muse-ings
Ach, these dark days of a west coast January, you give me a wee bit o’ doldrums or SAD?
Many ideas and images are there, only lacking the creative desire to pull them together.
Where is my muse?
by Marja-Leena
by Marja-Leena Vottovaara
– photo by Soren Andersson, via wikipedia
Browsing the latest posts at The Megalithic Portal a few weeks ago, an article with the name Vottovaara, caught my attention for it sounds Finnish and also sounded rather familiar to me. Of course, it’s about the flying stones of Lapland which I wrote about back in August 2004. I find it exciting when I come across these connections and new links, especially concerning the lesser known region of northern Europe, and particularly the Karelia area of the Finno-Ugric people.
Aluta, the author, kindly gave me permission to link to this. She wrote, in part:
Seids or seitas are objects or sites revered by the Saami people as representing nature or earth spirits. Found throughout the area once called Lapland, they were constructed and revered in the distant past by the Saamis’ pre-Christian ancestors. They can take many forms, including constructions of wood or just secluded pools or valleys, but in this case the word refers to seid stones, which are stones or boulders, often of unusual shapes or placed in unusual ways. These are the megaliths of the ancient northern peoples.
Usually these special stones are placed sparingly or singly, sometimes near stone rows or stone circles. But Vottovaara, a mountain in the Republic of Karelia, part of the Russian Republic, is host to a bewildering abundance of them, from 1000 to 1500 seids and other stone constructions all in one area.
Among the most striking features at Vottovaara are its propped boulders, sometimes called flying stones because of the way the boulders, often of interesting shapes, are elevated by smaller stones, making them seem as if they are lifting into flight.
Please read the rest of her interesting article and the links, as well as my article for all the details about this ancient Saami ‘place of power’.
The sad thing that Aluta brings up is that these sacred stones are being threatened by mining development. A Finnish group gathered names for a petition to save Vottovaara (sorry I write this too late for my readers, but I did sign it). They have had a reply and request to improve the petition. Let’s wish them better luck than so many other places around the world similarly threatened and damaged by resource and other developments.
Related links:
Heninen’s photos of Vottovaara
Voimakivet (Powerstones – vanishing Finnish cult structures) – a Finnish page with great art work! and more photos of these types of stones; the top is at Vottovaara, the bottom ones in USA.
Rockpiles on Vottovaara
A Swedish wikipedia article which calls these balanced megaliths ‘chicken and eggs’, the source of the image above in one of the links. (My article is also linked!) Here’s an auto-translation.
by Marja-Leena winter afternoon
At the mouth of the Capilano River at Ambleside Park, West Vancouver, 4:00 pm
Today seemed to be the first day this year without rain, though I haven’t kept any notes on it. It’s been incredibly wet, normal winter weather here in coastal British Columbia, and we just wear our rain gear and carry on. But a mild (8C, 46F) dry day is a treat with the sun out ever so briefly. We head out; first for a bit of browsing of the January sales in some shops until we feel too warm and stuffy indoors, then for a long seaside walk. The sun peeks out again to greet us before it disappears into the clouds again. Home again, pleasantly tired.
by Marja-Leena an artist’s brain
I have a messy habit of bookmarking anything and everything that interests and excites me. Soon I have so much on my computer that it all gets rather lost, like piles of papers. Once in a while I sift through some of it. This is what jumped out at me today, as it did the first time I saw it and loved it.
Stuff goes in. Stuff comes out….
In much of our education system – particularly in the over examined school context – it is often implied that art/design/creativity is a kind of sausage machine process: the meat of ‘inspiration’ goes in at one end, is chopped up with a bit of other stuff, is seasoned by the maker, to then emerge conveniently packaged at the other.
This is a way of learning, but it is not real. The things that truly capture our imaginations – our passions and preoccupations – are embedded deep in the fibre of our being. A constant latent presence, they may surface unbidden or are actively revisited and tussled with, building up layer upon layer of understanding.
All experiences add to the texture of our thinking. Audrey Walker describes things seen/discoveries as being ‘absorbed’ into memory and she has used the analogy of a store cupboard to illustrate the idea of consciously accumulating information which may be retrieved at a later date. I like to follow this train of thought and think about the neatly labelled jars you know to be there. Of course the (my) reality is often a haphazard array of open vessels spilling over or gathering dust. And I have the additional ingredient of mind numbing amnesia that comes with an ageing brain, so the rediscovering is even more potent …as here. [images here]
In Dorset recently, idly collecting the odd flat, smooth black stone during the day, I felt moved – just before we left the beach – to piece together a black spot.
Some days later, back in the studio, combing through images on my laptop (in the hope of editing to free up space) I came across black spot two. I’d photographed it in the stores at the V&A a couple of years ago. It’s painted tapa cloth from the Pacific Islands (1800’s). I had loved the simplicity and burnished solidity of the circle. I had also forgotten all about it. Rediscovering it was quite a shock. It was obviously subliminally there all the time, quietly and patiently sitting in a dark corner somewhere.
