studio beerhorst door

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

This is the door to my carriage house studio this winter. I have a wood stove but it still can get pretty cold in there when the tempt drops down into the low twenties and the wind is blowing. It is very rustic and natural. It is helping me to keep the wild alive in me. I have been using only what I can salvage to fix it up. The exterior wood around the door came from an 1840s house downtown that was getting a make over. i approached the general contracter about the giant wood pile of pine tongue and groove planks and he said I could have it if I took it all, so that’s what I did. It took me two days to pull all the nails. I have used 3/4 of that wood already. The studio has been helpful to give me a place to “get away” and make stuff or just sit and read beside the stove with candle light.

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Rick Snoozes

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

Taking time to rest. My dentist tells me I must be grinding my teeth. She says that it is caused by stress. I am looking for why I may have stress and for ways to let it go. I have been taking naps in the afternoon more regularly lately and it seems to be helping. I want to enter into his rest. Find that quiet place inside no matter what may be going on around me. I think Pearl took this picture.

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A Time For Old Books

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

Last night Rose and I went dumpster diving and came home with our back packs heavy. The coolest thing was finding a bag full of toliet paper. We were down to our last role. It feels like God is leading us in his mysterious ways these days. This collage cantains some of the elements that have been pulled out of dumpsters. To me, making art out of what has been discarded is a powerful message of redemption. After all isn’t that what God has done for us, retrieve us from the trash pile and put us beside him in front of his father’s throne? Brenda and I will be included in a show at Buckham Gallery in Flint MI which is a alternative space much like UICA here in Grand Rapids. We will be showing pieces like this which we are making together. It is difficult to work together like this but also very exciting to let go of some of the control and allow another person to take the steering wheel artistically. Please say a prayer for us that we will be able to have God speak through us in this work and touch people in a fresh way; perhaps even open up some hearts and eyes. Thank you.

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Bird Scout CollageJPG

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

This collage was begun last year while in Brooklyn. Maybe it looks like just a jumble of color, bits and pieces. I think it relfects my desire for making connections. I have really been struggling lately with the world I live in. It feels like our culture is comming apart at the seams all around me while every one just goes on with their busy days. As if the Titanic has hit the ice and their are only three people that know what will happen in the next three and a half hours and I am one of those three. I know this may sound wierd but that is what it’s been like in my head lately. I read a book called “The Long Emergency” by Howard Kunstler which has left me walking around bumping into walls. When I feel overwhelmed I can be comorted by making art. I hope the making of art is not escapisim but that it remains to be one of the ways I can come into the presence of God. His lap is the only safe place I know. I remeber reading that Picaso’s secret was that the only time he only found releif from his personal demons was while he was making art.

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Happy De-Lurking

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

Leave the world of Lurkdom if only for a moment and say hello here at studiobeerhorst. Really, a word from you may really make my day…..I need to hear from you……it’s sad, I look and look and your messages to me are so few….Be Happy….De-Lurk Now!

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woodpecker collage

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

Wood Peckers have been showing up in my collages and drawings lately. I’m not sure why. I know I love the sound they make. It is a mystery how they can tap at the wood that fast. Also it seems a miracle that their head and neck can take that kind of a beating with out any ill effects. The other day I was in the woods with most of my kids and a little neighbor girl, We were in the process of making a bridge across a stream with logs, branches, and wooden pallets when I picked up a log out of the mud that had several holes in it from a woodpecker.
The wood pecker holes made this old portion of a dead tree into something beautiful. Perhaps there is something holy about the things that animals have made like bird nests and empty walnut shells left with the teeth marks of a squirrel. I also like the tracks of raccons in the mud along a creek. I like the reminders of the lives of the animals that goes right on in a wild world parallel to our tame world of thermostats and refrigerators.

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