Woodlanders who've Gathered:

Who Came in 2008 

Daniel Mack, Gathering Weaver and Convenerwww.danielmack.com

Judd Weisberg, Lexington, NY   www.juddworks.com

Bill Olendorf,  www.twigz.com

Rob Gorrell, West Virginia     www.twigchair.com     robgorrell.etsy.com

Laurie Seeman, NY, Environmental Artist,  www.strawtownstudio.com

Liz and Bill Hunt, Columbus, Ohio  www.billandlizhunt.com/

Matthew Fallon, flutemaker, wandturner,   His work

Eric Bunn, NJ, wood carver    His work

Mary Panesis, Virginia    http://www.tuathagallery.com/

Craig Cowing, Blooming Grove, NY    www.noteablebowls.com/events/events.htm

Judith Z. Miller, Brooklyn    Her work and more

Kim Vergil from Montreal, Quebec, Canada.      www.kimcreations.net

Artist: painter, photographer, sculptor…. 15 yrs Rustic Artist, Builder, Creator….From Garden furniture Garden Structures…Techniques range from traditional Rustic Building Bent willow (lots of screws and nails but most of all magic and patience) Living willow structures (technique and a green thumb) Mortis and Tennon (my artistic spirit in rustic building)  In fall I sweep the saw dust from the studio floor and Paint in my tiny all purpose studio….My cocoon for creating….My art, rustic, and garden are about a creative spirit within that is always in need of expression.  The tools:  my hands….This year has been a year about Dreams (night dreams) learning, tapping, sharing, expressing.  Fairies have been the rustic expression…A result of the Internet Imagine U course with Dan last year, and our visit to the Fairy garden last year.   Where were the fairies and what did they look like.  Dan always saying:  Try something you wouldn't normally do.  Small if you are used to big.  Fast if you are used to Slow…..  All this mixed with wonderful talks and my magic wand from Mary and Jim.  The Fairies have appeared.  I have always talked of the magic of the rustic.  How you can't see the magic directly like you can't see the Fairies by looking at them.  But, rather by looking beside them and feeling.

Victoria Mowrer, PA    www.victoriamowrer.com   Woodlander has taken on such a broader definition for me.  It is not merely gathering natural materials and fashioning them into things. Maybe after this weekend I will be better able to articulate what my expanded defition really is.  I love the whole idea of "The Wayward Artist".  That is me to a "T".  As most of you know (I think) I was diagnosed with breast cancer in January and am still in the recovery stage (don't know if that is ever over really!?).  I do have a bit of hair now.  So, unfortunately, living with and beyond cancer has been the major theme in my head.  I have a million unanswered questions and everything is changing.  I can't wait to talk to Mary about  "living small".  Prior to "the big C" diagnosis I enrolled in a yoga teacher training program.  The idea was that I would graduate in October of 08 and therefore usher in my 60th birthday (Dec. 08)  with a very positive new skill and loads of positive personal time in accopmplishing that goal. Well, that sure got siderailed! At this juncture I will graduate in  March of 09 if I am lucky.  In the meantime, I feel about 2 weeks ago and cracked several ribs!  This is the year that I do not want to repeat and I just hope I garner as much wisdom as I can from the whole experience.  I have been doing very little artwork as I try to catch up economically in my work life.  I did recently complete a pebble mosaic and had a grand time teaching myself how to do it and gathering all of the pebbles!  I hope to get myself comissions.   I am very drawn to things right now that are repetiutive in nature.  Like weeding as an example.  Reach down, pull weed, reach down pull weed. Look back - see nice order and the results of my labor instantly. This is a change for me - Proabaly helps my ADD brain.

 

Jim Caulfield, Harrisburg , PA

I am strongest when making something, listening to music or looking at something beautiful.  I am weakest when talking about myself.  However, I have it on good authority that I have been a dog in at least one previous life.

 

 

 

Andrea Ursula Colman, birthday August 7, 1966. Pine Island, NY
I knew everything when I was a teenager, started to know less in my  20's, began to forget the things I thought I knew in my 30's and now  that I'm in my 40's I realize I know practically nothing about  anything and the more I learn the less I actually know! The best part  is that I'm O.K. with that.  I'm comfortable with paradox, ambiguity and spontaneity. Of course I  live in the NOW whenever I'm not thinking about the past or future,  but I'm trying to get over that. I have friends, good, true friends,  both conservative and liberal, Christian, Jew, Pagan, Wiccan and  agnostic. I like to think I build bridges, not fences and I find good  in all.  I embrace hardship and challenges with gratitude as I see them as the  greater gifts from God or The Universe or Whatever.  I'm a painter who doesn't paint with the exception of windows & walls,  a writer who does not write with the exception of bills and bios, and  a gardener who plants seed and forgets to water them, yet who grows  the best damn weeds. I'm an innkeeper with a fabulous husband and 5 wonderful, if sometimes  trying, kids ages 9,14,16,17 & 21. My 21 year old step-son is going to Iraq for his first tour with the Marines so please say a prayer for  his safe return. 

Mary Caufield, Harrisburg, PA

I'm back from a very powerful workshop at Omega on "The Not So Big Life" by Sarah Susanka (author of all of the "Not So Big House" books) She led the workshop. In a nutshell, it was about being present in your life, for this is where freedom lies.  (Do not dwell in your past, nor live for your future.  Focus on the present moment. )  And, how we create our own waking and sleeping dreams.  I'm looking forward to Kim's dream workshop.  I believe the reason we all can't wait to get to Warwick is because when there, we do truly feel free.  We all are our true selves, we are completely engaged, and we are completely accepted as we are.

AND MORE:  Anita Hawkins, NY,  Nancy Krim, NY,  Linda Concord, NJ,  Rich Pillar, NJ,

Hannah Maxwell, NY,  Kathy Davison, NY,

Laurie Osmond, NY,  Linda Pate, NY,  Raphael Cox,

Ginger Schmidt, NY  David Wiener, NJ   Paula Werme, NH,

Louis Basilion, PQ, Frankie Vergil, PQ, Jen Rydell, NY,

Hazel Lafleur-Vetter, PA, Elizabeth Bishop, TX, Grace Woodard, NY,

Griffin O'Brien, Marilyn Mamone, PA, Cynthia Fletcher, NJ,  Lori Evans, NY, Saba Hamilton, NY...

sorely missed: Shekinah Rae and Michelle Henkin, Adam Hamer and Jessica Lawlor, Madeline Thompson

2008 Schedule