Spring fever is in the air! Every year colorful blossoms slowly emerge, bringing us happiness and joy.
This year I’m excited to be welcoming spring with a talk on flowers and art. This upbeat subject will inspire and uplift us all.
You are invited!
The Scarsdale Public Library graciously invited me to return to present Creativity in Bloom: Flowers and Art on Tuesday, March 25 at 4:30pm. The event will last an hour – 45 minute talk plus questions, followed by refreshments.
The flowers topic is a bit of a change from my previous food presentation at the library called A Bite-Size Talk of Food in Art, which was well received, and included an exhibit of my food paintings. Edward Patrick Grigg will be exhibiting travel related pieces at the library during the month of March.
Registration Requested
Click here to register to come In-Person or attend Online. It’s especially important to register in advance if you’re attending virtually to receive the zoom link an hour before the presentation begins. And it will begin on time. Registration closes 3:00pm on Tuesday, March 25.
Bring a bit of an appetite since Bonnie, my younger daughter, is serving light refreshments. A rough head count will help her plan quantities of “bites” and drinks.
And how could we not serve food? It’s a long standing tradition at any Shipko event.
Transportation
The Scarsdale Public Library is located at 54 Olmsted Road, in Scarsdale, NY right off Boston Post Road in Southern Westchester Country. For those who plan to drive, parking is plentiful in the library lot and on the nearby side streets. Because of the positive response to this talk, and other simultaneous library events, parking could be more challenging than usual. Please allow extra to park.
For non-drivers from NYC, the Scarsdale train station is on the Metro-North Railroad’s Harlem Line from Grand Central Station. The station is fairly close (1.6 miles or 5 minutes) and easily accessible by taxi, Lyft or Uber.
Questions?
Finally, for additional information, please go to the website at scarsdalelibrary.org or call (914) 722-1302. You can always contact me directly at beverlyshipko@mac.com or 914-954-7779.
Now the question for me is how is to organize and condense a massive amount of material on this epic topic. I hope you’ll let me know how I did afterwards…
As always, I am looking forward to seeing you on March 25, and ushering in the delightful world of flowers!
GDC and The Lofts has graciously offered up the 3rd Floor Lounge for the show. It’s a large beautiful space with shelves, where more paintings can be shown than in my apartment. GDC (Ginsberg Development Corporation) will be providing food and drinks both days.
Saturday from 2-4 Cheese, Charcuterie and Wine & other non-alcoholic beverages
Sunday from 12-2 Bagels and Cream Cheese, Danish, and Mimosas, and other drinks
Notecards will be available for sale, including Riviera’s signature slanted birthday cake.
Of course, Oreos will be provided for biting (GF Oreos too!). Maybe your bite will turn up in a future painting…
Flowers – video, small paintings and fresh
There will be a running video of my favorite Sogetsu Ikebana arrangements from my weekly online zoom class. Plus I plan on showing at least one Ikebana arrangement – a creative activity that began during the pandemic and is still going strong. It’s like painting with flowers!
Also, some small flower paintings like the Lotus and Orchid will be exhibited, and featured on notecards scattered among the sweets.
Fun – a community of like minded people and a taste of AI
Expect the unexpected. Are you using AI (artificial intelligence)? Hope you’ll share your favorite AI apps with me. And I’ll share what I’ve learned since last year.
I plan to experiment with AI and see what happens. AI has evolved a lot in the last year. This is something relatively new for me. Your guess is as good as mine about how this will come out. Come see for yourself!
Logistics
Tour Maps For the RiverArts Studio Tour Weekend
Over 70 artists in the Rivertowns (Hastings, Ardsley, Dobbs Ferry, Irvington, Tarrytown, and Sleepy Hollow) will be participating in this event. You can download a printable map here and plan your strategy. My location is #23 on the map in the Ardsley section, and the other talented, realistic artist in my apartment complex is #22 on the map, Linda Friedlander. Linda is a short walk away in the 3rd Floor Lounge of Building C (1 Mill River Lane). So this stop is a twofer (two artists for the price of one!).
I’ll be updating this post with new information as it become available. I’ll have a few printed maps on hand, and will be happy to help you plan your route.
GPS Directions and Entry
GPS apps can be quirky. If the address in bold above comes up as being in Hastings-on-Hudson, that’s correct. The Lofts complex is on the border between Ardsley and Hastings., about 30 minutes north of Manhattan by car. As if it wasn’t complicated enough, there’s a second address for the building that you could try – 5 Mill River Lane.
