The Artist and the Orchard: A Memoir

I now hold the book in my hands. I’m surprised by its slight weight, it’s smooth surface. The cover painting is a detail from a watercolor of the orchard and inside are the rows of trees: training in the Noh Theater in Kyoto, raising my children in the old Baptist church in Groton, Massachusetts, moving to Old Frog Pond Farm in nearby Harvard, restoring an abandoned orchard, Zen Buddhist training, and the important personal relationships that have shaped my life.

The book leaning against the wall sculpture, Repetition of Days, from “The Agricultural Tool Series.”

Like a sapling, this writing has taken years to bear fruit. I have written mostly in winter. However, soon after settling into a writing schedule, the first warmth fills the air and the farming season begins. The doing takes over—the weeding, the planting, the tending. I’ve had to learn patience. While the apple trees have had to withstand a freak October ice storm, vole attacks, and the confusion of spring coming far too early, I’ve also lived through challenging events. The hope, of course, is that I am a little stronger. After all, like the trees, we can learn to be resilient and generous despite the inevitable setbacks the wild beasts leave at our door.

Now the published book is here and I hope many of you will celebrate with me on Saturday, October  30th at 2 pm. We’ll meet at Sanctuary, a recently restored large church in the center of Maynard, Massachusetts. In keeping with the community of individuals of who have contributed to the becoming of the book, a few musicians and poets will share the stage with me. Seating will be around small tables and make it possible to maintain social distances. We’ll wear masks and vaccination certificates will be checked at the door (or a PCR test within three days.)

Copies of The Artist the Orchard: A Memoir will be for sale. If you have already bought one, come anyway and I’ll sign your book. If you live far away, the memoir is now available from the publisher, Loom Press, local bookstores as well as at bookstore.org and other online sites.

Enjoy the new season, and I look forward to sharing this event with you.

One Heart

The oaks reveal their stark and pointed branches now that their leaves have fallen to the ground. They reach for the clouds; they scallop the sky. They shimmer in ripples in the pond. But near the bank where the soft and leafy ground meets the water, there is only darkness. Shade cast by the white pines extends out from the land. I travel through this darkness as if on a turtle’s back, out almost to the middle of the pond.

Turtle Refuge, bronze, LH 2020

We ride beyond the quivering muddiness, beyond the discomforts, beyond the thick pines that obscure any light or shape to where the branches point direction.

We ride in a small boat—fellow refugees, activists, seekers, artists, and poets. What can we do during these strange times?  What has meaning when so much is taken away? Where can we find something that holds? A place to land.

Boat Refuge, wax, 2020, LH

I search for a place where pond and sky meet inside my body—where I can form love with warm wax pressed between my fingertips. I made this small sketch, an idea for a new sculpture.

After finishing it, (it’s at the foundry and I don’t have a photo of the final version in wax) I started work on One Heart, three times as large.

One Heart, wax, 2020 LH in the studio. (15”H x 14”W x 6”D)

I sent a photo to a friend and moments later she sent back this poem by Li-Young Lee.

  One Heart

Look at the birds. Even flying
is born

out of nothing. The first sky
is inside you, open

at either end of the day.
The work of wings

was always freedom, fastening
one heart to every falling thing. 

I quickly wrote back, “How could you find such a perfect poem? A thousand falling hearts in the open sky to you!!”

She answered, “I love it so much it's taped to the inside lid of my incense box at the office. I read it every day.”

Next will be a larger heart. Maybe there will be room for birds and flowers, a few fish and trees on this one. After all, we are in relationship with everything else. We are interdependent and interconnected. We are one heart.

Juggling Flowers, Fruit, and Vegetables

The Garden: photo Robert Hesse

Raspberries, butternut squash, and tomatoes have taken over my Saturday mornings when I would normally write the blog for Sunday. I know how to juggle three balls from my days as a professional mime, but throw in a little art, add some poetry, and the juggling gets even more thrilling.

Our Outdoor Sculpture Exhibit, Around the Pond and through the Woods on the theme of REFUGE continues Thursdays through Sundays, 11 - 4 pm.

