Patti Gibbons Art

Back road blues. (I take a long breath here...and sip on my raspberry martini---much deserved after such an arduous day) Start of day: it is a bit above freezing, and I am driving along the creek. The fog is rolling off the snow. The late February sun is attempting to shove it's rays through the dense fog, and the snow seems to be going backwards into the sky from where it fell. Surreal. Shit. No camera. Never, never, leave home without it. Fast forward 10 hours later. I am driving along the Hudson and the sun is setting. The mountains in the background are pink and the snow on the river glows save for the one dark channel up the middle used by the barges. I am driving up steep driveways on ice and snow and enjoying the skittery playfulness I have with my 4-wheel drive. As I laugh, I have a flash back-1977, doing donuts in some mall's parking lot, bouncing off snow banks and laughing hysterically with friends. 20+ miles later I am heading home from dropping Alanna off to Megan...

Heaven help me for the way I am Save me from these evil deeds before I get them done I know tomorrow brings the consequence at hand But I keep living this day like the next will never come.. Words from Fiona Apple. One of my favorite Victorian cards says "by the grace of God, I am what I am". (I like saying this with a southern accent..) It hangs on my wall over where I work in the studio. I know it does not excuse bad behavior, but it validates my individuality and the freedom and spirit with which I live my life. I really TRY not to do things that will get me in trouble, nor would I intentionally hurt anyone. That is not to say that in my younger, less mature days, that I did some things that I am not proud of. Some hearts got broken and I was like a dust devil, leaving a mess in my wake, but in general I am a kind and loving person who has a wild side to me that I never want to completely let go. I also know that if I ever ran into any of these people, I would humbly...

"In the room the women come and go Talking of Michelangelo. And indeed there will be time To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?” Time to turn back and descend the stair" That is a small portion of verse from T.S. Elliot's infamous Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, a sad poem of despair, a solitary lonely man's failure to be able to reach out for and embrace love. The title of this mixed media work is indeed LOVE SONG, and the text is included at the bottom of the piece, but since you cannot read it, I cropped it for here. It is a bizarre piece, features antique prints, an antique image of a sculpture by Michelangelo, an audience in the wings...static, distant from the figures in the foreground. The figures are dogs dressed as women. I don't even know why I chose that piece for tonight. Perhaps it is because I have been sick for days, and after last night's speech (which was most difficult for me to give) and being stuck inside the house all we...

I just got back from another one of my more intense afternoons in history. I spoke at a benefit for the IVAW (Iraq Veterans Against the War) where the movie The Ground Truth was shown. A month ago our art community hosted a similar benefit, showing the movie and both the IVAW and Megan split the proceeds. Tonight's fund raiser was a bit different. The event was mainly for the IVAW,with a donation jar for Megan,(and oh how generous people were!) and I had been invited to speak. As I mentioned in last night's blog, I have never been quiet about my political views, but out of respect for Megan (as she was there with me at the other events, which were for her) I never publically spoken. Tonight was different. She was not there. The focus of this afternoon's speech was not political; however, it is did not take a genius to sense my stance. Sometimes silence in itself makes a statement (as lectured to me by Larry on the way there). I spoke from my heart, from a mother wh...

I am definately sick, and my ass is being kicked by my body. Slow down. Sleep. Don't move much. Heal. I have no choice but to listen. I have paid the price of ignoring such signs. My treat of the day was taking myself to get a bagel and a coffee in the late morning and sit in quietude for a bit, going to the bank, and then sat pretty much in one room all day working on my computer, (it needs some major tune-up work before my computer guy comes over...its like cleaning the house before the house cleaner comes....)I worked on taxes. I started writing my speech for tomorrow's benefit for the IVAW...Iraq Veterans Against the War, who help out returning vets. I have not publically spoken yet, though my views about the war and the govenment are no secret to those who know me. My political activist and PR friend Jay gave my name to the head of the Women in Black chapter in New Paltz. She called and invited me to talk about being the mother of a veteran. One of my dearest fr...

I am in a real funk tonight. I have been keeping it very together under great duress for weeks now, and the other day I started crumbling; a few minor bits and pieces altering the smooth fascade. It started when my family doctor of many years saw me in her office for a routing BP check, and asked about Megan, whom she had treated for 20+ years. I told her in medical terms, keeping it cool and factual, but when she asked how Will was, a switch was flipped and tears rolled down my face. In all the illnesses and heartache I have had in my life I had never cried in front of my doctor. But I am not the old me anymore, and I felt and acknowleged the sadness and grief I have been holding in for weeks. Lynne has alwasy been a wonderful doctor, and she holds a dear place in my heart. She shoots straight, has empathy, and is a wonderful gift to her patients. I have so much respect and I honor her.........and I need to tell her that. I went home and cried. I needed to do that. But a friend...

