Happy Greetings from Brooklyn!

Well, the blogging on COFFEE AND CAKE was fun and kept me in touch with everyone through our virtual koffeeklatsches, especially when I was living in Korea, but as it's turned out, here in NY there is just SO much to do and keep up with, that the blogging has taking a back seat for now. 

Life is good here in Brooklyn.  I have been in the studio a lot, working on a new series of paintings, one image below.  I love working in my loft/ studio here in Bed Stuy (just south of Williamsburg), which has great light and is just a walk or bike ride away from cafes and restaurants in the neighborhood, or a short hop over the bridge to Manhattan!  AND just a bike or subway ride away from the beach, teheAtlantic ocean --  I finally live in a city on the ocean again and I love it! 

"American Liberty"  2007, acrylic on canvas, shown earlier this year at the Phoenix Art Museum.

My time off is often spent at Smooch Cafe and the South African restaurant Madiba in Fort Greene, and I am often out and about with friends at live music performances -- lots of African, sometimes on Sundays drumming circle in Prospect Park.   In the last couple of months I attended concerts by South Africans Hugh Masekela, Abdullah Ibrahim (whose music I grew up with in South Africa), and Vusi Mahlasela, and was invited to the Library of Congress concert in DC, honoring Paul Simon (I even got to sit in on two days of rehearsals -- Ladysmith Black Mambazo, James Taylor, Stevie Wonder, Philip Glass, Marc Anthony, Alison Kraus....the list goes on).  My life is filled with art and music!

After living in suburban Phoenix for so many years, I especially love riding my bicycle around the neighborhood and into the city for gallery and museum visits, and it's been wonderful to live near my dear school friends from Phoenix and Ohio again.  Life is beautiful, eventful, and it's feeding my work in the studio.

And with a couple of images from Labor Day, I am signing off for now and would love to see you in the City -- get in touch when you're in town.  My cell and email are still the same. 

Tschuess,

Heidi 

With my dear Yvan, above -- friends since architechture and sculpture class at ASU in 1997!!!, and new friend Tony from Cape Town, South Africa below :-)

Hi.  I am indeed now living in Brooklyn, New York, and will be posting regularly again, starting in the next couple of days. 

In a tiny nutshell - it's all good ;), I am well.  Much more in the next few days!  Thanks for the prod, Sue!!!

Life just does not go in a straight line.  I am returning to Phoenix.  Whoa, no, not for good!   Since my Brooklyn loft-to-be will not be ready to move into till October, I am returning to my Phoenix studio to paint for a month and pack up more stuff.  Having to wait for an apartment for three months had not been in my plan, and I realized I will go Coco Bananas if I can't paint for three months.  I arrived in NYC about two weeks ago, and have had about a month-long break now from the studio, and can't wait to put brush to canvas!!!

In the meantime, I have been working on my new website, lunching in the City, walking the happy little pug in the park, hanging out on the terrace with Tasja.  over the weekend, my friend Therese stopped in on her way to Africa; had a great visit.  Saw the Jackson Pollock Works on Paper show at the Guggenheim this weekend with Dino, and took a nice walk on the East Side.   And today I realized I have been overtaken by this wonderfully peaceful feeling, knowing that I don't have to see everything in the City in 3 days...I can enjoy taking small outings, and don't have to visit three museums in one day!   I am really here to stay, errr, well, after I return from Phoenix that is.

95 degrees in NYC.  heat index of 105.  I'm staying in, spending time on reworking my website, and planning for the move to my new loft.   I had wanted to undertake a number of outings this week to see some shows in Chelsea, and finally take a trip to the Met, but at these temps it is quite nice and easy to stay put.  And.... tomorrow the heat index is threatening to reach 115, and soooooo.... apartment-bound I remain on the Upper West Side, in the company of the pug Louise, who drops her tennis balls at my feet.  Throw the ball already, throw!  Also the view from the terrace, including the heavenly Central Park and the lake!

