Painting with the Masters
Copying Leopold Schmutzler’s Here I Am, c.1910
At the Frye Art Museum
PAINTER OF DOGS BECOMES A DIFFERENT KIND OF STORY TELLER
The other day, I shared this ‘America’s Funniest Home Videos video of a guy playing with puppies, with a friend on facebook… she is not just any dog lover, but a world-renowned artist who specializes in paintings of dogs. Other animals sometimes come out of her brush, but mostly… Dogs. She is also President of the Animal Shelter on San Juan Island and an all around champion of animal rights. Here she is in her studio holding my favorite Dog Painting, and you can view her work here… JAIME ELLSWORTH
Jaime Ellsworth “No…but we could be long-lost twins separated at birth by a baby snatching nurse who sold him off for money for cash to gamble away in Vegas. She drank too much and lost all the money, and then felt so guilty about her dirty deed that she became a hooker to try to buy the baby back. Sadly that was her downfall as she became addicted to heroin and spent every penny she had on drugs. My brothers faux parents could never figure out why he preferred the company of dogs so much because they were told his real parents were busy astronauts and never had any attachment to animals or children as they were always in space. As a child he was never allowed to have a pet and made up for it in his adulthood by stalking people at pet stores who bought puppy chow and followed them home, waited until they went to work and climbed in the puppies play yards to fill his heart with all the puppy love he was so denied as a child……….to be continued…. “
So what do you think? Artist becomes Author? I for one am looking forward to the ‘to be continued…’
To see a previous TedBook story about The Painter of Dogs, and a show at Waterworks Gallery in Friday Harbor…
DOG SHOW… Sort of…
DOG SHOW… Sort of…
New Art Show in Friday Harbor goes to the Dogs at Waterworks Gallery!
Jaime Ellsworth paints Dog Pictures and Barbara Duzan makes Dog Statues
This was supposed to be on my PhotoLog… TedBook’sDAILYPICS… Dammit! Oh well, hope you like dogs…
JAIME PAINTS A NEW DOG PICTURE… (what else!)
Jaime Ellsworth‘Painter of Dogs’ is gearing up for gallery showings across the land… Drop by her studio in Friday Harbor and take a look… or simply CLICK THE PIC to see her work…
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To see more pics… check out this old page… TedBook’s DAILY PICS
FAUX SENT ME…
trompe l’oeil painted door
Oops… this was destined for my PhotoLog… TedBook’s Daily Pics … to see more doors, go to my PhotoLog.
IMPORTANT THINGS…
I have a lot of things to do today, some really Important Things. I got up early to do them. Here’s how it went…
Got up early. Made coffee. It was cold, so I decided to fire up the wood stove for the first time in five months. My wood stove was being used to display artworks during the ‘wood stove off-season’, so that meant I had to find space on my wall for my newest acquisition, an encaustic mixed media work by talented young artist Fiona Small, entitled ‘Rose Window’.
So, moving artwork ensued. I decided to move a photograph of my grandparents and mother, taken in the Redwood Forest during a camping trip… I would say in 1927… to my Family Wall.
My Family Wall is kind a family tree… a place to put a lot of family photos I treasure. A few of parents and sisters, but mostly daughters and grandkids. The only one without a person in it, is of the Golden Gate Bridge… I like the GGB… it was taken by my granddaughter Isabel, while in her ‘I want to be a photographer’ phase… it is very good and makes me think of her, and that’s why it’s on the Family Wall.
Actually, this isn’t the photo on the wall… I just like it and thought I’d throw it in… I think I’ll put it on the wall.
There’s 1st Lieutenant Theodore Strutz, my dad not me. My favorite photo of my mother Edna, taken in the 40’s, with a photo of my daughter, the actress, in the play ‘Talley’s Folly’, with her hair in the same style as my mom, hanging above. Another one of the actress, taken in Chicago in the 80’s, when Krista took me to Graceland Cemetery…https://tedstrutz.com/2012/05/28/the-crusader-and-the-acting-student… it’s one of my faves, because it reminds me of some fun times we shared in that great city.
Another from Chicago, is when Ashley and I attended a wedding at Harry Carey’s Restaurant… she made me very proud to have her on my arm that night… and one 10 years before, with her sitting on my lap in our jewelry store.