So, stuff goes in – isn’t always remembered – and re-emerges. My brain knows this information, but I don’t. Clever things, brains.
Check out the images in this post called Black Spot, by Sue Lawty, artist and author of Concealed, Discovered, Revealed, a Victoria and Albert Museum blog. I think it was Olga of Threading Thoughts who first pointed me in this direction.
P.S. I just noticed that this is my 1000th post, about a month short of this blog’s fourth birthday! It may not be remarkable compared to many others, but it surprised me.
by Marja-Leena lingering lazy days
My, have I been lazy this past week, not even blogging! The preparations and the holidays themselves seem to have tired me out a bit. I’m enjoying these quiet days to replenish body and soul. It’s now Twelfth Night, the eve of twelfth day of Christmas, signaling the time to put away the tree and all the decorations, but I’m not ready.
I’m still looking through old photos as I sort my photo files. Shown here are a few of the numerous photos my husband took two years ago during our Danish friends’ visit and trip to our favourite retreat on the west coast of Vancouver Island. Husband and I thought of going for a few days again this week, but decided we’ll go a little later this winter or early spring. It’s so nice to just enjoy the warm comforts of our pleasant home, punctuated with walks in the damp outdoors. We are true homebodies!
by Marja-Leena January tree fest
The holidays are not quite over yet, today is the 8th day of Christmas after all, AND there’s also a new Festival of the Trees to cheer us.
The Festival of the Trees is a monthly blog carnival devoted to all things arboreal. Like other blog carnivals, it’s a collection of links to blog posts and other sources, hosted each month on a different blog.
Festival of the Trees #19 is a real holiday treat. Mull some cider, pop some corn and cuddle up with a warm laptop. Lorianne has gathered a forest’s worth of links for your browsing pleasure.
Indeed, there are a lot of trees in that forest! I’m pleased to be part of this January’s festival and will savour the links slowly during my breaks. I hope you enjoy this tree fest too!
by Marja-Leena old year, new year
On this last day of 2007, I feel some sadness in saying goodbye to another year. Changing the annual calendars is such an adrupt marker of the passage of time and of aging, inducing a twinge of melancholy in me. I’ve sometimes wondered if all the partying, drinking and merriment is a way to avoid looking at Father Time in the eye.
Not being party types, we usually spend New Year’s Eve with a couple of good friends or just the two of us as it will be tonight. I remember our first New Year’s as new parents of a baby. We were to go to friends with her but she became feverish and we decided to stay home, and that night I taught my husband how to play chess.
In recent years I’ve been acknowledging New Year’s Eve as the sixth day of Christmas and the beginnings of a gradual lightening of the darkness, a sort of ancient ritual practised in thought and writing. I also like to remember an occasion or three in my childhood when we followed an old Finnish tradition of pouring molten tin into snow and reading our fortunes from the shapes, all in fun.
Instead of fortunes in odd shapes of metal, I offer up these frost stars and ice flowers of hope, peace and beauty for all of you reading this, and for this earth and everyone on it. Thank you to all of you, whether or not you comment here, for visiting my blog through the year and making this blog endeavour a less lonely pursuit! I love the connections and friendships with others all over this globe and feel that we do make a small difference in making the world a better place.
I wish you all many new successes and joys, good health, peace and contentment, and abundant creativity. Happy New Year! Hauskaa Uutta Vuotta! Bonne année! Allen ein frohes Neues Jahr!
Addendum Jan.2, 2008: I came across this at Wood s Lot a little late, but worth noting:
New Year’s Day History, Customs and Traditions at new-to-me blog Follow Me Here that I just bookmarked for further explorations.
by Marja-Leena trees of my year
Many of us are looking back on the past year as it’s nearing its end. Photography having become more and more a passion for me, I like to look through the year’s photos. They may be observations of the little things that capture my eye and images that I plan to use in my artwork. Often they are a visual diary of family and friends at varied gatherings, of trips taken, of many walks in the parks, and a record of the seasonal changes in our garden.
While going through them, I was also thinking about the current call for entries for the Festival of Trees being hosted this time by Lorianne. (There’s still time to submit with the deadline tomorrow, Sunday, December 30th!) So I took a tree-centric review of the year and found a LOT of images of trees! Here are a few highlights from our garden and from some of the walks. How fortunate we are to live in such a beautiful and tree-filled part of the world.
Cedars covered in January’s snow, then February’s catkins on the hazelnut tree
March’s mossy and leafy new greens followed by April’s fat magnolia buds
September’s light and shadows in the forest and the red maple leaves of October
Bare arms reaching up to the November sky, then magical trees with December lights
by Marja-Leena 