Mad for Zag

Update: still mad for all things zig-zaggy.

Clockwise from upper left:
1. Pink Charlie cosmetic bags by Julie Brown Designs
2. Happy Habitat Eco Throw in Paprika
3. Inherited Jewelry Box (designer unknown, but it was "Made in Italy for Lord and Taylor" and my grandfather gave it to my grandmother sometime in the 80s)
4. Yellow Zigzag Towel by Garnet Hill

Not pictured: new zigzaggy shower curtain.  All of these are hanging out in different places, so there's not a great deal of competition, visually.  Also that striped duvet is on its way out, which will simplify the bed.  I take my chevrons seriously enough to cater to their visual needs, apparently.

Richmond

I've been in Richmond since Thursday, occupying my aunt's lovely house while she's abroad.  You can't tell from the front, but this house is overflowing with art.  My aunt is my main art collecting idol, and being in her home is like being in candyland.  I love it.  I'm not alone, of course.

These dudes have been keeping me company.  I wish I had a better photo of Spencer (lower right), but he's distrustful of cameras.  I thought I'd be safe, as my little green box of an iphone in no way resembles a proper camera, but Spencer's no fool.  He knows the score.  Ergo, dark, under-a-tree photo.  Ah, well.  The rest of them are hams.  Here are a few other things I've been up to this week.

If you're ever in town, the photobooth is located in the New York Deli on Cary Street.  It's a proper black and white photochemical booth that the deli folks keep up themselves, and it's wonderful.  The food is great, too, so it's no hardship to spend an afternoon there.  The mask is a Yup'ik Smiling Face at the VMFA.  Their Pre-Columbian and Native American collections are small, but I'm a fan (clearly).

I've got a few more places on my list of things to check out, so expect more dispatches!  In the meantime, you can keep up with my Instagramming here, even if you don't have an iphone.  Not all of these are from Instagram (I'm a fan of TiltShift as a photo editor, too), but I'm sure I'll be posting photos one place or another.

James Chororos

I am really, really loving James Chororos' photographs, particularly his images of Hawaii.  I've never been to Hawaii, and admittedly have little conception of what being there is like (aside from sandy beaches), so I am loving seeing the islands through his eyes.

 

James Chororos can be found online here, or on Tumblr.

Peony Appreciation Post

 I came into possession of an iphone yesterday, and have of course been making up for lost time by Instagramming everything I see.  Actually that's not entirely true--I have a whole range of photography apps in addition to Instagram.  Because we are at the very beginning of peony season, most of the photos so far are of the blooms in my yard.  Here are a few.  Forgive the hipsterization of the snapshots--I'll get more adept at editing via iphone, just give me time.

I brought some inside, of course.  One of the things I love best about peonies is how easy they are to arrange.  As in, no arrangement is necessary.  Just plop 'em in a vase and let 'em do their thing.  Their thing is always spectacular.

Bonus:  Pups.

They hang out outside my bathroom every morning, taking advantage of the sunny spot.


The iPhone is basically my new camera, replacing the old Sony point-and-shoot which didn't survive the move back from West Virginia.  Here's hoping it brings with it a new era of blogging!  As always, you can also find me on Tumblr and Twitter.

The Alba Series

In addition to patterns, I've been on a photography kick lately.  I went a-wand'ring through 20x200 and was caught by these works by Laura Bell, taken while she was living in Edinburg, Scotland.  There's a sense of wistfulness to them, and I adore the circular framing, especially on the above, called "Ferry from Ardrossan Harbor."  It feels as if you're peering through a porthole.

"Arthur's Seat"

"Blackford Forrest"

All three prints are available on 20x200, in editions of various sizes.

Mikael Kennedy

I am in love with Mikael Kennedy's photographs.

Remember when I said all an artist had to do was paint me some waves and I was hooked?  Totally goes for photographers, too.  And if you capture the shoreline, make it bleak, bleak, bleak.  Some might find that depressing, but it never fails to take my breath away.  Kennedy does just that with all of these, from his Odysseus series.

Can't you just see that last one, blown up nice and big, dominating a big white wall?  I have the perfect place for it.  Come to me, waves.  Oh, and did I mention?  These are all polaroids.  Yum.

In Which I Rake Some Leaves

Fill ten bags, I was told.  That was my mission.  "Ha!" I thought to myself, "If you think I'm not going to attempt to make the largest pile of leaves I can, then I don't know what sort of child you think you raised."

I was scolded, as I attempted this.  "You're just creating more work for yourself!"  "This is a chore, Kelly, it isn't meant to be fun."  But this was nothing compared to the reaction to my decision to jump into one of the piles.  I was told that adults don't jump into leaf piles because we're heavier, and I was going to hit the ground and hit it HARD.

Did I?  Yes.  Did it hurt?  Hell yes.  Did it stop me from doing it a second time?  OF COURSE NOT.

