Art and Scavenger Hunts

gouache painting in journal

Painting Found Treasures

…Gathering Items to Paint

Our labrador appearing so calm

waiting for her walk in the park.

For four years I walked with my dog every morning in the city and I often felt like I wanted to stop and paint a picture of a tree, a flower,a building, but the dog would tug at the leash barely giving me time to snap a photograph on my I phone. Soon I made the walks scavenger hunts in which I’d find things to paint. While our labrador might carry her ball or a stick in her mouth, I filled my pockets with items I saw at our feet: feathers, seed pods, leaves, petals, and uncommonly shaped twigs. I’d carry them home and paint and draw them. They became daily items I posted to my Instagram account, records of my daily walking routine, mostly for me.

Collected items painted in watercolor.

After two cancer operations in the last year, my husband and I reluctantly gave our sweet energetic dog to a larger,  younger, more energetic family who have a garden, and other pets outside the city. This freed me for treatment recovery and any future travels we hope to make while hopefully it’s given her a more playful, active life, and fun days with kids and other pets compared with our solitary morning walks outside our city high-rise.  I miss her terribly. I’ve always had animals in my home and the decision to give her away was not made lightly. Even now I reach down and stroke any dog I see, grow tearful seeing black labradors, and snuggle with them if the owners allow me  (which is a difficult request to convey in a foreign language) as I traipse through the same paths for my exercise each day. Giving away our dog was the right choice but a hard personal one. Now I often walk alone to commute, clear my mind, and like so many with exercise apps “I get in my footsteps.” 

Painting  small  treasured objects from nature is like writing poems. 

Sympathy cards printed from journal painting of seed pods

While William Carlos Williams might have stopped to appreciate white chickens by a red wheelbarrow and Emily Dickinson wrote of hope and feathers, I have these small slips of paper with pictures of cones, needles, leaves, and twigs. When I look at them it reminds me to continue to pause,  see, appreciate, and respect the little things of life, the moments that we might overlook because they are beneath us, on the ground.

Now that  I don’t have a pet to walk, nor the time for so many Instagram artwork posts, I enjoy walking the same sidewalks and parks through this city. It’s an opportunity to observe the changes in the same spaces. I take in the way the light and shade shift, clusters of people come and go, and objects blow in the breeze or fall from the trees. I still pick up a feather or rock, tuck it in my pocket, and stash it away in a drawer for future creative projects. 

Pausing to gather and paint simple items is saying they are worthy of notice and respect

Technically, it’s not a “Scavenger Hunt”. It’s serendipitous. I simply intuitively pick up what interests me in the moment. If I’m scavenging or hunting for anything it is the practice and experience of being present and aware. 

Traveling the same paths one has the opportunity to ignore our surroundings thinking it is all just the same dull commute or one can look closer and see the subtle changes and shades of life, and the small items around us can be seen as specific, revealing treasures that punctuate our excursions. These treasures are like the carefully chosen words of a poet, the painting of a picture, a repeated refrain of a song. It is the opposite of “selfies” creating this art. It is a discovery of the ordinary. When I walk and collect and paint it’s as if I’m saying.  I see you- you,  feather,  leaf, flower at my feet, and you too, are worthy of love and affection.”

My favorite tree in Turia Park in Valencia, Spain

The Red Wheelbarrow By William Carlos William

so much depends

upon

a red wheel

barrow

glazed with rain

water

beside the white

chickens

“Hope” is the thing with feathers BY Emily Dickinson

“Hope” is the thing with feathers -

That perches in the soul -

And sings the tune without the words -

And never stops - at all -

And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -

And sore must be the storm -

That could abash the little Bird

That kept so many warm -

I’ve heard it in the chillest land -

And on the strangest Sea -

Yet - never - in Extremity,

It asked a crumb - of me.