panache upon panache

excuses first
I've spent an entire week sans blogging, as I switched between two computers so that I could continue to do my work and also learn my way around the new MAC. My computer advisor was sick so I downloaded software, transferred some files, figured out other stuff on my own (only one call to Apple). Maybe that's not a big deal to you techno-wiz types out there, but it's a big deal for a dizz-wiz like me. I can report that I've made progress and enjoying this how do I love thee, let me count the ways mac-moment in technological time and space. I can't believe how long I clunked along without it.

a number of ways of looking at a blackbird
Stopped by the nearby Des Montes Gallery to see Floyd Archuleta's new work. Ron had just returned from a visit bringing rave reviews.  Floyd is working on metal pieces that involve ravens and magpies.

Among twenty snowy mountains,

The only moving thing

Was the eye of the blackbird

         (Wallace Stevens, stanza 1, "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird")

 

a rooster...

and a horse from another planet...

Apparently this style is called Junk Art and is not a derogatory label. Floyd's work epitomizes the trend as he uses old farm tools, metals, and found objects to create animals with personality. In all cases his animals, no matter how fictional or inventive, capture an essence of the creature itself; perhaps its soul. Probably due to the fact that he grew up ranching and farming by the side of his brothers and his father, now 96 years old. Floyd lives comfortably in that world and in the ordinary 21st century world that most of the rest of us live in.

Time is a horse that runs in the heart, a horse
Without a rider on a road at night.
The mind sits listening and hears it pass.
            (Wallace Stevens, from 'The Pure Gold of Theory")