Baker arch

Baker arch. Acrylic. 15" x 20"

This driftwood construction no longer exists. 

It was on the beach one day. A few days later it was gone. I didn't see who made it. I don't know what happened to it. Was it blown down by the wind? Washed out with the tide? Taken away by a mysterious stranger?

I love its simplicity, its crooked perfection, its wabi-sabi. I cherish its anonymity and impermanence. But I had to preserve it on video and canvas. That's what I do. 

At this angle the arch frames Mt. Baker, an ancient volcano in the distance. Mt. Baker is usually obscured by clouds and not often visible from this beach. You could come here every day for weeks and never see it. Then one day, whoosh, it's there, gleaming across the water, an elusive snow-covered god basking in the sun. It's a very good day when you can see Baker. 

For me, this image celebrates the meeting of timelessness and transience - the ancient, sleeping mountain and the driftwood arch - made by the forces of nature and brought together briefly by a passing creative soul. 

Life, we know, is transient. But art, we hope, is timeless. 

Tide diamond

Tide diamond. Watercolor, collage. 11" x 15"

Empty space is powerful.


That's something the minimalist who arranged these logs instinctively knows.

I get the message.

Tide den

Tide den. Mixed media collage. 18" x 24"

Exclusive beachfront property. "Green" construction, natural materials, designed for maximum light. Air conditioned. Partly furnished. This one won't last!

Tide chapel

Tide chapel. Pastel. 12" x 15"

Found this structure on the beach just after last labor day.

It clearly took a fair amount of design, engineering and labor to create. Like all great architecture, it's esthetically unique, suits its environment and seems to have a purpose.

Chapel? Altar? Performance art? Spontaneous creative expression? I'll probably never know who built it or why.

A few days later it was gone. Which makes it all the more magical. 

   

Sticks and stones

Sticks & Stones. Watercolor. 11" x 15"

Sticks & Stones. Pastel, fabric collage.  11" x 15"

Someone placed these stones in the space between these driftwood logs. 

It made both the logs and the stones important. The relationship between them changed them both.

I came, I saw, I recorded. That may have changed me. Relationships do. Even haphazard, casual, anonymous ones like this. They have an energy that creates mystery and suggests meaning. 

Baker day

It's a good day when you can see Baker. Acrylic. 18" x 24"

It’s a good day when you can see Baker.

Not today, though. I thought so for a minute. Then the wind whipped my hair across my eyes and, when I looked again, there were too many clouds.

There is hardly anyone at the beach. It has been raining for days. I don’t remember how many. One rainy day blends into the next, like watercolor on wet paper.  But then today, late in the afternoon, the wind picked up and the sky cleared to a cerulean blue.

You could never call the sky here just blue. Or gray. It has a life and its colors are not just colors but air infused with sea light and forest shadow, shifting with the wind, blending with the mountains and melting into the gulf.

The beach is seven minutes away from home. A seven minute drive past rhododendrons in raw pigments of vermilion, magenta, carmine, cadmium red, carnelian, rose madder, alizarin crimson. Hedges of Prussian blue ceanothus. Cadmium yellow Scotch broom which everybody here hates and pulls out by the roots. I love its cheerful tenacity.

The dog is quiet in the back seat of the car but won’t sit down. She balances herself upright, feet spread, tail down. She’s too small to see out of the window but she knows when we’re headed for the beach.

I wonder if the dog feels the thrill of anticipation. I have heard dogs have no sense of time. For this one, riding in the car to the beach and chasing a big black Lab into the water are all the same moment. Einstein’s comment about time doesn’t work for dogs. For them, everything does happen at once.

How intense that must be. And exhausting. No wonder dogs sleep twenty hours a day.

The dog ejects from the car as soon as I open the door and runs yapping at the nearest black Lab’s heels.

I look for Baker.

A pair of herons bookend a tide pool. A seal flips me the bird with its tail as it dives.

I catch a glimpse, a white clad shoulder. But then, like Frodo when he puts on the ring, a dark mist descends. I watch it move across the gulf.

I give up squinting across the bright water, look down at the high water line, find tangled in dried kelp a perfect crab shell, claws tucked in, all of its other limbs intact. It weighs nothing. I put it in my pocket. It will be part of a collage I'm making.

I call the dog and she pretends not to hear. I promise her cheese. She thinks about it, then comes trotting.

When I get home a little later I go online to find out why no Baker today.

I read, Mount Baker weather forecast: Rain showers before 11am, then snow showers likely. Snow level 5900 feet lowering to 5100 feet. High near 44. South southwest wind between 8 and 10 mph. Chance of precipitation 80%.

I realize I've got it wrong. It’s a good day here every day.

But it’s a great day when you can see Baker.