idaho — Page 17

The Desert Breathes Ring

June 16, 2009 by The Noisy Plume

One of my favorite rings I have ever made featuring Owyhee Picture Jasper from Idaho:

The Desert Breathes
with great rushing heaves.
With silent inhalations.
A constant push and pull of wind
steady against sun parched skin.
Drying the land into cracks and fissures.

The Desert Breathes; dry heat rising up into the sky to deny rain
and to chagrin lightning as it crackles against dark sky;
electricity
without a conduit.
A phantom storm.
Hot skin ripe with sin, desperate for baptisim.
Man without precipitation.
Woman without tears.

This is the desert. Utterly rude in her landscape.
Creosote stretching like the beard of an old man,
growing even in death
deeper into the dust
of a blood red landscape.

The desert can breathe but it can’t bleed.

Filed Under: idaho, New Jewelry

What a Wonderful Disaster!

June 15, 2009 by The Noisy Plume

Yes.

I used the word disaster!

I’m home from Montana and feel great despite the d-word. I’m going to take a second to break the trip down for you and then I want to take a moment to really tell you what the point of this whole Montana show was via video blog.

Good:

-driving through Idaho and Montana to Missoula (beautiful)

-excellent company on the drive as my friend Erin was my plus one for the weekend

-arrived in M-Town and visited with a lovely friend in her crazy converted-church-commune living space where we experienced great music, excellent cakes, mosquitoes and plenty of art

-slept in a big comfy king sized bed

-beautiful weather

-a spectacular outfit on Sunday (turquoise strapless dress, over the knee socks, Frye boots, brooches, necklace, earrings, great bed head, the original pink wheat ring and my belt buckle slung low on my hips) made me feel beautiful

Bad:

-the soccer team at the hotel at 3AM romping about the hallways and women screeching about pizza (I refuse to share more details about this experience)

-the thunderstorm that arrived over top of Missoula at approximately 3PM on Sunday that actually washed my entire display away. A torrent of water was flowing straight into my typewriter (poor Underwood) despite my tent, my platters were filled with water, all of my vases were blown over, I was sopping wet, Farley was cowering under the table and my antique wing back chair might never be the same

-I left the show 4 hours early because my table looked like an utter disaster as did the artist (me)

-I then struggled with awful feelings after leaving a show 4 hours early that I spent 2.5 months preparing for

-I then left my phone in Deer Lodge Montana and realized where it was when I reached Dillon Montana and had to drive all the way back to Deer lodge Montana to get the phone when the girl at the gas station refused to mail it to me DRAT

GOOD:

-driving through spectacular thunderstorms on the way home

-a stop at the Patagonia outlet in Dillion, Montana where I finagled-in-an-honest-way (I just wanted to use that word) myself a spruce green article of clothing (a color that is very hard to find indeed)

-Erin playing DJ with her iPod

-talking to She when I was 40 miles from home

-arriving home

-falling asleep and sleeping in until 9AM and then just laying in bed and resting until 11AM this morning

-feeling free of a massive weight, feeling like I might drift away up into the rain cloud to be kissed by lightning and shook by thunder (today marks day 17 of rain in Pocatello)

-welcoming summer with open arms

-roses blooming in the rose garden

More than ever, I have this intense sense of growing pains as an artist!

I have three options really when it comes to my work and appeasing you. I can:

1. Send my designs to a factory in China and have everything mass produced.

2. Become one of those girls who just makes a lot of really crappy stuff without soul to keep cranking the numbers up and to stare googly eyed at my bank account.

3. Keep pouring myself into one of a kind designs and make exactly what I feel called to make even if it means I sell less and get more emails from people who are frustrated and impatient with me and acquiring one of my designs.

I’ve been strong enough. I’ve adhered my heart and soul to option three for a while now. It takes a lot out of me though. It’s hard. It’s hard to face the demand for my work while consistently expressing compassion and gratitude for all of the amazing people I meet. Working hard for you can be incredibly draining and overwhelming. It can be euphoric and blissful. It can be exhausting and uplifting. It can break me and make me. Sometimes I don’t think I can survive the demand placed on my soul and fingertips other times the demand pushes me into really new and wonderful explorations of metal and stone. But one thing always remains the same and that’s the joy I feel flowing out of my mind and hands when I design and craft jewelry. I love it. I love the work of my hands.

I’m not going to quit.

I’m not going to retire until I’m 80 years old and have a pair of plastic hips.

I won’t fade away.

