Winter threshold

Sötétedik az este, mécses gyúl, (The evening darkens, a candle lights)

Emlékezünk azokra, kik elmentek, (We remember those who have passed)

Szívünkben élnek, soha el nem feledtek. (They live in our hearts, never forgotten)

Ősz szél hozza a szavukat a sírnak, (Autumn wind brings their words from the grave)

Mindenszentek napján, lélekben várunk. (On All Saints’ Day, we wait in spirit)

Verses drawn from poems of Petöfi Sándor and Kosztolányi Dezső

Water and Stone

Dancing at Romai Part, Danube River, Hungary. April 2023

Beata Jirkovszky , Catlin Gaensler , Corinne Maurice

music: The Water Blessing Song by Nalini Blossom

This project is part of a collaboration with La Llanterna in Torello, Spain. Two groups of artists in Spain and Hungary came together to explore the elements of water and stone through movement, music, photograph, film and poetry.

Budapest and Torello, like so many of our settlements, have been built on riverbanks, and the rivers run like veins through the city, bringing life, energy, peace, and sustenance. We depend on our rivers for irrigation, power, commerce, and transportation, but may forget to slow down to appreciate them as living systems. By coming to the river to listen with all of our senses, we both give and receive energy. We can foster our own wellbeing and also the wellbeing of the river.

You can also help the wellbeing of our rivers! Join us between the 22nd of April (Earth Day) and the 8th of June (World Ocean Day) to help clean up our rivers! Find out more here .

Water and Stone

A cold early spring morning along the Danube river, Hungary.

Wind, Water, Stone

BY OCTAVIO PAZ

TRANSLATED BY ELIOT WEINBERGER

Water hollows stone,

wind scatters water,

stone stops the wind.

Water, wind, stone.

Wind carves stone,

stone’s a cup of water,

water escapes and is wind.

Stone, wind, water.

Wind sings in its whirling,

water murmurs going by,

unmoving stone keeps still.

Wind, water, stone.

Each is another and no other:

crossing and vanishing

through their empty names:

water, stone, wind.

In my exploration of water and stone, I also found this podcast from Vox about the origins of water on Earth very interesting. I see water and stone as related but opposing forces, each with the ability to shape the other. Both yin and yang. As I learned from Lydia Hallis, a planetary scientist at the University of Glasgow, there is a deeper connection between water and stone which can be uncovered by studying samples of the very oldest water on Earth.

In the Air

My creative book challenge this week is to be influenced/ inspired by an artist. I am inspired by Nick Cave’s soundsuits. I love how my children dance with scarves and was inspired to take their movement out into the air. Masks and costumes transform us from ourselves to something other. Giving us permission to become the essence of something else, a shell that strips away our shell.

Looking to the Sky

Looking up into the sky

I feel small, in a way that makes me feel light and peaceful and a part of everything.

All of my worries, aspirations, accomplishments feel like nothing

I am just a part of a microcosm, an infinite space of emptiness, collecting points and chaos.

Everything is beautiful, cataclysmic, peaceful and ever-changing

Drifting in the cosmos

I am stardust as I look up into the sky.

May 8, 2020

Fastidious Feet

I’m quite sure I didn’t know the meaning of fastidious until today! My interpretation was perhaps being obsessive- I am fastidious about getting out and moving my feet each day! It is this detail- of movement- the necessity… of walking… that I just can’t do without. Thanks for my feet! March 12, 2020