Comes a new year, and I find a time to pause in my butterfly report. The holiday season has been pleasantly busy for us at Living Traditional Arts, and part of the activity has been a dispersal of many of the food related paintings from the Living Traditional Arts Shop. Andrew Bick’s food photos…READ MORE >
Last summer in Wisconsin we saw vibrant greens and blues, lit by golden sun through clear pleasant air. I kept watching for the sharp accent of orange and black of the Monarch butterfly, and for a long time I didn’t have much luck. Even on that valley farm so beautiful that we used the word…READ MORE >
A brief stop at Bakke Farm, then over one ridge and across two rivers to the beautiful valley farm of a friend who said, yes, she had seen a Monarch this summer. One. It was still July, and I’d been thinking about Monarch butterflies. Her place, grown lush in the moderate summer weather that settled…READ MORE >
We got to Wisconsin in the summer. It was July, and we saw a few fireflies. There was a feeling in the air. I had to ask. “Seen any Monarch butterflies this year?” We visited a lot of people and I asked often. No one said they’d seen more than one, most said, “No, none…READ MORE >
I first saw this easel design when I was living and working in Toronto, Canada. Two different schools had several in storage and brought them out to display signs or art work in progress at festivals or at special classroom events. Neither school used them for individual easels in full classes – I’m thinking they…READ MORE >
The Viroqua, Wisconsin plein air painters keep Bakke Farm on their list of regional locations that offer beautiful rural views, and three painters came to the farm one Friday in August to catch a summer image. Kathy Fairchild arrived first. Kathy comes to the farm quite often; she and her husband have a garden over…READ MORE >