My day started off with someone sending me an email full of philosophical musings. The one that struck me most was "the most powerful sex organ of the body is the brain". It made me smirk because my friend and I were having a discussion along those lines over Sushi and Saki last night. We joked that as we have aged, sex existed mostly in our head---and our head was FULL of it. At times I feel like a teenager. Am I regressing, is it hormones, or mid life crisis I mused? Does it have to be called a CRISIS, isn't it one immense power surge before our bodies FORCE us to slow down? After watching the movie Venus , with Peter O'Toole, I realized for some, desire and sexuality never die and can be awakened at any stage in life. But think about it...the brain. That complex mass of nerve pathways and tunnels and transmissions that fire from the constant imput of the senses. Then throw in chemistry and all the messages plowing through our body that are hard wired into o...

I am not sure who this finger should be directed to...AOL or Roadrunner. I have roadrunner and AOL...and I just wrote this intelligent, honest blog....and just as I was about to end it, I heard GOODBYE and POOF, there were my words heaved into cybespace never to be found again. I am pissed. I have such little time, and I make such an effort to write meaningfully and honestly and BOOM. And, after having this happen several times now, you think I would save my work every few minutes just in case shit like this happens. But it forced me to examine Jay's great words of wisdom tonight about writing. He told me to write freely, to write honestly, to write as if no one is reading. There I will find my voice and there will I be honest and truthful. So the universe took all of my carefully written thoughts and threw them into the cyber pit and said, well THERE YOU GO PATTI, put THIS in your pipe and smoke it! Didn't you hear what he was saying? So goodbye to my 45 minute narrativ...

Museday....those mornings when I go back to work after a holiday and no matter what day of the week it is, it is still monday....and while sitting on the toilet or taking a shower, I muse as to why the hell I have to work in the first place, how there are so many millionaires in the world and I don't understand why can't one of them be me.....and why can't I just make art and write all the time AND be a millionaire. But for now I like the steady salary I am making after 15 years of teaching, and I muse myself right into my car and head to work. Every tuesday is a museday as Megan goes for more chemo and radiation, or has more tests, and I think about her fate, her daughter's, my own fate, and how impermanent and fleeting everything is. I find myself frantic, trying to make every moment count in case tomorrow it has slipped away, morphed into a nebulous memory that drifts though the mind like a fog. I attempt to hold onto every experience, but it moves too fast a...

Alanna reminds me of my childhood, what it is be to a child full of discovery and innocence, and how to remember and keep it in my life. This morning the sun was streaming in beams through the side window, and you could see the dust floating around in the light. Alanna saw this and darted about the sun beams to catch the dust. She would then run to me and hand me her "butterflies". I watched her dance and she looked like a little angel, her back lit blond hair a halo of light. When tired of the game, she pulled out her blocks to build robots and gates (she loves gates......) and drew pictures and cats and other creatures on her easel. When I gave her water and a paintbrush she proceeded to paint over her drawings, as well as her toys, the toybox.......till the water ran out. Everything was new, everything a discovery. Then I remembered running kites up and down the block, knowing that if I wished hard enough, my home made kite would get as high as the store bought one...

I can't imagine living anywhere but here. I might go away for a month or two when I can no longer take the long winter, or my joints ache too much with the cold, but I know my roots are deep within the shale and dirt of the Catskills. Though I am not a native (I moved from Long Island in '69 when I was 12) I consider myself pretty darn close as I had been coming up to the mountains since I was a baby. My grandfather had bought a little cabin which used to be a gas station after the depression, and an acre of land which bordered the Esopus Creek. After my grandfather died when I was very young, my grandmother had a stroke. Though she could have learned to walk, her heart was broken, and she lost her will to walk and "live". My aunts would bring her up with my grandmother's two sisters, and they who would spend the summer in the little cabin, away from the heat and chaos of Queens. Being the oldest of all the grandchildren, I would get to stay in the cabin wit...

