Sunday, August 05, 2012

Upside Down

 View from Upstairs at Hemlock Lodge   Blair Pessemier   Acrylic on canvas   12 x 16
 Kids in the Yellow Raft   Blair Pessemier   Acrylic on canvas  12 x 16 inches
  Playing in the Lake    Laurie Fox  Pessemier   Acrylic on canvas  12 x 16 inches  SOLD
 Harika in the shade   Laurie Fox  Pessemier   Acrylic on canvas  12 x 16 inches
 Lobster Cooked  Laurie Fox  Pessemier   Acrylic on canvas 14 x 16 inches  SOLD
 Trees at the Badminton Courts  Laurie Fox  Pessemier   Acrylic on canvas  12 x 16 inches
Kids playing on the sand  Laurie Fox  Pessemier   Acrylic on canvas  12 x 16 inches

ARTNOTES: Upside Down

Wow.  Why is it upside down?

Our biggest project this vacation has been to turn the upstairs of Hemlock Lodge into a Camera Obscura.  Imagine being inside of an old box camera and you get the idea.  We blackened the window and door panes to eliminate all the light coming into the room, and then cut a peephole giving way to the view of the lake and hills beyond.  I hung a white canvas on the opposite wall and VOILA! a picture of the sky, hills, and lake, complete with motorboats and skiers racing by.  All of this is upside down (like Blair’s painting of the scene).

I am like a conjurer or a circus side show:  people are astounded by this trick.  It isn’t really a trick but a feat of optics:  the lens in our eye works the same way.   I have attempted to sharpen the picture by sizing the peephole, but I think it is a problem of distance from the window to the wall.  So, it is a slightly nearsighted look at the view.

Meanwhile, we paint other things, trying not to sweat on the canvas. Lobsters, trees, kids at the lake.   It is terribly humid here, more oppressive than it has ever been since Blair and I have been coming to the Lodge, twelve years.    We relish the car’s airconditioning – as does Harika.  We sleep in the range of the fan.   Last night we had a cricket as loud as a car alarm.  Each time Blair turned on the light to find it, it stopped.  He thought it was attracted by the sound of our fan.  I am not sure.  I find relief as  I float in the lake.

I actually like the feeling of sweat on my upper lip.  I love the contrast of sweltering and then jumping into the water.  I get goose-bumps, even thought the lake temperature is 70-something degrees (f). 

We listen to the radio:  bluegrass, blues and R+B, while making puzzles on the porch.   Harika barks at passers-by.   We rock in the rocking chairs.

The biggest contrast of all is that of here and Paris. 

(ps. my camera isn't sufficient to photograph the inside of the camera obscura)

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