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A well maintained landscape with mature trees can increase property values up 25 percent. Trees can cool houses in summer. A city lot with 30 percent plant cover provides the equivalent cooling necessary to air condition two moderately sized houses 12 hours a day in summer.

The Value of Trees Around Your Home

The Value of Trees Around Your Home

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This favorite neighborhood tree inspired Moon Over Cypress, 14 x 11 Oil Pastels on paper, Paper Places series.

This place is one of my major quest-destinations this summer (2010), so there will be plenty of new photos to post by September for sure. Most of these are details of the enormous fossils for sale on the grounds of a warehouse in nearby Holbrook, where all sizes of petrified logs and pieces can be purchased. Diamonds? hah! Fossils are a girl’s best friend…

Petrified

Read more about the significance of the park area.

William Shakespeare

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John Muir, Biologist, Naturalist

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Featured Art and its Inspiration

Paint Arson, 11 x 11 x 3 inches acrylics on canvas, gallery wrapped sides painted. (Most of the Magic Square series are signed on the side, so in this view the signature is superimposed.)

Buying a new jar of Cadmium Red medium hue was just the thing to reboot, then re-route some old habits I was falling back into, like over-working paintings. Here I began with a lush Redwood forest in mind, thinking I could safely stir up some inspiration with the hot scarlet under my usual cool green palette… I did not intend to start a fire!
A new color invigorates the work process like nothing else can, and adds renewed life to your results as well. Incorporated as a base, straight out of the tube or mixed with your usual palette, a new color changes everything. Here now, as the painting is seen in the second thumbnail, there’s nothing I can do except follow it and see where it leads. The strength and intensity of this color as a base is dictating a whole other unintended but interesting direction, and it’s in charge for a while. I hope I can manage it.
Painting, whatever the subject may be, is a journey through all kinds of unanticipated thoughts and associations; some are short and sweet, ending within 1 – 6 hours and not much more than a visual, but some are packed full of adventure that isn’t even realized until surfacing from a few hours of work.

The forest fires were still-smoldering when we walked through the Californian Redwood and Sequoia forests last November, and my memory lapses into romanticized imagery of smoky rays of light in the sunset. It’s perplexing that the effects of forest devastation could be so pretty when the fact is that just the week before, a raging fire was the cause of all that beauty, and not just the smoky sunset, but fire enables the entire forest to flourish. As I’m painting this I’m thinking about all kinds of how fire is a naturally occurring event like rain and snow, and is an essential part of forest cycles…and of how fire is destructive but supports renewal and re-creation as well.
Fire opens pine cones to disperse their seeds, controls pests and disease. By burning weeds and weaker trees that rob sunlight and nutrients from healthier trees and plants, it also clears the way for new seeds to sprout. Ash aerates, and contains properties that determine the quality of soil and what is able to grow there. Realizing that certain trees only regenerate with the aid of fire, like the giant Sequoia cones only release seeds through fire, today’s standard fire management practice is to allow naturally occurring forest fires to burn, still with a mind to sensibly control it.
So what element does it take to open a painter’s eyes to new possibilities? A jar of Cadmium Red medium hue!

Paint Arson

	11 x 11 x 3 inches acrylics on canvas, gallery wrapped sides painted.	$250.00

From Little Acorns Big Oaks Grow – a page from my father’s drawing workbook of illustrations done when he was 10 years old.

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Native to the Pacific coast of northern USA and southern Canada, this broadleaf evergreen tree can reach heights of 90 feet (27 m).

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Pacific Madrone (Wikipedia)

“…Native American people ate the berries, but because the berries have a high tannin content and are correspondingly astringent, they more often either chewed them or made them into a cider. Many mammal and bird species feed off the berries…[ ] Mule Deer will also eat the young shoots when the trees are regenerating after fire. It is also important as a nest site for many birds, and in mixed woodland it seems to be chosen for nestbuilding disproportionately to its numbers. The timber distorts during drying and is not much used, but an attractive veneer can be made from it. Recently, it has become more popular in the Pacific Northwest as a flooring material, due to the durability of the wood, and the warm color after finishing. Mostly the wood is sought for its heating capabilities since it burns long and hot in fireplaces.

Conservation
Although drought tolerant and relatively fast growing, the Pacific Madrone is currently declining throughout most of its range. One likely cause is fire control: under natural conditions, the madrone depends on intermittent naturally occurring fires to reduce the conifer overstory. Mature trees survive fire, and can regenerate more rapidly after fire than the Douglas-firs with which they are often associated. They also produce very large numbers of seeds, which sprout following fire. Since the arrival of Europeans in North America, fire suppression has resulted in a reduction of the range of the Pacific Madrone.