OH WHAT A DAY. A glorious, fun, sensual, loving, adventurous, hedinous day. Carol and I started the day with lunch at G's. We had such interesting conversation that the two women next to us stopped theirs and evesdropped the entire time. We talked about passion, about being middle aged but not middle of the road (!!!), what we want out of life and men, and the piece-de-resistance of the conversation was about food and sex. I of course, was totally involved in the conversation and had no idea anyone else had the slightest interest in what we were saying. Fueled by our conversations, we met Fran and then headed north. We were set on terrorizing at least three counties. We hit Olana first, the house of Hudson River Painter Frederick Church. It was a beautiful, crisp, cold day in the Catskill Mountains. We hiked up to the house from the lot, the trails of deer, snowshoes, and sledders dotting the landscape. The sky was a brilliant blue, the colors of Church's Italian/Mooris...

It is late, and my post will be short and sweet. I know, unusual for me. But I could not go to bed without some sort of closure on the day before I get ready to dream. I had a wonderful day, and what parts of it that were not good are readily tucked away somewhere safe. The day was light as many kids stayed home. After school I went out to celebrate Megan's 23rd birthday- we went out to dinner. There we ran into two very good friends of mine---who know me from my OTHER life time LOL, (one of which whose boat I commandeered to chase a date of mine around on the Hudson...) so we all ate together at one of our favorite spots. After dinner, the kids (are they still kids at 23? will I call them kids at 43?) wanted to see Ghost Rider. Not my favorite genre of movie, but I did enjoy the special effects and it was a joy to be there with her and her friends. Who the hell cared WHAT was playing. The strangest part of the evening was an accident we witnessed in the parking lot where so...

I was BLESSED with the gift of another snow day, and to boot, I had no one at home with me!!!! I stayed in bed till 9:15 reading The Kite Runner and sipping my coffee that Larry so graciously brought up to me so that I did not have to go downstairs. I spent an hour and a half reading, which is a pleasure I have long forgotten. The day flew, doing sundry chores such as picking up dry cleaning, doing laundry, some abominable house cleaning, but then treated myself to a massage, a healing with my chiropractor, and lunch with a great friend. I cancelled my German class as I knew I had to be home alone tonight, doing whatever I wanted without anyone watching or caring. I am sipping some wine while still doing chores, but that and checking my emails and doing a little dance or two help break of the monotony of every day life. And sometimes I LIKE the monotony of every day life, especially since my life is so.....active. Though it was very cold out, I did not seem to mind the wind or th...

The universe was kind to us today and gave us a gift of a snow day. I have been going at such a breakneck speed, that this forced me to slow down and take time to do some of the things that I have been ignoring for a while. Having Alanna for the past two days has REALLY s l o w e d me down too. Megan called at 8 am and asked if she could spend the day here. I was delighted, and Dole dropped her off on the way to work. I got to spend the day feeding and nurturing her, and the organic pancakes and chicken soup I made actually stayed in her stomach all day. We made a fire, drank hot cocoa, Dole came by after work and got Megan and Alanna out in the snow for a while. She glowed with happiness and love and said "I have spent the day with the people I most love in the world". Her boyfriend Dole is a loving, kind, gentle man, who has been taking care of Megan and Alanna for several months now. He is supposed to go to Iraq sometime this year and I hope that some miracle ...

Today was a long day fraught with stress and sadness for me. Megan went for her treatments, the colonoscopy, and was confirmed to have another tumor, the results being forwarded immediately to Sloan Kettering. While experiencing this via phone calls, I had to face 7 classes of teens, abuzz with the talk of the storm, and Valentine's Day. The seniors raise money by making cards and selling flowers, and today was delivery day as the impending snowday was threatening to botch things up. We worked for a good month designing, producing, and then finally delivering them to students and faculty. This year I sent a card and a flower to quite a few to both my peers and my students in appreciation of their kindness and beauty of spirit, and a select few got a fabulous CD I had made. For perhaps the first time I felt the real spirit of love and showing one's appreciation for such a precious gift. The upbeat energy of students who got flowers was wonderful. They liked the cards and the...

I have been hard to get in touch with these days...been running wild, probably because something told me to run and play while 1) my hormones are fairly stable and 2) I had some freedom from responsibility. I think this weeks debauchary (well, not true debauchery in the sense of the word, but it is such a good word) is a symptom of my life; totally out of control. I had fun, so I guess that is all that counts these days. H O W E V E R I feel it all coming to a screeching halt as once again our worlds are spinning out of control and being altered as I type. Megan is really sick. She passed out last night from pain and fell flat on her face, put her teeth through her lip, etc. She called the doc who does not want her alone. The chemo is toxifying her brain they said, and she is in bad pain from the radiation. She has morphine when it gets too bad. The docs have found another spot near her rectum. They are trying to move the colonoscopy to tomorrow because of wednesday's weather, a...