Refuge Within, Liz Fletcher: Photo Robert Hesse

Walt Whitman visits the farm on Saturday, September 19th at 2 pm.
We will be hosting a visit from the towering Walt Whitman. If you’ve never seen Stephen Collins’ portrayal of the young, questioning Whitman, as well as the aging brilliant raconteur of love and longing, this is a rare opportunity to enjoy it en plein air. Stephen will be performing in front of the pond near my studio. Flinging Whitman’s words to the open sky makes Whitman’s poetry soar. I imagine even the kingfishers will pause to listen. Seating is limited so RSVP to reserve your seat. Tickets: $15.

Live Plein Air Poetry on Sunday afternoon, September 20th at 3 pm.
Join 26 poets sharing the poems they have written for Refuge, our online chapbook of site-specific poetry, inspired by the fields, pond, garden, trees, and creatures who live at the farm. The Zoom event will feature photographs by Brent Mathison who traced the paths of the poets and captured the glow of their words. Lynn Horsky designed the elegant chapbook. Poetry Editor Susan Edwards Richmond will be our host. You can join the livestream of this event beginning at 3 pm Sunday, at  facebook.com/OldFrogPondFarm and download the chapbook at at: penandanvil.com/hw/chapbooks.  There will be an opportunity to order a digital print copy as well.

On Saturday, September 26th we celebrate Bolton Harvard Open Studios from 10—4 pm.

When the farm season ends, I look forward to returning to more intimate blog post writing. Meanwhile, I hope you are keeping all your balls in the air!

Linda Hoffman, A Mudhead Mime, 1975

See Change

For those of you who live in the Greater Boston area, here’s something wonderful to see!  See Change is Studio Without Walls’ new exhibit of site-responsive sculpture along the Riverway Park in Brookline. The exhibit was to have opened in April but was postponed indefinitely because of Covid. Now, through the downright doggedness of its founder, Bette Ann Libby, and the willingness of the Brookline Parks and Open Spaces Department, it’s open to the public, free—and a pure delight! When Holly Cyganiewicz and I were installing our sculpture, A Tree Grows in Brookline, two fathers, both with children under three years old, stopped to chat. They walk this lovely oasis every day while on childcare duty. We’ll be back, they each said.

A Tree Grows in Brookline, Linda Hoffman and Holly Cyganiewicz; tree trunk with burl, painted curly willow branches

I was delighted to see Bob Shannahan’s life-size Mastodon and its Mother, made with alder and sumac branches, a sculpture exhibited at Old Frog Pond Farm last fall. And to find,Julie Lupien Nussbaum’s Alien Fishery, where she’s augmented the lone fish accompanying her sculpture Vodnik with Cruel Shoes also exhibited at the farm, and created a school of fish hanging from a high oak branch. If there’s a slight breeze, when you pause to watch, they turn as one body. Some sculptures in this family-friendly exhibit respond to the devastation of our planet, others to the need for justice and equality, and some captivate and offer hope for the future with their colors and shapes.

Studios Without Walls is a Brookline-based collaborative group of sculptors and conceptual artists who produce exhibitions of art in outdoor and public settings. Their commitment is to bring art to their community and educate audiences to appreciate and participate with outdoor sculpture. Photographs of this year’s installations, site maps, as well as treasure hunt clues are online at Studios Without Walls. Globe Correspondent Karen Campbell wrote in her glowing review, “With sculptures tailored to nestle in and around the trees, a leisurely amble offers a surprising visual treat of clever, substantive, thought-provoking art.”

Bllnkah II Liz Helfer; broken windshield glass

Brookline’s Parks and Open Space director said, “Brookline’s Studios Without Walls affirms the power of art to change your perspective.” The thirteen participating artists are Gail Jerauld Bos, Grey Held, Liz Helfer, Linda Hoffman and Holly Cyganiewicz, Janet Kawada, Bette Ann Libby, Julie Lupien Nussbaum, Madeleine Lord, Maria Ritz, Bob Shannahan, Marnie Sinclair, Allen M. Spivack, and Delanie Wise.

The exhibit is open through September 7, 2020. Wear your masks, stay six feet apart, and take a stroll along the Muddy River. The Longmont T stop will take you there and free parking is available on nearby streets.

Thank you Brookline Parks and Open Spaces, sponsors and supporters of Studios Without Walls, and especially the artists. We all want to “See Change”!!