Not having had much time on my hands with my move to NY, I am glad to finally have managed to see the Al Gore movie, An Inconvenient Truth... a MUST MUST SEE.  If you been listening to the mainstream press declaring that the weather intensification of late is just another normal spike in another normal up and down variation, and that this global warming is not THAT big of an issue... OH BOY!    Even the attack-dog FOX channel managed to report "Gore's Global Warming Film Gets Rave Reviews From Climate Scientists"-- .

Central Park, Dino and Yvan in the background playing ball, and me, hanging out with Lou(ise). 

Phoenix: 21st Century City (Hardcover)

"After Berlin, Brooklyn, and Moscow, Phoenix is the ideal fourth city to be explored in Booth-Clibborn Editions’s fascinating series about cities that are emerging creatively. Thanks to its majestic desert setting, appealing climate, and abundant economic opportunity, the Phoenix metropolitan area is the fastest growing in the U.S. Along with its population growth, the city has seen a flourishing of expressive arts of all kinds. Phoenix 21: Desert Metropolis captures the historic movement and youthful energy of the region as it evolves into a vibrant world-class metropolis with a unique character."

preorder on Amazon

Sugar-Coated, my gumball HumVee, is featured in this publication!

Know anyone who needs a September apartment and pet sitter in NEW YORK CITY?  I will be available probably for the first 3 weeks of September until my loft is ready to move into.  First two weeks would work too.  If so, please call me at 602-561-5117! 

Phew.  The hunt is over.  I can begin to enjoy The City!  After morning to night searching for the past week, I found a loft right around the corner from several friends.  Joy.  Relief.  The loft is located in Clinton Hill, in a large building with lots of artists.  Seems everyone who lives there just loves the building. 

It'll be a while before i can move, I've got through end of August figured out and need to find a place to stay for September.... sooo..... if you know anyone who needs an combined APARTMENT / dog/ cat/ goldfish, oh, I hope not snake ;-)  SITTER for September or part of September, please let me know!  I promise I won't eat ALL the chocolate in the house.  (Haha to Tasja.)

Oh yes, today I had a lovely NY experience:  Totally authentic Korean food for lunch (Naem Yeong) and then shopping at the Korean grocery store!!!   I was in heaven over lunch.  It was SO GOOD.  I will for sure have to make a pilgrimage to KT once a week or more to get my fill of eating great Korean food while catching snippets of conversations.  I am SURE no one expects me to understand a syllable of Korean.  I saw some women snickering at me today while I was reading a "Specials" board, which was written entirely in Hangul.  Yeah, so, I might not always know every word I am sounding out, but I do get lucky sometimes, and I do have a few menu items memorized.  I remember at the end of my 7-month Korea stay sitting at a little eatery in Seoul with a friend, proudly reading every single line on a menu of about 20 items, knowing pretty closely what most of them were.  I love that sense of uncovering something not immediately visible to my eye, that feeling of discovery through patience, not being able to see word as image and having to put the individual letters together to form a meaning .  And I love that I know and can penetrate this intense foreignness even a little.  And I remember the sense of calm because words could not accost ME -- I had to make the effort to allow the word to unfold, deciphering and allowing it in, rather than being shouted at from all directions.  A beautiful and subtle sense to remember.

So, at the restaurant I was greeted in Korean and English and by reflex responded, "Yeee, Anyeong Haseyo."  Funny.  And I ordered in Korean, though my oder was double checked by the staff in English.  Yes, Noodles with cold soup.  Ts ts.  The side dishes were SO yum.  And!  Spicy! 

My next restaurant outing will be for a "jigae" (a phenomenal stew) that I love, a picture of which I saw in one restaurant window.  With Chinese jujubes!!!  Oh, my fa-vo-rite!!  And at the grocery store -- Yay, I found "laver," the toasted, oiled and salted seaweed I lovelovelove, and a few odds and ends, including the chunky aloe vera drink, and some fresh sesame leaves to surprise my friend Yvan with.  The odd things one craves after having spent some time in another culture...