The Lofts is located on Saw Mill River Road (west side), one mile south of the Lawrence Street exit off the Saw Mill River Parkway. Go to the northern building in the three building complex (the Lofts has red trim). Park anywhere in front of the buildings, or in the hidden lot on the southern end of the complex by the maintenance shack.
Hopefully the building door will be open. If not, type Beverly into the directory to reach me so I can buzz you in. Take the elevator to the 3rd floor.
.If you’re coming by train from Manhattan, take the Hudson Line of MetroNorth to the Hastings-on-Hudson train station. Grab a cab or Lyft to The Lofts at 423 Saw Mill River Road. Call me if you have questions.
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Please note: For those of you who have been coming to the Studio Tour in April for many years, Sunday hours end earlier at 3pm.
Feel free to contact me with any questions through email at beverlyshipko@mac.com. You can also reach me on Facebook (Beverly Shipko, Artist) and Instagram (@beverlyshipko).
2024 Studio Tour | Preview Shows
In addition to the main Tour weekend, there will be two preview shows.
Sunday, October 20 from 3-5pm at Hastings Village Hall Gallery, 7 Maple Avenue (for artists from Hastings, Dobbs Ferry and Ardsley). I will have a painting in this show.
Sunday, October 27 from 3-5pm at Shames JCC, 371 S. Broadway (for artists from Irvington, Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow)
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This is always a joyful event. It feels like a big celebratory party! Hope you can make it. Bring your family and friends. Everyone is welcome. Feel free to forward this invitation.
Finally, I’m looking forward to seeing all of you art lovers and foodies, and exchanging ideas. See you soon!
For those of you who were unable to join us in May at the Scarsdale Library or on zoom, I invite you to watch the video below of my talk, A Bite-Size View Of Food in Art.
As you will see, the talk covers many highlights of the long standing, irresistible tradition of incorporating food in art, going back thousands of years to the present, including my own work. This bite-size view provides the context of how I see my own paintings, with a brief nod to Ikebana.
A Bite-Size View of Food in Art with Beverly Shipko
This video marks the inauguration of my very own YouTube channel. It was surprisingly easy to set up with Bonnie’s help. Thank you for leading me into the 21st century!
So come take a byte out of my YouTube Channel! You’ll have good time salivating over numerous food images and won’t put on any weight by watching. And as I promised a gentleman in the audience, it won’t raise your insulin levels.
I thoroughly enjoyed our Ikebana class this week! Ikebana is turning out to be an unexpectedly creative outlet for me, and has opened up new horizons that are here to stay.
The last time I posted Ikebana arrangements, they were beautiful centerpiece lessons from our Sogetsu school textbook, and made of typical flowers like red and pink roses and greenery, which you can see in Joy and More Joy.
This week our lesson was a freestyle arrangement with a Halloween/Fall theme, which means that I got to break out my box of light colored driftwood from my naturalist friend Steve who volunteer to work the trail behind my apartment. I tend to think more sculptural in freestyle too.
Leslie also gave us the option of creating Haunted Halloween Ikebana (clearly an American take on Japanese Ikebana), taking advantage of seasonal materials. I was so inspired that I ended up making 3 different arrangements, using various Ikebana techniques.
#1. Fall Theme. Orange is the salient feature of the first one.
This arrangement features gourds and flowers from Trader Joes, light gray driftwood, and a piece of dark, textured wood I found walking with my friend Ronna in Dobbs Ferry. (Sometimes it takes a village!) Of course, I can’t forget the water in the black container (or suiban in Japanese) which is an important part of this arrangement. I finished this pretty quickly since the design came easily.
#2. Haunted HalloweenTheme. While working on a second arrangement on a round white container (similar to the black above), I was startled to hear Leslie suggest that I take the container away.
I actually forgot that she could see what I was doing. It felt like Leslie was in the room, but she was on zoom. And it was a great suggestion and gave the design a more natural look. This was as far as I got in the allotted time. I wasn’t happy because the branches felt so bleak.
I asked the group for feedback during the last half of the lesson when everyone shares. I explained my original vision, and that I had looked for spider web netting to drape on the branches for that spooky quality, but never found it.