Increasing development pressures in Pacific Madrone habitat have also contributed to a decline in the number of mature specimens. This tree is extremely sensitive to alteration of the grade or drainage near the root crown…”

Arbutus Uses and symbolism

As key pieces in the Dancing With Trees art collection, these uniquely refurbished chairs are a means to relay some of the more abstract concepts regarding the importance of trees, particularly with reference to myths, legends, other historic aspects and cultural significances.

Marcel Duchamp (1887 – 1968) founded the term “Readymades” by exhibiting ordinary objects as art forms. Though he might have preferred that we be appalled by his signing of ordinary unattractive products like the urinal or a bicycle tire, we end up reconsidering the beauty of Design. His generation of artists advocated the obscure notion of “Art imitating Life”.
It’s said that nothing is truly original; that we only re-invent and improve upon each others’ innovations. The entire process of creating these chairs – rather: re-creating – pays tribute to all Arts, defined in the broadest of terms, and artifacts ever created.
Each chair utilizes the 29 x 29 x 29 inch structure of discarded vintage plastic lawn chairs. They were purchased at a second-hand store before realizing their value as original “Solaire chairs” designed by a French Canadian team, Fabiano and Panzini. They were completely unfashionable during the 1990’s, but I remembered their intriguing design as lawn furniture back in the early 1970’s, and how comfortable they were. A nostalgic vision to refurbish them came to mind, half-thinking that they could be thrown away if I couldn’t figure out a way to re-salvage them.
Two were non-functional with cracked plastic and large gaps, so the risk of paying $3.00 each was reasonable. However, like a lot of artwork, the finished products did not materialize for many years. About ten years would pass before having enough time to start projects that were not work-orders. Two more chairs were purchased after moving to Texas, where despite my husband’s protests, I insisted on moving the first two along with the rest of our belongings. The down-side about the design of these chairs is that they can’t be stacked, they take up a good deal of space, and are awkward to carry. My take is that they are worth every inconvenience, but his disgust at the time was warrented because they were moved in the same embarrassingly poor condition as when they were purchased. (The photos shown here in the process pictures are not the same chairs; these are outside an old motel in Ottawa, Ontario, where I hope to purchase a few more in any condition.)

The designs were chosen over a period of extensive research and fascination with art history and prehistory-anything; the age of the dinosaurs, cave paintings, signs and symbols, heiroglyphics, rocks, gems, fossils.

After weaving strips of canvas across the damaged areas and layering more of the fabric with white glue in a paper mache fashion, thin layers of plaster were gradually applied, allowed time to cure, then sanded in between coats. The four chosen chair designs were finalized as sketches on paper then drawn freehand on the dried plaster surface with graphite, marker, and acrylic paints. 3 out of 4 chairs involved some carving, with successive chairs each more elaborate than the one before. All are finished with coats of varnish and an application of wax to enrich the colors.
The chairs are truly one-of-a-kind, completely functional, and are the ideal place to replicate historic art themes and ancient artifacts. With far more ideas than chairs and a quest to buy more at this point, unfortunately the value of original vintage Solaire chairs increases while availability decreases. I’m looking to buy more in any condition, so if you know where more can be purchased, please email me at nikki_coulombe@hotmail.com.

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Cycad Fossil Chair

		Cycad Leaf Fossil Chair, Homage to the Earth, 29 x 29 x 29 inches, completely functional refurbished vintage chair, mixed media
$2,500.00

The Cycad Leaf Fossil Replica Chair is thicker and heavier, with more carved details than the next three, which were made first. The front of the chair is a rendition of the fossil of a Cycad leaf from the first species of palm-like trees that grew about 50 million years ago. The original Cycad fossil was discovered in a Wyoming riverbed.

The circumference on the back of this chair has an informal mosaic embedded with authentic fossils of an extinct clam and pebbles. The extinct genus of shells called Myalina are estimated to be 345 – 225 – million years old, and were found in a playground in the Dallas, Texas area.
Completing the back of the chair, the surface is texturized along with patterns of the bark and leaf scars of a fossilized Paleozoic Lepidodendron. The first trees on Earth were actually leafless; nothing more than woody stems standing in and absorbing nutrients from water. Lepidodendron were a primitive species of the very first trees on earth, reaching heights of 130 feet (40 m) tall, with leaves that grew flat directly along the bark around 400 million years ago.

