twenty-one :: cultivate/cultivation

barely in time for a monday night posting [thank you pacific time]

today marks the return of shari and my documentary project.

shari chose the word today - cultivate or cultivation.

SHARI'S RESPONSE

cultivation:

i chose the word this week one day as i was sitting in my study looking
out the window at our garden.

note: you may need to click out of a reader to see this video clip::



i love this word. how it rolls off the tongue. how it sounds like hard
work and it is!




walking in the rain.

currently:
am trying to cultivate a playful approach to life. sometimes, i fear i
take things far too seriously.


what are you trying to cultivate in your own life?

MY RESPONSE



this word at first seemed really daunting to me. how do you represent this word in a static image?

of course i thought of planting. getting the soil ready for plants. i started to think about how you can take a garden in various directions. you can cultivate for food, you can cultivate for decoration.



how if you are serious about the idea of growing you actually pay attention to soil, to the sun, to PH, to all of these very small details that can make or break your attempt to foster plants.

or how you can also just wing it and magically things will thrive and grow.



how sometimes if you try too hard it doesn't work..... you can't cultivate.



above is my recent japanese print love. the magazine ku:nel . i think it was bluelines that sparked my interest in it.... it's really a great visual treat.... and made me

start wonder about other things we cultivate - like taste in art, or food, or poetry or??? how exactly do we plow, amend and ready our minds and hearts for cultural cultivation? in my role as an educator i'm constantly wondering how to do this - how do you cultivate a love for art? can you? or do you want/can it be something that spontaneously emerges?

and so i repeat shari's question. what are we all trying to cultivate in our lives??