Jerry Michalski has been coming to Windgrove off and on for a month doing sketches, preparatory small paintings and now, today, a larger, final oil painting of Roaring Beach. Generally, his routine is to awake at 6AM, observe the light on the beach, take notes and then meet me for morning coffee and toast around 8. He then ventures back to his easel until later in the day when we meet up for dinner, a glass of wine and wandering discussions on art and life with a bit of good gossip thrown in to keep us centered in the mundane realities of everyday living.
It would be an understatement to think that I don’t get immense satisfaction from his presence here at Windgrove. Not only does it give me pleasure to have his company and artistic energy on this land, I also welcome again the opportunity to have Jerry painting here as an artist-in-residence.
The last official resident artist at Windgrove was when Sally Horne arrived in December of 2005 to begin a three month stay. This, as many past readers would know, blossomed into a loving partnership that necessitated the stopping of the “much too public” residency program. With Sally now living elsewhere, the closing of one door allows the opening of another and I am using Jerry to kick start the next phase of Windgrove’s artist-in-residency.
Like before, Windgrove will welcome those artists — painters, sculptors, writers — whose work deals with healing the human relationship to the more than human world. Here, art and ecology and spirit come together with a seriousness to the task at hand and more than a pinch of fun thrown in to leaven things up a bit.
But this time there will be more boundaries in place so that my private life is not so impacted when other artists are staying here. In the past, the biggest impediment in having a private life was that the main house was the center of eating and socializing. This was okay and doable when I was single, but not so okay when in relationship.
I might be an old dog, but I’m still capable of learning.
Therefore, what I want to build next is a self contained two or three bedroom artist-in-residency house complete with kitchen and sitting area where the artists themselves will provide for and look after their daily needs. This way, I (or, I and my partner) can visit or not visit depending on what’s happening in my/our lives. Having three artists living together instead of a solo resident should make for a more vibrant while less intrusive program.
Fingers crossed.
I’m open to any suggestions as to how to make the Windgrove artist-in-resident program a user friendly operation for all concerned.
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The process to survey the blocks of land I intend to sell for the further development of the Windgrove Artist-in-resident program was begun this week. An interesting process, indeed, as we walked and drove any number of kilometres just to do the preliminary work of establishing the north and east boundaries of Windgrove’s 100 acres. Next week the west and south boundaries. Only then, in the third week, will the boundary lines for the actual smaller 6 and 8 acre blocks being sold get established.
Good question, I thought, as I helped carry up some survey equipment to the top of a hill nearly a mile away from the blocks to be sold (and off my property, as well). But what is required by law is that our survey had to be accurate to within one mm or 1/16th of an inch. To pinpoint the corners of the existing Windgrove acreage to this degree of accuracy meant we had to start at a government established “trig” point; points located on certain hill tops around Tasmania consisting of a brass disk set into concrete.
By happy conincidence, I came across the above Wendell Berry poem a few days before Sally Horne set up in the studio to paint a series of four mandalas while in residence at Windgrove. With today being a “solstice” event, it only seems appropriate that she is painting circles within circles.