Did the dogs attack me as soon as I hit the ground?  Duh.


In conclusion:

room love

Would you check out this room?  There is absolutely nothing I don't love about this room.

I think it's somewhere between those blue chairs and the big star pillow on the couch.

In Abigail Ahern's home in London, courtesy of The Selby.  The whole house is lovely, but oh! that room.

back from the brink (Montana)

Hiya, folks.  I know I have been a neglectful blogger of late, but I like to be cheery when I blog, and it's tough to be cheery when there's little to feel cheery about.  Unless they are doors.  I have no trouble feeling cheery about doors.  However, I'm feeling pretty great about covering 12 states in 12 days in a car with my parents, brother, and sometimes a dog and not going stark, raving mad.  On that note, I thought I'd share the photos I'm proudest of from our time in Glacier National Park in Montana and Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.

I'm happiest because this was the first time following the post-VISTA move that I dug out my camera and had a good time with it.  The last 3 photos were taken of Mormon Row, an area I highly recommend checking out if you're ever in Grand Teton.

Bonus: a video of us hiking around Lake Josephine in Glacier.

a report on the galapagos

I went to the Galapagos Islands, and you should too!  I'll be honest, I did not have a clear idea how this trip would go, mainly because I'm an art historian and when I travel it's generally to visit art, ruins, monuments; things that man built.  The Galapagos, by necessity, is pretty man-free (only 4 islands in the archipelago are inhabited and only one has what one might term a town).  Well, happily, the trip surprised me and I would be willing to go back again and again and once more forever and ever.

There is just something so freeing about being in a place so free of man's influence, populated by fearless animals who clearly view you as something not even remotely approaching a threat to them.  Some of the wildlife was curious, some wary, but for the most part they just didn't care.  "Eh, you've seen one awkward, two-legged ape thing, you've seen them all," you could clearly see the Marine Iguanas thinking.

But now here's what you came to see: the beasties.

Galapagos Sea Lions.  These were EVERYWHERE.  We saw lots and lots of pups, too, and got to witness the classic "MAMA FEED ME" tactics every creature must employ.

Lava Lizard.  Saw lots of these, too, but they have different colors on different islands.  This guy was on San Cristobal.

Marine Iguana.  The only ones with these gorgeous colors were on Espanola Island.  Everywhere else, they were the same inky black as the lava rocks.

Sally Lightfoot Crab.  We saw these all over, too.  The adults were all this fantastic red, and the babies were pure black (you can see one in the lower right of this photo).  This camouflages the young from the adults, as (fun fact!) they are all cannibalistic.

Of course, the famous Blue-footed Boobies.

This is a juvenile Nazca, or Masked, Booby.  He was right on the path on Espanola, and was as curious about us as we were about him.  Love those big bug eyes.

And adult Nazca Booby on Genovesa.  These guys were my favourite of the boobies.

Red-footed Boobies on Genovesa.  These guys are the only ones which perch in trees--they've developed a prehensile toe in order to do so.

A Giant Tortoise, of course!  There are very few of these guys in the wild, as they were hunted nearly to extinction (entirely to extinction on some islands).  This guy was in the Charles Darwin Research Center on Santa Cruz.

We made friends.

A Land Iguana, also on Santa Cruz.  These guys were GORGEOUS.

There is a very small flamingo population in the Galapagos, and they can be hard to spot.  We saw three, including this guy, who flew in over our heads to land in a lagoon.

There is also a very small (less that 1,000) penguin population--we saw about 20, which was quite a treat.  We even snorkeled with them!

We saw lots of amazing things underwater, but most moved too quickly to get good shots of.  I sort of stalked this Sea Turtle in order the snap this.

Here's the ship!  The National Geographic Endeavour.  We were quite fond of it.

My fantastic Aunt Anne and me on Bartolome, with lots of volcanic outcroppings behind us.  We only visited the older islands, so we didn't see any of the young, active volcanos on the western islands.

All in all, it was the trip of a lifetime and I'm SO grateful that I had a chance to go.  We traveled with Lindblad, which has a partnership with National Geographic.  Our experience was wonderful--the ship was great, the excursions were great, and the naturalists were downright wonderful.  And--always good--the food was fantastic.  I'll recommend this trip to anyone who'll listen, and if I had all the money in the world, I would definitely take other Lindblad cruises (like one of their Arctic ones, for example).  I know some people have mixed feelings about cruises, but this was nothing like my first cruise experience, where we were essentially in a gigantic floating hotel.  Lindblad ships are much, much smaller, and the whole experience feels so much friendlier and more intimate (in our case, the staff and crew outnumbered the guests).

This is a trip that I'll be carrying around inside of me for a long time to come, I think.

Note: all photos aside from the adult Nazca Booby and the Sea Turtle taken by Anne Grier (except for the one we're both in, of course).