Saturday, October 21, 2006

The Quiltmakers of Gee's Bend

If you haven't heard about these ladies, you're missing out.

In the isolated enclave of Gee's Bend, Alabama, over a period of 150 years, women have been turning out some of the most incredible artwork -- in the form of quilts -- I've ever seen.

With their use of bold colors, linear forms, and largely asymmetrical designs, they have married form and function in a stunningly beautiful way. Words can't do them justice.

To see some of these quilts, click here, here, here, and here.

To read and learn more, click here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Items for purchase: a PBS DVD and books.

Deep thought for the day

Rejection is the occasional cost of doing; it is almost never fatal.

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Marcus Aurelius on Tranquility

"Men seek retreats for themselves, houses in the country, seashores, and mountains... But this is altogether a mark of the most common sort of men, for it is in thy power whenever thou shalt choose to retire into thyself.

[T]ranquility is nothing else than the good ordering of the mind. Constantly then give to thyself this retreat, and renew thyself."

-- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Part IV, paragraph 3