And you! You dear woman, I promise that you WILL, even if you are frustrated beyond words, you WILL eventually get a piece of jewelry from me that was meant for you. Thank you, as always, for your patience, love, kindness and encouragement. You’ve got some of the most amazing qualities that I hope to keep fostering in my self.

Jeepers.

What more is there to say?

Over and out,

Plume

PS This video blog is really long but it encapsulates the Missoula show experience perfectly AND you get to see me cry! Go get some popcorn and Kleenex and enjoy the ride!

Filed Under: idaho, jewelry show, missoula, montana, New Jewelry

In the front yard lurketh:

June 13, 2009 by The Noisy Plume

Now that winter is through, they have ceased their tom foolery with the bird feeders though they do still enjoy shuffling around on the front porch at night (sets Penelope to wild bouts of woofing and snuffing at random intervals).

Filed Under: idaho, mule deer, plume gables, pocatello

June 10, 2009 by The Noisy Plume

We anchor ourselves together

brace against the wind

swim the sunshine and cheat grasses

to the secret place

that grows the wildest flowers.

[they cannot see the city from their vantage

they know the white ghosts of flight against blue sky]

Up in the hills, a narrow valley,

between blistered and sun ravaged draws,

the thick scent of a green divide

in an undulating landscape of bone dry grasses;

a lush caesura in a tumult of bleached deer skeletons and well worn paths.

A tree erupts with the calling of young, hungry hawks too big for their nest.

Too young to fly.

The lupins fade to eye-shut tight white.

In my left hand a scepter of wild blooms.

In my right hand a message from the wind:

bow down, bown down, bow down

to the breeze.

I breathe the wild roses.

I cast myself into my senses.

I make merry melody with each

bend, swoop and snap of my hands

the bouquet is complete.

https://www.thenoisyplume.com/blog/2009/06/10/449/

Filed Under: idaho, poetry

Sunday is Setting

May 31, 2009 by The Noisy Plume

The West Bench is blanketed in some unbelievable clouds.

My poppy bed has reached its zenith.

I’ve been in the studio since noon and have some girlfriends coming over for dinner, after which I’ll return to work until midnight or so. With the onset of summertime, I don’t feel guilty about embracing my night owl nature and working until 3AM some nights. It feels right and I make sure I do all my hammering before 9PM so as not to annoy the neighbors (though I think they are grateful I’m so small scale when it comes to forging since the gent who owned my home before me was a blacksmith!!!).

Kelly departed yesterday afternoon and while I had the very good intention of getting into the studio to do some work, my body felt ragged. I cleaned the house and rearranged my studio, painted a background wash on a huge canvas and went to bed early.

The presence of UmberDove was such a blessing. Her arrival perfectly overlapped the departure of RW on his first roll this fire season and we kept so busy, it was hard to find enough minutes in the day to miss him.

We spent, literally, every minute together making art. We only left Plume Gables to buy supplies or groceries. I now have a painting studio, Kelly took great delight in learning some smithing techniques, we did some sewing and then repeated everything I just mentioned until the wee hours of the morning. It was intense, in the best way.

We dined well out in the dappled sunlight of the yard.

And breathed in the expanse of Idaho while we watched the clouds sweep West to East; cleaning up this country and scrubbing the floors with zephyrs.

There were:

honest moments, silent moments, laughing moments, learning moments, vulnerable moments, moments of appreciation and wonder, moments of excitement, moments of elation….

Stepping back from it all, and reflecting on the time I spent with that woman, I cannot help but feel richer

and imbued with a new and fresh creative power.

But more than this, I feel like someone really understood my creative process and took a moment to speak Artish with me, and cultivate the concepts I’ve been obsessed with lately. Birds of a feather flock together, and we make a feathered pair like no other.

My mind is swimming with ideas and inspiration. I spent 3 hours sketching and writing before I fell asleep last night; dreaming of the possibilities that exist with metal, fabric, feathers, oil paints…I’m utterly overwhelmed. In every single way. In every good way. It’s like someone turned the faucet on and it’s running out of control, hard and fast, it cannot be turned off.

There are so many plans, so many ideas and time is so regimented and consistent. Couldn’t we squeak a few more hours into the day?

COULDN’T WE?

Dinner now and more makery later this evening, into the wee hours of the morning. My fingers, mind and heart are on fire. I could solder by touch, never mind a flame.

PS If for some reason I someday have to share a studio space with someone, it’s going to be Kelly. We can work side by side in the comfort and power of the presence of one another without saying a word, for hours on end, and then do it all over again the next day. To boot, we like the same music which is a big deal.

Filed Under: idaho, pocatello, umberdove