watercolor 64 10x13”
1:26 PM: today i started out with a smaller watercolor: 10 x 13”. there are a few others this size in the series, and i was just in the mood for something smaller today, although i do have a larger, 13 x 20” one ready to go.
in this one i explore the rock patterns more deliberately, and have found a combination of blues and greens, together with that delicios orange, that i like a lot. i have another few hours to work before we take our afternoon trail hike, so let’s see if i start work on the larger surface…
5:54 PM: so i ended up staying with watercolor 64. i was too aware of our imminent zoom call with 9 ex birchwoods campers. read about birchwoods on my story page: https://www.philiptarlow.com/chatty-bio
we had a truly great call. it was more in present time than you might imagine for a group of guys & girls recalling people & events from 70 plus years ago. and that’s because our 2 month annual experience at birchwoods, in huntington, massachusetts in the berkshire hills, is a timeless experience, transcending the minutae of ordinary experiences. am i glorifying, exaggerating? ask my buddies. i think not. what we all experienced is as fresh and vibrant as if it happened yesterday. birchwoods founder/director otto rosaahn was part of the ethical culture movement, and that was a big part of it. here’s a brief look at what that was/is
:”….“Now the daring thought that we had, in the beginning of the Ethical Movement, was to unite in one group, in one bond, those who had this religious feeling and those who simply cared for the moral betterment…. In the broader sense religion means zealousness and devotion to something supreme, in the special sense it means cosmic outreaching.”
i like to imagine otto and sonya rosaahn alive and witnessing all this. i like to imagine them present on our zoom, filling in the blanks when we were foggy on the name of a particular event, a particular councelor. their spirit permaeated every aspect of our birchwoods experience, starting with otto’s talk to the freshly off -he-train/bus campers in the wooden town hall building, july 1st. i have deep gratitude for those who organized the call. it was way overdue, but perfectly timed!
the staff at birchwoods, with otto and sonya in the center, on the bottom row.