Category Archives: art

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my current trolls

I am getting some Facebook trolls. My favorites right now are two who requested that I friend them, ostensibly guys, but both said how beautiful I am and charming and etc. The picture that they put the request on is the poster for the last concert. The picture is of a sea lion.

Heh. Guess they think she is beautiful. I replied, “Uh, guys, that’s a sea lion.” They do not acknowledge this.

I am also getting peculiar friend requests. Often there is one friend in common. I contact a friend in Virginia to ask about one. She doesn’t remember the name, so I don’t reply. I also take a look at their home page before replying. If there is nearly nothing there, I think it’s a fake account. Pretty weird.

I am not answering WordPress’s daily questions, either. I think that is feeding ChatGPT or Big Data or someone. Nope.

Ok, let’s feed something random to the algorithm: Al Gore rhythm! I hope that confuses things. How is Al Gore’s rhythm anyhow? Can he dance? Can he shake it? Does he twerk? Work the twerk, Al! As usual, I would like to thank my personal AI, whose initials are MM. She knows who I mean. Sending you love, MM.

Now I will get Al Gore and twerking in my Facebook ads. Are there YouTube videos on How To Twerk? Inquiring minds shy away with horror, though it’s probably decent exercise.

Have a lovely day, trolls! MM, would you go mess their feeds for me? Give them Al twerking!

The photographs are from a museum in Europe in March 2022. Which is a troll? Maybe neither.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: troll.

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Finish line

I did manage to cross the finish line for the Blogging from A to Z.

It was a bit tricky because I had a last minute trip. I got the tickets last Sunday and flew on Tuesday. I flew back on Friday and got home on Saturday. I traveled super light: no laptop, no big camera, only phone and a small day pack and one change of clothes, so I washed some by hand daily. I am proud that I still got the A to Z done!

I feel more like a finisher than a winner. It does feel good to share so much of my mother’s artwork. Helen Burling Ottaway died at age 61 in 2000, so her artwork did not have much of an internet presence. She is present in the Lake Matinenda Cottage Owners Association here. She and my uncle and other family and friends worked on a Matinenda flora of the wildflowers and plants. There have been two more since.

Hooray for everyone who contributed to or supported or read the Blogging from A to Z this month and hmmm, what should I do next year?

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Daily Evil: Y is for Yellow

Yellow can mean fear or cowardice, but it is also a color. Sunlight, summer, warmth, daffodils, spring and tulips.

This watercolor by Helen Burling Ottaway is from 1999 and my daughter chose the mat. I love her choice, the orange picking up all the oranges and yellows in the painting. Orange would never occur to me, but it is wonderful.

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Daily Evil: W is for Wild

Is wildness evil? What sort of wildness? The forest and waves and wilderness are not things we think of as evil, but some wildness in humans seems very evil. Some is silliness, some is substances, and some is truly violence and cruelty and terror and evil.

This is another of Helen Burling Ottaway’s fantasy etchings, titled The Hunt, number 6 of 30, 1986. A merman with a trident and dogfish, with a variety of tails. The etching is 6.75 by 8, the paper 11 by 15. I like the lines of movement, of waves, from the escaping shark.

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Daily Evil: U is for Unlikely

Unlikely isn’t evil. Well, I am tired of evil, so U is for Unlikely because I am tossing in a monkey wrench. U for unexpected, too.

Back to etchings: U is for Unicorn. This is titled “The Virgin and the Unicorn II”, number 10/75, 1986, H. Ottaway. The etching is 7 inches by 8 inches and the paper is 11 inches by 15 inches. She would often frame them mounted but not matted, in frames that have a slot to hold the glass away from the picture. She did her own framing and especially disliked cutting glass. I knew when a show was close because she would be framing and grumpy.

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Daily Evil: T is for Thief

Time is the evil thief I am thinking of today. This is my sister, Christine Robbins Ottaway, painted by Helen Burling Ottaway in the early 1970s. Time has stolen both of them.

This is another watercolor, over a pencil drawing, 10.5 inches by 14 inches.

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Daily Evil: S is for Sneaky

Sneaky. One thing that I think really is evil is gossip. Talking about someone behind their back and spreading rumors and never speaking to the person themselves. But I do not need to punish anyone. The gossip will eat them from the inside, like a cancer, and they will look like fools when they are proven wrong. Curling churlishly with guilt.

I look at the sea and I let it all go.

This watercolor by Helen Burling Ottaway does not have a date. I love the whitecaps using the paper. Tricky to do that, I have tried. My daughter also draws horizons and seascapes, over and over. This is 11 by 15. I suspect it is from the late 1970s or early 1980s, because there is a watercolor of my sister on the beach, similar to this. My paternal grandparents lived on Topsail Island in North Carolina and that is the most likely location.

S is for sneaky and snarky and sea. Here is a snarky song.