Then someone suggested using Spanish moss, and pulling it apart. It was like a light bulb went off! What a terrific idea that is, I’m thinking, especially because I can finally use those two small unopened bags of moss that have been sitting in my closet for a year!
Adding the moss made a major impact and this arrangement finally felt finished. It was conceived of almost as a tableau – almost like a stage set in its own little world. Somehow the addition of the moss reminded me of the Rose Bowl Parade floats with hanging moss that I watch every year on New Years Day, since the Big Ten always played in the Rose Bowl… hopefully with Michigan in it..
Getting spookier?
#3. Halloween. What would you call this one?
This last arrangement I made Sunday night before class. What I’ve found is that it’s a good idea to plan ahead for Monday’s class. I try to pick a direction on Saturday, and then go to Trader Joe’s at 8am on Sunday morning when the flowers are delivered… most of the time.
As I had already bought my orange flowers and was going through this planning process Sunday, I remembered that Steve had given me another piece of wood that had possibilities for this theme. I won’t say that the wood was ugly, just that it has character and I tried using it so many times before but could never make it work. Here’s a closeup of the top.
This time around, I thought it looked rather haunted, and maybe evoking scarecrows I used to see in old movies in the middle of corn fields (am I thinking Wizard of Oz?). So I put the wood in the vase (propping it up on rocks), and added dried grasses that reminded me of straw and scarecrows. Finally, I cut little white mums from large pots on my little patio that I bought at Westchester Greenhouses (a bargain at $8 each for such a large size).
This is what I ended up with. While I designed the arrangement so it could be viewed from all sides on my kitchen counter, this was my “front” when I began.
Here’s the side view.
Here’s what I considered the back, until Leslie got all excited the “back” so it became the “front” of the arrangement.
Leslie said it reminded her of the gargoyles on Notre Dame, which I included below for myself as much as for you.
Now that I’m comparing the two images (the middle gargoyle in the photo vs. the arrangement), I really do see why she said that. The wood has a head (even has an eye!), with the horn coming out, similar to the gargoyle. There’s the beige grass that almost feels like a shoulder, or wing, or whatever is coming out the back of the left gargoyle. The dried grasses come forward almost mimicking the corner curve of the Notre Dame architecture under the gargoyle (any one know what that’s called?).
Arrangements By The Other Students (aka fellow Ikebana addicts…). Carin and Susan had fun with this too. I was impressed with what they both came up with.
Let’s start with Carin’s, which has that decomposing feeling of Dutch vanitas and memento-mori still life paintings, reminding us of the transitory nature of life with its semi-bare branches, fading sunflowers and berries. All that’s missing is the skull… Carin even made her own container by carving out the inside of the pumpkin. She wins my Most Creative award of the week!
Ah, but the skull is here in Susan’s arrangement, which I thought was absolutely delightful! What a happy and macabre skeleton this is in its coffin-like container. She made the dark spider web herself using orthodontic rubberbands, and had wonderful white plant material that felt so ethereal like real spider webs do. (I admit I was envious at the time.) Susan wins my most Spooky Fun Award of the week.
The coincidence is that we both used the same orange flowers even though we live on opposite coasts of the US. When I looked up the flower on my seek app , my new favorite app that identifies species at the click of a photo, it turned out to be a pot marigold. Maybe Susan went to Trader Joe’s too in Oregon, or maybe she’s just lucky enough to have these growing in her backyard, which has been an amazing source of plant materials for this class.
Ikebana is having a major impact on my life – both in my everyday and artistic worlds. I take longer walks and look for different trails and habitats, studying the plants and trees as I go. After working with natural materials every week for a year, I went down to the garage to get my fake gourds with the stand I’ve been using forever for the fall. This time I had to put the fake ones back and fill the stand with real gourds from Trader Joes.
It’s funny but I’m already looking forward to next year’s Halloween Ikebana arrangement. That’s how I know this is really the start of a new tradition.
Something new and exciting crept onto my dinner plate tonight. And it’s an exuberant yellow and orange.
Here’s the backstory. Maybe you won’t be so surprised if you have read More Joy.
There’s been a silver lining for me during this pandemic.
Over a year ago, my sister-in-law, Leslie, reached out and asked if I would be interested in taking an Ikebana class from her over zoom, which she was trying to teach with for the first time (as was everyone when the pandemic began). Ikebana is the Japanese art of flower arrangement. I jumped at the chance to study Ikebana with her! And I asked my friend Carin if she wanted to join in the fun. There’s 5 of us on zoom every Monday morning, including Leslie.
