8:25AM I’m off to walk through some serious snow. I’ll tell you a little about the picture when I get to work. With coffee.
…
10:21AM Last night, Joslyn and I attended the art opening of our friend Johannes Girardoni. Johannes greeted me at the door with a warm smile.
Long-legged in a well-cut black velvet jacket, he led me in to see his work, pieces created with encaustic and found wood. Encaustic is wax combined with paint to produce a unique, vibrantly colored material. Some artists will paint with molten encaustic, but Johannes prefers to display shaped blocks mounted on pieces of found wood.
Pictures don’t do his art justice, because when seen in person, there is an overwhelming desire to touch the wax. It looks so soft and bright, some of it like foam, some of it like Play-do, that you just want to poke it.
I resisted the temptation, but I did smell it after being encouraged by the artist. “Go ahead. It’s beeswax,” he told me and that prompted me to sniff the art—something inappropriate without the encouragement of the artist—at an otherwise reserved event.
Johannes’ daughter Julia and one of her little friends pose in front of one of the exhibits in today’s picture. She was pictured here a few weeks ago in a shot of me removing a rubber band from her Barbie’s hair at Kevin’s cabin.
Johannes’ wife Heidi and other daughter Julia also attended along with many friends and family. After inspecting the art, the most fun to be had was watching a cadre of little kids tear around the gallery in their Sunday clothes.