Thursday, December 31, 2020

December Flying Carpet 2020

 In September, October, November
and December of 2020
The Flying Carpet

did a daily calendar project

called Ritual of Fragments.

This is the month of November.

Part of October and November

By September 2020,
it felt like the days 

were drifting by in a haze.

In an effort to grasp specificity
within the strange fluidity 

of this time…
The flying carpet decided
to make a calendar 

of  3” black and white drawings

This is a detail of December

perceiving the extraordinary

within the ordinary

11 25 2020

Turning the corner

11 4&5 2020

It's all about the numbers

11 7 2020

Breaking the Glass Ceiling

10 25 2020

Migration Amazement

9 26 2020

Purple Datura Silhouette

10 8 2020

Feeling like being

in the eye of the hurricaine

All wishes for health and well being

in the New Year



Monday, November 30, 2020

November Flying Carpet 2020

 In November
The Flying carpet
prayed for a transition
from chaos to order

 


 


 



 

 


 

Special thanks to EVERYONE 

who made this a possibility

Saturday, October 31, 2020

October Flying Carpet 2020

 In October,
The Flying Carpet
attempts to navigate 
“The Cloud of Unknowing”
during this incredible time of

so many overlays 
of truth and falsehoods.

Images of palimpsest come to mind

Traditionally palimpsest referred to
a manuscript or writing fragment 
on which the original writing 
has been partially removed
to make room for later writing 
but with original traces remaining.

Now a palimpsest can be…
something reused or layered
but still revealing visible traces
like these walls in Nara, Japan
A palimpsest of billboard messages
subsumed in time
Or the message implied
by what remains visible

The forces of nature
obscuring a graveyard memorial

or autographs of men
fighting in Algeria…
a palimsest of
person superimposed upon place

…and history juxtaposed
with the present…
So many sailors from distant lands
waiting with their goods
quarantined on San Lorenzo,
“The Plague Island” off  Venice…
a palimpsest of their scrawls

“Before I Die' 

is a global wall art project…
originally created by Candy Chang
on an abandoned house 

in New Orleans
after the death of a loved one.
There are now
 over 5,000 of these walls 

around the world.

A Momento Mori 

for the modern age...
This one becomes an inscrutable
palimpsest in North Carolina

A memory moment
captured in reflection palimpsest

Summer Fall Winter Spring,
my journal for the year 2008…
layers of daily drawings
on translucent mylar...
fan shaped segments...
hermetic images
approximating the way
events can float
to the surface of memory


With heartfelt love to all...
 
Thanks to Sialia for making
the excellent box 
for Summer Fall Winter Spring


Wednesday, September 30, 2020

September Flying Carpet 2020

 In September

The Flying Carpet notices 

that in this time of seclusion
and hasty planned escapes,
the happenstance of SERENDIPITY
seems almost non existent.

So, The Flying Carpet
sends you an antidote:
Greatest Hits of SERENDIPITY

 

Our neighborhood kebab joint
in Venice…
an assemblage readymade…
 


 André Breton, surrealist,
enthused about
“the chance encounter
of a sewing machine and an umbrella
on an operating table”
but how about
this Elephant Carving School
in Chaing Mai?

 
Mistaking free bookmarks
for our look-alike
Biennale tickets in Venice (!)
our day’s plans caput…
we discovered this strangeness…
 
 
SERENDIPITY… defined as
“an apparent aptitude
for making
fortunate discoveries accidentally”
These leering Nagas
and this sign in Laos
seemed like providence


Perhaps our most
SERENDIPITOUS
day ever… April 8, 2017
Was it a dream, Nelly and Nancy?

Zack discovered
these tiny masterpieces
of scraped paint layers
hiding throughout
the Passages in Paris


How many years
and how many stories?
this ghostly silhouette…
bed headboard
in the demolished mansion
in Mexico City

the mystery of
Christo-ish repair
in Lisbon

 
SERENDIPITOUS
alignment in Paris
 


Anachronistic SERENDIPITY
in the History of the Ages
Parade in Kyoto

and the gondolier
checking his cell phone
in Venice

And the SERENDIPITY
of finding the perfect gift
for She Who Loves Giving
 


Dedicated to the memory of 
Ruth Bader Ginsberg

 
Artist unknown

Monday, August 31, 2020

August Wondering Carpet 2020

 In August

The Flying Carpet imagines
what this
Time out of Time
feels like to you…

perhaps a time of
connection
rectangles within rectangles...
our eyes and minds
are pixilated

 

 
perhaps a time of
disconnection
hives of loneliness
 

 

perhaps a time of
mourning
when mirrors are draped
 

perhaps a time of
time standing still

 

 

perhaps a time of
sorting
and sweeping up
the dust from parts of your life

 

 

perhaps a time of
metamorphosis
(in the pupa stage
when the caterpillar’s enzymes
almost completely dissolve his body,
the imaginal discs remain
to form wings, antennae, and the rest)
 

 

perhaps a time of
resurrection
 

 
perhaps a time of
connection without embrace…

Sending love 
in all languages to you