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Salish Spindle-Whorl Replica Chair

	Salish Wooden Spindle-Whorl Replica Chair, 29 x 29 x 29 inches, completely functional refurbished vintage chair, canvas strips, white glue, plaster carved and sanded, Acrylic paints, varnish
$2,200.00

Details

The Salish Spindle-Whorl Replica Chair

Cultures across the world throughout time have used trees and their byproducts for homes, clothing, foods, medicines, transportation, furniture, tools, as aids to construction, and more. We generally still continue with ancient traditions of beautifying utensils and everyday objects with designs that corelate to the use thereof, or simply to be aesthetically pleasing.

A whorl is as the base on which a spindle twirls as it receives the yarn as it’s created. Spinning yarn and weaving fabric comprise some of our oldest known technology. The design carved on the original wooden whorl shows a central human figure holding two otters, animals that are still prevalent and adored in that area. It was found near Vancouver Island, Canada, believed to have been used by the early indigenous Salish women while spinning yarn for blankets and clothing. It’s notable that fabric was also created by chewing and refining the fibers of bark sectioned from Cedar trees.
Also native to Vancouver Island territory, a Kwakiutl prayer to a Cedar tree reads: “Look at me friend! I come to ask you for your dress, since there is nothing you cannot be used for. I come to beg you for this, Long-life maker”.

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Mayan Bowl Replica Chair

		Mayan Bowl Replica Chair, 29 x 29 x 29 inches, Vintage chair, mixed media

Great civilizations have come and gone. The Mayan Bowl Replica Chair is included in the Dancing With Trees collection with the statement that as modern society consumes, enjoys and depends upon Earth’s resources, we are as vulnerable to the very same consequences for our actions, and a flux of unpredictable cosmic events. Rather than spreading fear about predictions for our future, we only ought to heed the facts and reevaluate the purpose of our activities as one civilized planet.
Mayan society was based on an intricate system of faith in a multitude of Gods. It was expected that perfect growing conditions for crops would be granted in exchange for human sacrifice. There is speculation that their cultural decline is attributed to a string of self-inflicted and circumstantial environmental catastrophes. The loss of forests due to over-extended usage, weather, floods, volcanic eruptions and other natural phenomena, and the resulting deterioration of habitats caused and a loss of the faith, population displacements, decline and eventual extinction.
The original Mayan bowl’s design dates back to the Late Classic Period of Mayan history, 600 – 900 A.D. Common Era. The central portion portrays two Water Gods witnessing the birth of the omnipotent Maize God who immerges from a turtle, symbol of the earth, all floating in the “primordial soup”. Customarily, hieroglyphs written along the top rim reveal what the bowl was used for and the owner’s name.
Inspirational resource: Maya, Divine Kings of the Rainforest edited by Nikolai Grube ISBN 3-8290-4150

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The Tree of Life Chair

	The Tree of Life Chair - Our spiritual and cultural connections with trees, 29 x 29 x 29 inches vintage chair, canvas strips, white glue, drywall compound, acrylic paints, varnish, wax
$2,200.00

Details

The design on the Tree of Life Chair incorporates a few ancient, cross-cultural esoteric symbols for beliefs that still hold meaning for many of us today. The Tree of Life, a widespread mythical idea with branches and roots representing, among other things, the philosophy of “As above, So below”. Symbolic of longevity, and central to the design is the Japanese character Shou, very much resembling, and possibly originating from the shape of a tree. Stylized branches, roots and cones of the Pine, also symbolic of longevity in Japan, are interwoven in the classic Celtic style. I was also inspired by the ornate work of illuminated gospel manuscripts in “The Book of Kells”, illustrated by Irish monks around the year 800 A.D., Common Era.
Snakes are well-known as having similar religious or mystical connotations in many cultures, and two resemblances are drawn around the circumference of the chair in a familiar Yin-Yang placement. Australian Indigenous legends regard the Rainbow Snake as the most important sacred symbol; believed to be the creator of all things. Christian biblical literature advocates that the snake that offers the apple from the Tree of Knowledge to Eve. There are subtler symbolic references here as well, starting with the overall circular shape of the chair itself, and the repetition echoing within. The circle is another universal symbol, a common shape seen in nature and nature’s effects, suggests Life’s recurring cycles, unending unity and a sense of completeness.
I played with various color combinations, painting the Celtic design over and over, also carving it out in areas and trying to make it look like ivory inlay, but it never did get there until finally deciding it looked best as aged Sienna colored wood. I felt the carving outline wasn’t suitable, so drywall compound was reapplied, it dried, was redrawn and repainted. Colors from those previous layers add to the depth of the antique patina finish.

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Hal Borland, American author

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Sidestreets: urban and rural interest