See Change

For those of you who live in the Greater Boston area, here’s something wonderful to see!  See Change is Studio Without Walls’ new exhibit of site-responsive sculpture along the Riverway Park in Brookline. The exhibit was to have opened in April but was postponed indefinitely because of Covid. Now, through the downright doggedness of its founder, Bette Ann Libby, and the willingness of the Brookline Parks and Open Spaces Department, it’s open to the public, free—and a pure delight! When Holly Cyganiewicz and I were installing our sculpture, A Tree Grows in Brookline, two fathers, both with children under three years old, stopped to chat. They walk this lovely oasis every day while on childcare duty. We’ll be back, they each said.

A Tree Grows in Brookline, Linda Hoffman and Holly Cyganiewicz; tree trunk with burl, painted curly willow branches

I was delighted to see Bob Shannahan’s life-size Mastodon and its Mother, made with alder and sumac branches, a sculpture exhibited at Old Frog Pond Farm last fall. And to find,Julie Lupien Nussbaum’s Alien Fishery, where she’s augmented the lone fish accompanying her sculpture Vodnik with Cruel Shoes also exhibited at the farm, and created a school of fish hanging from a high oak branch. If there’s a slight breeze, when you pause to watch, they turn as one body. Some sculptures in this family-friendly exhibit respond to the devastation of our planet, others to the need for justice and equality, and some captivate and offer hope for the future with their colors and shapes.

Studios Without Walls is a Brookline-based collaborative group of sculptors and conceptual artists who produce exhibitions of art in outdoor and public settings. Their commitment is to bring art to their community and educate audiences to appreciate and participate with outdoor sculpture. Photographs of this year’s installations, site maps, as well as treasure hunt clues are online at Studios Without Walls. Globe Correspondent Karen Campbell wrote in her glowing review, “With sculptures tailored to nestle in and around the trees, a leisurely amble offers a surprising visual treat of clever, substantive, thought-provoking art.”

Bllnkah II Liz Helfer; broken windshield glass

Brookline’s Parks and Open Space director said, “Brookline’s Studios Without Walls affirms the power of art to change your perspective.” The thirteen participating artists are Gail Jerauld Bos, Grey Held, Liz Helfer, Linda Hoffman and Holly Cyganiewicz, Janet Kawada, Bette Ann Libby, Julie Lupien Nussbaum, Madeleine Lord, Maria Ritz, Bob Shannahan, Marnie Sinclair, Allen M. Spivack, and Delanie Wise.

The exhibit is open through September 7, 2020. Wear your masks, stay six feet apart, and take a stroll along the Muddy River. The Longmont T stop will take you there and free parking is available on nearby streets.

Thank you Brookline Parks and Open Spaces, sponsors and supporters of Studios Without Walls, and especially the artists. We all want to “See Change”!!

Lalla Unveiled

Last week, on my doorstep, I found, Lalla Unveiled: The Naked Voice of the Feminine, a book of poems by the 13th century Kashmirian poet, Lalla, with new translations by Jennifer Sundeen. Lalla was a wandering ascetic, mystic, seer, and prophet who danced through the streets reciting her poetic quatrains.

 To know the Self is a boat towed upon the ocean.

When will God ferry me across?

The rope is frayed, the clay pot uncooked, the water ebbs.

My soul is yearning to go home.

I share the arrival of this new book with you not only because I love listening to the words of this ancient Kashmirian sister, but I painted watercolors for this edition.

Married at twelve into a family, abused by her mother-in-law and husband, Lalla endured their harsh treatment for years. A spiritual seeker, Lalla knew there had to be a way out of her suffering. In her early twenties, she ran away from her husband’s household and met the yogi Sed Bayu who became her teacher. Once she completed her studies, Lalla set out on her own, a lone woman—husbandless, penniless, and homeless, but with the knowledge that the divinity resides within each of us.

 Slay your inner demons: lust, anger, desire,

Or their arrows will destroy your soul instead.

In meditation, with careful thought, feed them stillness and silence.

Then see they truly have such little hold.

Lalla tore off the binding cloth of the society to which she was born. Thread by thread she remade herself from within. A rebel and a seeker, she gave up the comforts of hearth and home to wander, always loving and always teaching. She didn’t follow a prescribed path or religion but discovered her own truths from within her own body.

