The Poetics of Place
Art And Writing
Hosted by Cullowhee Mountain ARTS
April 18-24, 2015
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More information & registration: cullowheemountainarts.org
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MEDIUM FOR ARTISTS: Mixed Media, Drawing, Conversations, Presentations & Creative Play
MEDIUM FOR WRITERS: Poetry, Drawing, Conversations, Presentations & Creative Play
LEVELS: Intermediate – Advanced
Here is an opportunity for poets and visual artists to work side-by-side, sharing their perceptions of and responses to the landscape of Taos. Students will bring their varied insights into the processes of making art and share the work they create, in solitude or collaboratively, in an environment that nurtured the work of such luminaries as Georgia O’Keefe, D.H. Lawrence, Willa Cather, Ansel Adams and Martha Graham, in the very home that provided both haven and inspiration for so many, the Mabel Dodge Luhan House.
The Mabel Dodge Luhan House, also known as Big House and St. Teresa House, was the home of artist Mabel Dodge Luhan and a haven for artists and writers.[1] The house is one of the earliest examples of Pueblo Revival style in Taos. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1991.
The stage for the six days will be set by artist Rebecca Crowell and poet Cecilia Woloch, who will give presentations on the history of artists and writers in Taos. Time will be devoted to exploring the town, with sketchbooks, notebooks, cameras, etc…- a time for the students to wander alone or in a small group.
“This time for exploration will be used to discover what aspects of the place you are drawn to and how those might play into your work”. (Rebecca)
“I really think that artists “see” differently — I know that when I look at anything in the presence of a visual artist, I get the benefit of at least a glimpse through that other lens — and probably poets do, too. So the opportunity to wander and observe together could be really rich.” (Cecilia)
“My class will focus on small works in any medium in abstract response to the surroundings. I thought I’d focus on “Place” as a topic overall… for an example, I will give a presentation about how various kinds of places have influenced my own work such as Spain and Ireland.” (Rebecca)
“I’ll also focus my class around responding to the environment — both the “outer” landscape and what I think of as the “ghost” landscape of any landscape, where those layers meet, and what those landscapes evoke in each of us, in terms of an inner landscape.” (Cecilia)
Crowell and Woloch will send to participants a suggested reading list. An evening will be given to an optional book discussion group.
Lodging is at the Historic Mabel Dodge Luhan House & adjacent Juniper House, where participants will sleep in rooms that were once occupied by art luminaries such as D.H. Lawrence, Aldous Huxley, Georgia O’Keefe, John Marin Martha Graham, and Ansel Adams. Your stay includes breakfast and lunch each day in the “Big House” dining room, a Saturday night wine reception followed by dinner in the “Big House” dining room and Tuesday night dinner in the “Big House” dining room. (other evenings are open for exploring local cuisine).
The Instructors:
Rebecca Crowell is an abstract painter represented by galleries in Santa Fe, NM; Telluride, Colorado; Atlanta, Georgia; and Dublin, Ireland. She has had a total of five overseas artist residencies since 2001, including her most recent, a six-week Fellowship awarded at the Ballinglen Arts Foundation in County Mayo, Ireland. She was also an artist-in-residence at AIR Serenbe in Georgia in 2013. Her work is found in hundreds of private, public, and corporate collections nationally and internationally. She holds an MFA in Painting from Arizona State University and has had considerable teaching experience in universities and workshop classrooms. Rebecca has been teaching her original techniques in Oil and Wax Workshops since 2009 around the US and now teaches internationally as well. Video 1: Studio Workshop, Osseo, WI Video 2: Rebecca Crowell, Abstract Painter
Cecilia Woloch is the author of six collections of poems, most recently Carpathia (BOA Editions 2009), a finalist for the Milton Kessler Award, and Tzigane, le poème Gitan (Scribe-l’Harmattan 2014), the French translation of her second book, Tsigan: The Gypsy Poem. The text of Tsigan has also been adapted for multi-media performances in the U.S. and Europe. A novella, Sur la Route, a finalist for the Colony Collapse Prize, is forthcoming from Quale Press in 2015, along with a new collection of poems, Earth, recently awarded the Two Sylvias Press Prize for the chapbook. Other honors include The Indiana Review Prize for Poetry, The New Ohio Review Prize for Poetry, the Scott Russell Sanders Prize for Creative Nonfiction, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the California Arts Council and others. She collaborates regularly with musicians, dancers, visual artists, theatre artists and filmmakers and conducts workshops for writers across the U.S. and around the world.. The founding director of Summer Poetry in Idyllwild, The Istanbul Poetry Workshop and The Paris Poetry Workshop, she has also served on the faculties of a number of graduate and undergraduate creative writing programs. She divides her time between Los Angeles, Shepherdsville (Kentucky), Paris (France) and a small village in the Carpathian Mountains of southeastern Poland.
