Welcome: Newest Mother-Daughter Press Photographer-- John Feldhahn-- my grandfather

This path and gate lead forward and backward for me.  Sometimes I have heard something 1000 times but only on the 1001st time do I understand and take in what is important. Some paths are impossible to predict.  Who would have put me here looking at photos, family photos, and being touched as an artist and a daughter and mother.



My mother told me about her parents. That they were artists among their regular lives. My grandmother went to Parsons school of design -- enabled by the men in her life.  My grandfather loved photography. I heard this many times and I remember him with a camera and trying to catch us all in photogenic moments. But none of this prepared me for the day, about a month ago, when I opened up the boxes of photos she saved of his slides. They were beautifully filed, labeled, and even had compelling names on them such as "my 50 favorite pictures".  [Note to all mortal photographers-- this is one way to make your work live]. 

I fell into 3 days of breathtaking photos of people I knew including myself, my family, and complete strangers. So, as we have been selecting photographers to work with Mother-Daughter Press I want to welcome John Feldhahn and share just a couple of photos of his.  John's family came from Germany and he was born in Nebraska to a family that joined the Church of Latter day Saints. His mother Anke was a seer, a prophet, and woman not to be trifled with.  John went to Pharmacy school and met Madeline Crick at college.

The gate shown in the first photo was made by Madelines father -- Mr. Crick at his foundry in Independence Missouri. Much of the wrought iron work in their yard came from the foundry.

Until recently however, this one below was the only photograph of Johns I knew well.



It is Gay's wedding day. He has set the stage for this photograph. Each detail carefully thought out. She is very happy and wearing yards of blue silk. He places a photograph of her husband to be in a frame behind her and one of her mothers wedding in the other picture. He asks her to hold a mirror and look towards it. She wants to hide her hands, the ones whose nails she nibbled and a febrile illness had rendered unlovely to her.   They practice many shots but this is the one they like best.
The care and attention to detail are part of what make this photograph so beautiful. The model is gorgeous and the connection of photographer to subject-- uncommon and good.

Gay later worked some of his photos in with hers luckily, the same garden he photographed stayed in the family and my aunt Lois worked in it and made it even more lovely so we have over 60 years of one garden in photos.  Gay took his intital slide and then added in elements of Lois' garden and her own too. In this picture, that is her bird, his bird bath, Lois' birdhouse, and all of them shared the orchard. The flowers were from all three gardens.  


We were all shocked to end up gardners after watching our parents do it. Years later wishing we could ask them questions. This is the next best thing to getting a second chance to play in the dirt with them and design somthing together.

We plan to put many of Johns Photos in a web gallery and some images to stock for those places that like historical or antique images.  I am so pleased to have these to show.

Congratulations to John and his family :)
Let us know if you want to see more of his work or their work "together". Look for the stone pedestal birdbath as one clue 
Sharon

Whee! Photoshelter features "11 great walkways"

Stepping stone path through blooming Vinca minor or periwinkle

I got this notice from Photoshelter -- the folks who manage websites for a large collection of photographers. 

Hi Sharon,

Hope all is well with you. I'm getting in touch to let you know that one of your images is featured in our recent "11 Great Photos ofPathways and Walkways" blog post:
Great photos of pathways and walkways

....We try to recognize the exceptional work of our members. We love your photos, and look forward to seeing more of them in the future!

Cheers,
Meghan

--
meghan grosso | marketing coordinator | photoshelter inc
212.206.0808 x3325 | meghan@photoshelter.com | http://www.photoshelter.com

What a treat and great news for Mother-Daughter Press.! So, in the spirit of walkways, paths, circumnavigation, perambulation and vacillando here are a few more photos.

Cairn on the path

Scalloped brick walkway and a Mexican pot

The MKT rails to trails project in Columbia Missouri

Shade garden path past hobbit birdhouse made of Cedar

Paving stones through pink garden

Being the guerilla gardener that she was Gay made many paths

so if you want to see more go to the website and put "path" in the searchbar

There are many fun and gorgeous images

Meanwhile...

Wherever your path takes you 

may it have much beauty and 

times when the going is easy.