 Then the washermen beat and dashed me on the stone

And rubbed me with clay and soap to whiten me

Then the tailor cut me piece by piece

Now, as finished cloth, I have found my way at last to Freedom.

Jennifer Sundeen, a yogi and healer, and mother of three daughters, is the founder of Durga Studio, Durga’s Red Tent, and Goddess Pilgrimages. She brings this background to her translations of Lalla’s quatrains, recognizing in some of them specific instructions for repeating mantras and practices of controlling the breath. 

 Thoughts are a wandering horse speeding across the sky.

In the twinkling of an eye they travel a hundred thousand miles.

The bridle of Self-Realization is knowing how to rein in these thoughts.

Controlling the breath will steady the chariot’s wheel.

Coleman Barks, the eminent translator of Rumi, Hafiz, as well as a book of Lalla’s poetry wrote, “Jen Sundeen is dancing and singing along with Lalla, in the same wisdom, the same joy!”

In these days when we are torn apart by acts of aggression and hatred, it is comforting to read the words of a woman who lived through patriarchal persecution, personal betrayal, and social tumult to find freedom and peace, on her terms, in her own way.

She who knows herself as all others,

She who knows no difference between night and day,

She who knows herself as not separate,

She is the one who truly sees God.

In July, I will be offering a watercolor painting session, Lalla’s Lake. It is said that one day Lalla was late returning home with the family’s water jug because she stopped to meditate at the local shrine. Her husband, suspecting her of infidelity, struck the jug balanced on her head. The jug shattered to bits, but the water remained in the shape of the jug. Lalla went inside, filled the empty containers, and poured the remaining water outside. This water became a lake, and was known as Lalla’s Lake all over Kashmir. We’ll dip our brushes into the pond at Old Frog Pond Farm and let Lalla’s poetry inspire our painting.

There will be a Zoom launch on Saturday, June 20 at 5pm ET. Information to join this event can be found here and you can also order a copy of the book.

Pond Alchemy

The water at Old frog Pond Farm travels south from the Elizabeth Brook, through a culvert under Eldridge Road, fills the pond, and empties over a waterfall into wetlands that feed the Concord and Assabet Rivers. 

Water Meets Water, Watercolor, 2018, Linda Hoffman

Pond Alchemy

sheets of angled rain

pierce the pond

water meets water

lily pads

host their guests

a frog and beads of water

attentive to water

a blue heron

waits —

the wise say,

‘the way of water

is to flow’

a black cormorant

grasps a snag

winging water droplets

tree swallows

pluck insects

splash of water

the wise teach,

‘water never

harms water’

weaving threads

of iridescent water

dragonflies hover.

Early Morning Pond View, June 2, 2020, Linda Hoffman

The Birth of Fruit

May we spread the seeds of true justice across our nation.
May we water them with our grief, and tend them with great love.

Spring’s robe swishes as she walks through the rows of apple trees, the small fruit now covered with white clay to protect it from the egg-laying stings of the plum curculio beetle.

On the high-bush blueberries, the white bell-like corollas dry, then fall, exposing small green fruit.

The mulberries pop out from smooth branches like furry caterpillars,

 and the husks of the peaches fall to the ground revealing first fuzz. 

Fruits are ovaries, designed to protect the all important seeds. Peppers, tomatoes, as well as squash are technically fruits, but we think of them as vegetables. Asparagus aren’t fruits, but because they are a perennial crop, we give them two long rows in the berry patch. The stalks shoot up overnight.

Rhubarb is technically a vegetable, but it’s most often cooked in pies or with sugar to sweeten its tart taste, and therefore, is often thought to be a fruit. Our favorite recipe for rhubarb is stewed with strawberries and a bit of honey or maple syrup.

Not far away, the blackberry buds entice as if there weren’t hiding sharp thorns.

Blackberries ripen well before the red raspberries whose canes are mowed to the ground in early spring. Fall raspberries grow four to five feet high, bud, flower, and bear fruit all in one season.

Seedless table grapes are a new crop for the farm, the vines are only beginning their long climb to maturity.

Finally, spring embraces summer, and the strawberry ripening begins.

Photos: Linda Hoffman and Ariel Matisse