Of course this required a lot of shifting around of photos on the Family Wall. And that required a lot of dusting and cleaning of the frames, which in turn brought out a lot of memories. This is why I like the Family Wall… the memories. Each photo tells a story, like the cast photo of The Man Who Came To Dinner… taken around ’72. Ann, the original family actress, was in the play, and I came in at the last minute to replace an actor who 
had quit the day before the show opened. Ann is right of center with the pearls. I made some important friendships in that play. Let’s play ‘Where’s Waldo’… can you find me?
I didn’t plan the Family Wall, I have lots of family photos elsewhere… even on the fridge… it just happened. There’s me with one of my favorite women at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. It should probably be on my Madame X Wall… yes, I have one. 
So, after the moving, dusting and remembering, I decided to share my Family Wall. I haven’t taken the time to write in TedBook for some time… people have been talking. “Too many Important Things to do”, I’d say.
Well, it’s now 1:30, and the Important Things still haven’t been done today… Or have they?
ELEPHANTS INVADE FRIDAY HARBOR
Sculptor Matthew Gray Palmer… bound for the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, Co.
This post was meant for my PhotoLog, but I posted it at TedBook by mistake… I’ll get the hang of it eventually… Check out my PhotoLog: http://tedstrutzdotme.wordpress.com/
DREAMING OF A MIDSUMMER’S NIGHT… Opening Soon…
Krista painting the Wold Road set for Shakespeare Under the Stars…
I meant to post this on my Photolog… TedBook’s DAILY PICS… have a look… http://tedstrutzdotme.wordpress.com/
KRISTEN MAKES A BOOK…
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| Press made by Steve Gutmann |
High in the Sequoia National Forrest somewhere, is a gathering of Musicians and Artists sharing music, dance and experiences during a giant two week camp out. There are a lot of talented people, from all around the world. What am I doing here? After hearing about Sweet’s Mill from my daughter, like forever, I decided to attend. Krista and her BFF Kristen have been going since they were kids, and now my granddaughter, Ula, has been attending for all of her 11 years. Krista is an actress and Kristen is a Belly Dancer. I have no musical talents and marginal artistic skills, but I do like to take photos, so I decided to chronicle life at Sweet’s Mill.
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| soon the ‘bookmakers were deep into cardboard, art paper and paste… |
- Sky began the process with making the cover of the book and concluded after adding the pages. The books were done, and the campers had a journal to record their experiences in…
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| making the binding |
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| attaching cover plates |
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| sizing art paper for cover |
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| gluing cover together |
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| press together |
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| adding the pages |
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| Kristen’s Book |
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| Kristen & Sky |
And, that’s how you make a book!
I’m looking forward to Sweet’s Mill next month… I will probably make another book, but Sky is also the head of the Photography Department at Cal Poly… and I just bought a new camera… I have lots to learn.
THE CRUSADER … and the Acting Student
One day, the actress took me to see Graceland Cemetery… I was living in Chicago, and she said it was a must see. It was a beautiful spring day, and we strolled the grounds… me snapping pics and she studying her lines for a play that was opening soon. Never one to miss a dramatic opportunity, she began posing with the statuary… giving me her reaction to each theme. When we came to the stone knight, she fell to the ground and played the ‘fair maiden struck down in the prime of life’. After she got up, I asked her if he had slain her. “Oh no”, she replied, “he stands guard, protecting her.”
The Crusader by Lorado Taft (1931)… Cemeteries are the perfect place for a history lesson. I learned a lot about Chicago history at Graceland. The place names I had seen around the city came alive with the dead. The men and women who created Chicago, or made her interesting, making their final stop at Graceland and the other cemeteries around town. Their gravesites were fascinating, not only for the artwork, but for how they wanted to be portrayed. Some erected huge mausoleums, and some preferred something quieter… like their name carved upon a rock. Victor Lawson got a Medieval Knight. Victor was the publisher of the Chicago Daily News, and the sculpture embodied his character. The monument does not bear Lawson’s name, but does have an inscription which reads, “Above all things truth beareth away victory”. At his brother’s request, Lorado Taft sculpted The Crusader out of a single block of dark granite.
Taft’s most famous sculpture also stands sentinel at Graceland… although of a different type… it is entitled Eternal Silence.
Wikipedia Photo
I thought of my photo, taken in 1988, while watching Game of Thrones last night. The knights protecting their charges… and some not with protection in mind.
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For my friends hanging out at the Still. Here is one I wrote a while back… I thought of it when I advised one of our yeahwriters (the girl in Chicago… do you know who I mean?) to visit Graceland Cemetery.
For my other friends, check out this week’s other stories at yeahwrite’s Moonshine Grid