For years, I’ve admired Leslie’s Ikebana arrangements from afar since we never lived on the same coast, let alone the same city. Leslie took her first Ikebana class after college, when she lived in Japan with her husband Leigh, who was stationed there for a few years.
I have been deeply touched by this class, which could perhaps be described as a mini-addiction – only rivaled by my obsession with painting food.
During class, Leslie has wondered out loud several times how Ikebana was going to affect my painting. So have I.
I have painted flowers before in my pre-food years. They tend to be focused, single images. One of my favorite flower paintings is hanging in my daughterBonnie‘s apartment. Purple is still her favorite color.
“Iris“, by Beverly Shipko, 1980s, Acrylic, 36 x 24 inches
During my small 30 Day Painting Challenges, I interspersed flowers among my subjects. I have always enjoyed flowers and admired Georgia O’Keefe’s bold images since I was a kid. You can read more about each of my flower paintings below – Sunflower, Peony, and Tiger Lily.
“Sunflower” by Beverly Shipko, Oil painting on panel, 6 x 6 inches“Peony” by Beverly Shipko, Oil painting on panel, 6 x 6 inches“Tiger Lily” by Beverly Shipko, Oil painting on panel, 6 x 6 inches
When I recently spotted a clamshell package of brightly colored edible flowers at a new local grocery store, Mom’s Organics Market, on an impulse I bought it.
Soon I discovered how much fun it is to liven up the plate with different colors and textures, and to cluster the flowers together as I do in my Ikebana arrangements. I laughed out loud when I realized I was playing with my food – something we discouraged the kids from doing when they were little. And I was having such a good time!
At the moment, I don’t know how Ikebana will affect my future paintings and body of work. However, I am excited to see the two worlds of Flowers and Food finally come together on this unconventional purple canvas that we call a plate.
A few days later, I went out and bought a bouquet of multicolored pink roses for my weekly zoom Ikebana class, which is the Japanese art of flower arrangement. Marie Kondo would have approved since the flowers sparked joy – in her words – and still do looking at these photos. The lesson was our first centerpiece, designed to be viewed from all angles including top down. So it did well on my low ottoman.
Of course, I couldn’t resist putting the final arrangement near the pink donut pillow and painting, where I could enjoy the combination every time I walked by. (Admittedly the day glow, hot pink pillow in the first photo somewhat overpowers the arrangement, but didn’t in real life.)
It wasn’t just the finished product that sparked joy (which I was initially not sure about), it was the process of assembling the entire centerpiece – and looking at it from every point of view. I was completely absorbed and challenged by the task at hand.
The hardest part was getting the first 3 branches in (actually 2 branches and a long stemmed rose) radiating outwards at 120 degree angles to each other. It was like drawing a math pie chart with 3 equal size pieces in flowers. Only it was more challenging since the center of the design is off to one side, as you can see below. I was struggling until I got out a step stool and looked straight down onto my kitchen counter, where I make my arrangements.
The low cluster of roses in the center went in last. It was an iterative process. Put a flower in, turn the container, take a flower out. Maybe put greenery in, and turn again. Raise a flower, shorten a flower. Turn. Made me think of that song Turn! Turn! Turn! (To Everything There Is ASeason) by The Byrds.
During our zoom class, I showed my finished arrangement for the end of class critique (just like art classes!) by turning the container the full 360 degrees with both hands. For this blog, I haven’t quite mastered the art of turning with one hand and taking a stable video with the other.
So here are a few of the still photos I took after class of Sogetsu Ikebana Variation No. 6 Horitzontal Style Moribana (meaning low container). Notice how water, with its reflections of light and color, is a key element in this arrangement.
Sometimes I’m not quite sure what my daughters truly think of my pink Ikebana arrangements. It’s fascinating that they both seem to avoid wearing pink (if at all), perhaps because it has Barbie-like connotations from old fashioned generations. I still enjoy putting on deep pink to brighten myself up, with its positive connotations of cotton candy, romance and sweet memories. In high school, Mom told me I looked great in pink, which I should wear if I wanted to “snaggle” a guy…
Ah, the joy of pink endures – aside from donuts. Now it’s manifesting itself creatively in a whole new and unanticipated way through the spirit of Ikebana.