Steinbeck Planted A Seed

Much of my artwork is inspired by the many places I've been too, and since I have again recently relocated I though it appropriate to share this entry from an old blog here.



28th Street Landing provided by the City of Hoquiam, WA

 I've travelled Americas highways more than most, being a chronic "tumbleweed" or Bohemian, and the interaction with so many personalities has had a wonderful effect on my art and self. I would love to travel Europe someday, but America is quite large enough. I have crossed it many times and still cannot hope to see it all. I was a fan of a book by the writer John Steinbeck when I was young, and that likely had an influence on my travel desire. He wrote, "Travels with Charley" that captured me with charm and adventure off the beaten path. Charley was Steinbecks dog, and I lived with one that looked just like him. Steinbeck had been asked to write about America, but he despised commercialism and tourist traps. He refused to write about or visit the mundane famous locations that middle class America drags children off to by droves each summer. He wanted the real people -- the real America. So he packed off with his dog in a tiny travel camper and went from town to town, staying off of the main highways and onto the back roads of America; That just sounded too romantic for me to resist!
Johns theory was that to know the people you must live with them. So from the time I was 13 years of age I have lived many places. I educated myself, utilizing the public library system in what ever town I happened to have landed in for a time. I "payed" for my education by offering my services in return to the library by performing tasks such as sweeping floors, reading to children and the elderly, working used book sales, artwork and signs, landscaping; what ever I could do. The closest I've come to growing roots under this Tree was the nearly ten years I spent in Washington State; the Great Pacific Northwest. I now find myself back in the family home in Ohio. My husband and I are both open to whatever the future may hold for us. But the Internet now makes it possible for me to grow roots, of a sort, under this Tree and I am grateful.

• http://www.steinbeck.org/Travels.html
• http://www.ci.hoquiam.wa.us/murals.htm Hoquiam has many wonderful works of art that create the town. View some images here that will give an idea, but photographs don't compare to standing in front of these, some times, immense, vivid, creations. The town tells its own story through images and artists.
• * Artist Portfolio

Life influencing art that influenced this artists life!

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