own passions, insights, perspectives and respecting ourselves by realizing that our expressions are valid–explicit ones! This is empowering. We don’t hide, we talk about, we create about, what society has deemed discomforting, and each time we’re open, we begin to appreciate, love, respect even more.

As I reflected in a discussion with Laura Madeline Wiseman earlier, it’s an amazing jolt when you read or view something that you connect with. It’s hard to describe! It’s also hard to describe the exploration I make with my body-prints–it is that of body image; self-portraiture; of the relationship of our inside to our outside; of abstraction and the male gaze; of what makes art/women beautiful? And, its my body printed on paper. Its my tiny thank-you to feminism, to female artist victories.

So long story short–I’m so excited to have Kayla with us reading Tuesday!  She said she’ll be reading from her chapbook Mini Love Gun (Main Street Rag 2013):

“Mini Love Gun is important to me because it deals with a variety of tough subjects—rape, violence, sex, being a woman in the gritty/urban world, etc. I’m interested in pushing as many boundaries as I can, both in my work and my life, so I feel like this collection does that as well, but not without having fun. Most of these poems are really funny to me.”
(Kayla Sargeson, Les Femmes Folles, March 21, 2014)

“After Barbara Roux, self portrait in stones,” M. Deskins 2014

The environment is an issue of immense importance, especially as I look to my children’s future!

I interviewed Barbara Roux last year for my journal, Les Femmes Folles.  The New York based conservation artist shared with me how both feminism and the environment play a role in her work:

“…My inspiration is wild habitats.  I work directly with nature and am both a feminist and an active conservationist.  My work has been selected for the Feminist Art Base of the Sackler Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum. I create works that engage small habitat niches.  I see my projects as a statement against the altering of a large area in wild landscapes that I feel some male artists making Earth Works in the 1960’s did.” (Barbara Roux, Les Femmes Folles, May 23, 2013)

Scrolling through the inside and outside work of Roux on her website, you want to be with it.  It is intimate and you can feel her love of nature. I love the pieces where she writes poetry on pieces outside like tree trunks and leaves. Do see more and enjoy at barbararoux.com.

So I’m cheating a bit today, as my daughter was the creator! But I took the photographs, so that works! Whenever we go to the park, she’s always gathering up things, like acorns, leaves, sticks, rocks, to make something. Today she created a self-portrait. On this windy day it flew away in no time, but it was just delightful seeing her mind work and the resulting very nice little sculpture!

This one here she made a few weeks ago, finding acorns and placing tiny rocks in them–more of the process than the outcome, which I suppose might be the usual for her and my son!

I look forward to thinking about nature more as I embark upon the project with poet Laura Madeline Wiseman on trees!

Thanks for reading; again, Happy Women’s History Month and please do check out my journal on women in art, Les Femmes Folles; my anthology that just came out: Les Femmes Folles: The Women, 2013; and my first illustrated book, Intimates and Fools (poetry by Laura Madeline Wiseman, LFF Books, 2014). If you’re in/around the Morgantown, WV area, check out my curated showat Monongalia Art Center: Les Femmes Folles: WV! The show runs thru April 5 and there will be a reading featuring Laura Madeline Wiseman on March 25; details at femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/events!

Also see Les Femmes Folles’ current Call for Art & Writing: Our Intimates and Our Fools on the Submissions page!