I’ve been trying this new technique with the phone solicitations that I constantly get these days. I am on the no call list, but certain organizations seem to be above that , ie: the Police Benevolent Asso., the Sherrif’s Dept., Drug Dog Fund, the Fire Dept etc. Oh, and various political and medical organizations. Over the years I have donated to many of these folks, but I think somewhere along the line my name was sold to various organizations as a person who is a donor, and I am besieged with calls. And, have you ever noticed, that if you make a donation based upon a phone call or a mailing, that within a few months they are asking for money AGAIN? However, I have a new technique which seems to have quieted things down a bit. When the phone rings and I hear “how are you doing today?“ I tell them that I am really shitty and give them the worse scenario of the week. After all, they asked, didn’t they?! If that isn’t enough and they STILL ask for a donation, I tell the...

Wow. What an intense day I just had. It was intense in all senses, and I must find a point of balance and peace before I go to sleep. I met up with my cousin and his wife and daughter for lunch. I had not met his daughter since she was a very young girl. She is in a crossroads of college decisions, and they wanted both Larry and I to talk to her about various options in the arts as we are both artists. My re-introduction to this young relative was one of a beautiful, elegant, passionate young woman who was a breath of fresh air in my life. I have no doubt that she will do well in whatever she chooses. She has the support and love of family. I have only recently re-connected with my cousin, and it has been a heart-warming experience. Later on I had a party that was thrown in honor of one of my co-workers who is fiendishly battling a very nasty cancer that won't let go. A group of us gathered who have worked together or kept in touch over the past 15 years. It was a poignan...

It's Friday night. It is bloody cold outside and I refuse to go out again, no matter HOW tempting it is. I’ve hardly been home this week as I filled it with meeting friends, dining, attending various functions and in general, letting go. I feel like I am in the eye of the storm; I take full advantage of this quiet time to spill into the world . Sometimes I wonder if I fill my time so that I don’t think too hard about things. I’ve been starting my mornings kindly by embellishing my routine. Early morning has become a time to honor and prepare myself for the day. When the alarm goes off I spend time lolling in bed thinking of what I want out of the day, what I have to do, and let the dreams of the previous night slowly slip away. I get my cup of coffee, and today I lit a candle while taking a shower in a dark bathroom. It was scented with lime, vetiver and other exotic scents. Because it was soy, you can scoop out the molten soy from the candle and use it as a crème on your body. Ima...

At times poetry and lyrics/music influence my writing and art. I hear verse that intriques me and I think on it, absorb it, chew it. 100x at least. In fact, when I find a musician whom I really enjoy, I will listen to the CD till I am intimate with all its nuances. Over and over. I have been absorbing some of Beth Orton's music like that. Similar to smell, music can take me back to a time period, a relationship, a memory-all in a split second. I have been thinking about these words from Central Reservation: "...everything and nothing is As sacred as we want it to be". I thought hard about the duality of the verse. I spend much time thinking about mortality and the paths we travel in life, and our relationship to the universe and the possible beyond. At times I feel pretty small -a speck of dust on the wind, a zooming electron in endless space. As humans we want to make a mark on the world, but very few of us have history book lives; the work we do matters in the h...

It is 11:30 PM and I am JUST getting to my blog. The challenge; to make a piece of art AND write something of worth in 15 minutes. I am still focused on color and atmosphere. Today I drove along the Hudson at sunrise; the clear crisp blue of the sky was reflected in the river, creating tones of rose and turquoise on the ice. Puddles of cobalt were splashed upon the surface; I could not determine if they were breaks in the ice or clouds reflecting on the water, as the road is narrow,winding, and icy, and I so carefully balance my study and driving skills. Once again I was frustrated that I did not have a camera. But I decided to give that up and enjoy the beauty of the morning and the flight of the turkeys in front of the car. I crossed the river later today, to visit my friend in Rhinebeck, and go out in Tivoli, and wonderful little artsy town near Bard College. The sun was so intense reflecting off the ice on the river, and was blinding me in its reflection off my rear view mir...