Peace, 

Sharon

The garden.... the great writ small and the small elevated to the divine

Gardening as spiritual practice, intellectual paradigm, & a love story

Raspberry Bee Balm or Monarda

I was explaining something to my husband, something charged and important, emotional. The reason for the tears or intensity are not relevant or even memorable, but typically this scenario is unlikely to go well -- me leaky and sore and him trying to help. But, on this day I used my garden as a metaphor to illustrate my point(s) and how I felt.   Into a grand garden-based simile went the mishmash of partially processed feelings, deep connecting ideas, and whim and I began to explain.  Using the garden and the gardener as metaphor -- spinning from concept to common practicality.

Admittedly I am prone to see (invent) large meaning from simple things.  A quality that when viewed generously is creative and exciting but turned on its tail can be exhausting (& tedious).   But, gardens are metaphors that do not run out. It is all there, the drama, the truth, the process.  The epiphany of the quotidian

The great writ small and the small elevated to the divine.
the earth and the sky - grounded and soaring - heart and intellect
A place where all of me can come and find a voice, an ally, or an example.

Everything I have learned from Buddhism, by being a Quaker, as a parent, from studying physics and the sciences, about love and how life works, is in evidence in my garden. If I want to be reminded of the Central Truth or any of the 1000 smaller neighboring truths, they are all on show and available in my garden. On this particular day using Great-Mother images of necessary-but-difficult pruning, the care of little shoots, the need for rocks as rest and edges as frames I was rewarded, my husband smiled-- little rootlets connect.

A couple of cattails at sunset

This poem came to me from The writers almanac is called "the gardener" by Ken Weisner and it speaks to some of these elements

The Gardner

by Ken Weisner
For Kit

You get down on your knees in the dark earth—alone
for hours in hot sun, yanking weed  roots, staking trellises,
burning your shoulders, swatting gnats; you strain your muscled
midwestern neck and back, callous your pianist's hands.

You cut roses back so they won't fruit, rip out and replace
spent annuals. You fill your garden dense with roots and vines.
And when a humble sprout climbs like a worm up out of death,
you are there to bless it, in your green patch, all spring and summer long,

hose like a scepter, a reliquary vessel; you hum
through the dreamy wilderness—no one to judge, absolve,
or be absolved—purified by labor, confessed by its whisperings, connected
to its innocence. So when you heft a woody, brushy tangle, or stumble

inside grimy, spent by earth, I see all the sacraments in place—
and the redeemed world never smelled so sweet. 

"The Gardener" by Ken Weisner, from Anything on Earth. © Hummingbird Press, 2010. Reprinted with permission
http://www.elabs7.com/c.html?rtr=on&s=fj6,mhln,dv,kvqx,d4h0,2m6n,mf9q

Cherry Tomatoes

Photograph Gay Bumgarner Images titled "Burpee big boy and the cherries"

"Burpee Big boy and the Cherries"

Cherry Tomatoes
by Anne Higgins

Suddenly it is August again, so hot,
breathless heat.
I sit on the ground
in the garden of Carmel,
picking ripe cherry tomatoes
and eating them.
They are so ripe that the skin is split,
so warm and sweet
from the attentions of the sun,
the juice bursts in my mouth,
an ecstatic taste,
and I feel that I am in the mouth of summer,
sloshing in the saliva of August.
Hummingbirds halo me there,
in the great green silence,
and my own bursting heart
splits me with life. 

"Cherry Tomatoes" by Anne Higgins, from At the Year's Elbow. © Mellen Poetry Press, 2000. Reprinted with permission. (buy now)

 See image in website

Cairn- Built by Gay McDonnell Bumgarner and Patrick C. McDonnell

This was one of two cairns built by this energetic (fidgety) artistic duo.  They were also responsible for numerous wooden arbors, garden benches, and brush piles.  

Based on my quick review of the definition, cultural, and historical information about cairns it seems they are built by almost everyone and for purposes ranging from the trivial to the supremely important. If you see a Cairn, depending on the place, the time, and a myriad of other cues it might be saying to you.

-- "There are too many rocks here so I will pile them all up in this one place"
--"Wow"
--"Go here"
--"Don't go here"
--"I bet I can make a bigger more amazing pile than you can"
--"Buffalo (or Reindeer) run this way (toward cliff)"
--"Someone is buried here"
--"This is the top (summit) of the mountain"
--"I am (or wish I was) Andy Goldsworthy"
-- "There was a very important battle here that defines our national pride, or, a cart carrying fruit tipped over around here last week.

As we all know few forces are more compelling than the urge to pile rocks one on top of the other.

Fortunately, as an act of reverence the cairns built by Gay and Pat were collected and now adorn the gardens of good friends.  Cairns make great garden art, we would love to see yours too.