Studio Kiekje

Details from the weekend

 

 

 

* Lovely golden honey with honeycomb in the jar from Reading Terminal Market for a friend who is very close to her wedding day!

* A tissue-thin piece of a butterfly wing found on the ground. I would love to frame it in a small frame, but I'm not quite sure how to do it.

* Reading the sequel to Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm which I finished recently. I somehow missed reading these as a kid, despite the voracious appetite for reading material which I had back then. It's fun to read them now though. They are sort of a poor-man's Anne of Green Gables. I like their naive quality.

I hope you had a wonderful weekend.

Fraktur

 I've been reading this book about some children's book illustrators. I'm particularly fascinated with the chapter on Trina Schart Hyman, who was a favorite of mine growing up. Her version of Little Red Riding Hood is an amazing work of art with strong folk influences.

 

Hyman lived in Sweden for a few years when she first started out, and one of her first jobs was to illustrate a book by Astrid Lindgren. With the money she earned for that book she bought a bright blue tandem bicycle and used it to travel with her husband through Sweden, Denmark, Norway, England and Scotland. The influence of the country-side and towns through which she traveled on this journey can be seen in her work.

 

I was interested to find out too that Hyman was born near Philadelphia and that she was fascinated with the art by the local Pennsylvania Dutch community. In particular she cites Fraktur painting as something she imitated when learning how to draw and paint. I had never heard of Fraktur  despite living in this area, so I turned to the almighty Google to find out more.

 

Fraktur is a style of lettering and illuminated folk art created by the Pennsylvania Dutch community. Many of the pieces created were used as decorative blessings or certificates of baptism, marriage and the like.

 

The illlustrated borders for the text are very appealing to my eye, and I can see that they influenced Hyman's work. I think I would like to go see some of this work in person, especially because a lot of it is from nearby Buck's County, Pennsylvania. Perhaps an adventure for this summer is in the making!

(images of Fraktur in this post come from this  gallery)

wearing a book around my neck

As I mentioned in my last post, I got a beautiful necklace as a birthday/M.A gift from my friends. (Thank you again, Sarah, Johanna and Beth!)

I have seldom owned such an incredible piece of jewelry. What makes it even better, is that it is hand-made by the talented Margaux of The Black Spot Books.

 

It is a miniature black leather book hung on a copper chain. The note which Margaux included with the necklace says that the leather came from an antique chair from Holland in the 1800s.

This totally blows my mind. I'm wearing something around my neck which is almost 200 years old.

I just love this necklace. Within the first 24 hours of owning it, I was complimented by a girl in a local pizzeria. We ended up having a conversation about Etsy and the importance of supporting local artists which was just delightful!

 

I love books and jewelry - so this is a perfect combination for me. I will treasure this gift!

The Black Spot Books shop has other equally lovely offerings, including more book necklaces. But the full size journals and art prints look lovely as well.

Wild Things and Tamales

Yesterday Sean and I had a lovely Philly date. We went to see the amazing Maurice Sendak exhibition at the Rosenbach Museum. Sendak is one of my most favorite artists, and is the illustrator of numerous wonderful children's books including "Where the Wild Things Are" (truly, a classic). The exhibition was very thoughtfully displayed to demonstrate running themes in his work and artistic influences. I always feel in awe of seeing the sketches of an artist, I feel like I'm getting to see a secret in a way. One of my favorite details of the whole show was a little drawing of a girl holding out her nightgown with the text "pink is for nightie". Sean pointed out that it was highly kiekje-ish, and I have to agree. :)

If you get a chance to go to this show, I recommend it so highly! The people who work at the Rosenbach were so friendly and helpful as well. And they gave out these free  hand-outs with little drawings by Sendak that you could pop out of the card stock, as well as the loveliest bookmark I've ever seen:

We collected a few (some of which will be passed on to my little brothers). But I know that one will be framed and hung in a favorite reading nook, I love it so. The mysterious cloaked figures are delightful

While in Philadelphia we also took advantage of Restaurant Week! During Restaurant Week some higher level Philly restaurants offer a prix-fixe menu for $35. We chose Alma de Cuba, and it was fantastic. It was really one of the best meals of my life. Sadly, no pictures, as the restaurant was super dark. But, I did get to try ceviche for the first time, and unsurprisingly, being the raw fish fan that I am, I loved it. The anise flavored tamale was also delicious.

:Sigh: There's this moment in the Daphne du Maurier book "Rebecca" where the protagonist wishes she could bottle up a day so she could relive it. I already want to relive our outing yesterday.

This blog posting brought to you by such words as "awesome", "fantastic", "wonderful", "delicious" and "favorite".

Have a lovely Friday, everyone.