Though this is unfinished, this is the start of a small painting inspired by my trips along the Hudson. Tonight's entry on Megan's blog talks about the trips I make to see her when she is sick from chemo, and now, radiation. This painting was influenced by one of my photos one of my recent trips. I have been photographing the river when I can borrow a decent digital camera. I am seriously entertaining buying a Nikon digital 5 mp, which is far better than my six year old Olympus, at 1.3 megapixels, with no zoom. (it is only 99.00) I need a decent digital camera as I like to document my life through the landscape and whatever else might be an inspiration. I received a wonderful post from last night's blog. It made me cry. Amber was right, I have indeed been loving broken people for a long time, and I still do. That is my modus operandi; to give myself less credit than I deserve. It must be the intense Catholic Jesuit influence my father left to me as his legacy; to...

Tonight's photo is for my friend Bertha who lives out in western New York, where it is undoubtedly COLD. I don't know if you are still reading this, but this photo's for you! Several months back I posted a beautiful geisha print from the 1800's and talked about how I have a little geisha and doll collection in my dining room. A geisha paint-by-number from a garage sale, some vintage geisha dolls, some of which are damaged but still need a home, an assemblage, antique prints...and a collection of little dolls from around the world bought by my Great Uncle and my Irish relatvies. Many of my old things are damaged; my Scottish doll has lost her hair, the Irish one is missing her hat, one of the vintage Japanese dolls is missing a limb, but I cherish them in their all their imperfections as they are still beautiful to me. I look at them wistfully and wish I had learned how to love people like I learned to love things many years ago, with my children, my family, the men wh...

Larry worked today, so I found myself a free woman again. Karen called me to go to the gym, and I decided that it was a good Sunday morning activity. I had not been in a while and need to get myself back into the good physical condition I was in before a fell..over a year and a half ago. No skiing, no running, no high impact sports. So off to the gym and onto the elliptical and tread mill where I managed to pump out a few miles and wake up some of the muscles that have been dormant for a while. I need the endorphin rush too from a good workout these days and hope that it keeps me a bit more balanced. After a stretch and some great conversation, we took a sauna and then out into the COLD....Fortunately the sauna gets your body so warm that it lasted long enough for me to get some gas, the paper, and a few other things..then back home to the studio. I started another small painting and got the under painting sort of figured out, and will work a bit here and see where it takes me. Not rea...

I awoke this morning to the season's first real snowfall. Though only and inch and a half or so, it was heavy and lovely and I HAD to take a pic of it from my studio. This photo was taken about 10:30 am....with the sun shining strong and the sky the most beautiful cerulean blue. (I have to remember that I need another tube of it) I ran around town a bit, my usual saturday bank, Post Office, bagel, and art supply run and settled into the studio to make some cards. I have a few orders and a home show next weekend, and being that I just had the gas tank for my studio refilled, I figured I had better get into production. I REALLY REALLY wanted to paint as the light was wonderful, but I had to work on what I knew I could sell. For a long time Ebay helped keep my business bills paid, but it has become more and more difficult to do business there; tons of competition and the prices that I am getting are making me wonder if it is worth my time in listing things, except to clean out m...

I am a bit frustrated right now. I wrote this intense expose blog eariler, and when I went to go back and publish it, it was gone. POOF...a work of art floating somewhere in cyberspace never to be found - by me at least. Perhaps it is just another example of our being "dust in the wind". So, the blog will take on an entirely new rambling as I am not going to try and recreate the earier one. The day was interesting to say the least. My students were vibrant, talkative, interested in stories and interaction with me. Sometimes I have to forgo art history for the student's own history, intertwined with mine. Together we forge a camraderie, understanding, empathy that crosses age barriers. The kids refuse to believe I am almost 50- they see me so much younger. Perhaps it is because I let them know I am human, have made mistakes, have not forgotten what it feels like to fall in love, to be loved, to experience something new. I do not pretend I know it all, have all ...

Recently one of my students started calling me "Pattycakes". He said it was better than all the other names that kids call me, and I looked and said "WHAT NAMES do the other kids call me?" He laughed and said they weren't bad, only they didn't fit me..and Pattycakes was just right. What he didn't know, and I later told him, that Pattycakes was my old business name from my other lifetime. I was an airbrush artist/designer and worked for a few companies before I started my own business designing children's clothes. I did really well, and had a rep - the whole 9 yards. I stopped when I had children, as I did not have the proper set up for spraying and could not compromise my children's health (nevermind my own). But the name stuck for years. I could not go out without someone yelling HEY, CAKES is here, or some other derivative of the name. It took years for it to fade, and now the memory has been revitalized by one of my feisty students (whom I ad...