Chicago: Oak Park’s Frank Lloyd Wright and “Papa” Hemingway

Posted on June 26, 2013 by Patty

I believe in God, only I spell it Nature.
– Frank Lloyd Wright, American architect and interior designer, Truth Against the World: Frank Lloyd Wright Speaks for an Organic Architecture

The front of Frank Lloyd Wright’s first home and studio.

When traveling with children, adults have to find the balance between visiting sites that children will enjoy and doing things they will enjoy. On our third day of our Chicago vacation from last week, it was our turn: We took the train to Oak Park, which is 10 miles west of the Chicago Loop, to tour Frank Lloyd Wright’s first home and studio and the other homes that he designed. While our kids weren’t thrilled to walk to 20 sites, they retained some of the information from the audio portion of the tour, which I consider a small victory.

Exterior detail of Wright’s home.

Oak Park became a destination for Chicagoans who fled for wide open spaces after the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, which killed hundreds and destroyed more than three miles of the city. So just in case the house next door went up in flames, one’s property line would be far enough away to be safe from catching fire. Our touring day could not have been any better – warm but pleasant, with low humidity and a slight breeze. Led by a guide, we saw his home and attached studio first, which had beautiful stained-glass and leaded-glass windows, built-ins, interesting ceiling lines, and sconces that showed off a house wired for electricity.

The beautiful children’s room.

Wright’s mother, to whom he was very close and who bought the house next door to his home, knew he was going to become a famous architect. His mother, who was a teacher, fostered this belief by hanging photos of buildings around his crib. The top floor of his home features a very large open room that was called the children’s room. He didn’t believe that children should be seen and not heard – the prevailing Victorian attitude. An interesting piece of information: His mother and wife developed the concept of kindergarten – no doubt in that great room – by letting their children play with building blocks, which was the foundation for the kindergarten curriculum. In addition, Wright’s son created Lincoln Logs.

The Frank Thomas House, 1901, 210 Forest Avenue, Oak Park.

Wright had to borrow money from his mentor and boss, Louis Sullivan, whom he called Lieber Meister for beloved master, in order to build the house for his wife and growing family. Sullivan helped shape Wright’s career and influenced what became known as the Prairie School of Architecture. They parted ways when Sullivan discovered that Wright had designed a number of homes on the side, which was a violation of his contract. The many homes we saw on the tour were in fact Wright’s early bootleg homes. They all represented the Prairie School of Architecture’s philosophy of being close to Nature. The style is characterized by earthy interior and exterior colors, horizontal lines, obscured front doors, rows of vertical windows, and integration with the landscape. The massive Unity Church was an artistic breakthrough for Wright, who realized while designing and building this church that “the reality of the building is the space within” – in other words, the walls and roof don’t define the building.

The Frederick C. Robie house in Chicago.

We also toured the Robie House (5757 South Woodlawn Avenue, Chicago, 312.994.4000), which is a U.S. National Historic Landmark located on the campus of the University of Chicago in the Hyde Park neighborhood. Wright considered this house the crowning achievement of the Prairie style and ultimately the structure that he cared about the most in terms of preservation. Designed and built between 1908 and 1911 for Frederick Robie, a successful businessman, and his family, the house cost nearly $60,000, which is the equivalent to approximately $1.3 million today. Interestingly enough, the built-in dining room cabinets are made of plywood, which at the time was a new technologically advanced building material.

The Nathan G. Moore House, 1895/1923, 333 Forest Avenue, Oak Park.

Robie only lived there for a little over a year; he was forced to sell to pay off his father’s debts when his father passed away and his wife divorced him after finding out about his mistress and his frequent trips to brothels. Two more families lived in the house, with the last family selling it to a seminary, which turned it into a dormitory for married students. Two plans to demolish the house were defeated, with the last attempt in 1957 bringing out Wright, at age 90, to protest via a press conference. The house was saved and donated to the University of Chicago in 1963, and has been undergoing restoration since 1997 by the Frank Lloyd Wright Preservation Trust. There is still much to be done before the house is returned to its former glory, but historians have been working painstakingly to ensure that the house reflects its original state.

Hills-DeCaro House, 1896/1906, 313 Forest Avenue, Oak Park.

I have long been a fan of Arts and Crafts, Art Deco, and Frank Lloyd Wright architecture, mostly for their devotion to simplicity and attention to detail. Seeing the intricate patterns in the stained-glass windows and rugs and lighting fixtures, the murals in his first house, and the built-ins was definitely a spiritual moment for me and a very moving experience – you truly feel close to Nature. If you’re ever in Chicago, touring Oak Park and the architectural buildings in the City is a must to fully appreciate the history of this great area.

Hemingway’s legacy in Oak Park
As a writer, you should not judge, you should understand.
– Ernest Hemingway, American author and journalist

Paying homage to “Papa” Hemingway.

By the time we finished up our Frank Lloyd Wright tour and walked to Ernest Hemingway’s birthplace (339 N Oak Park Avenue, Oak Park, IL 60302, 708.848.2222), I only had an hour to do either the tour of his birthplace home or the museum. I could not do both. I stole a glance around the first floor of the three-story Victorian house, which was decorated in period style. When I was told by the guides that the tour focused on the first six years of his life in his grandfather’s house (his family moved afterwards to a house that his mother designed and had built) and that the museum, which is located in the Oak Park Arts Center (200 N Oak Park Avenue) a few blocks away, was comprehensive and focused on his writing career, I opted for the museum – while the kids grabbed a bite to eat. My appetite was literary.

The Oak Park Center, which houses the Hemingway Museum.

I wish I could have done both, but the museum was a treasure trove of Hemingway memorabilia and had numerous artifacts that required more than an hour of one’s time to see and read everything, including two videotapes that were running in a loop. Hemingway was born on July 21, 1899, and went to school through high school in Oak Park.

I took a seminar on Hemingway when I was an undergrad at UC Davis, and I loved reading his novels and short stories, sharing and discussing what was going on in his stories, and examining the structure and rhythm of his sentences and the choice of his words. One of the best pieces of advice Hemingway has given to other writers is his famous theory of omission, from Death in the Afternoon: If a writer of prose knows enough of what he is writing about he may omit things that he knows and the reader, if the writer is writing truly enough, will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them. The dignity of movement of an ice-berg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water. A writer who omits things because he does not know them only makes hollow places in his writing. He also wrote, “Never confuse movement with action,” which is another great lesson for writers.

The crowded room that housed myriad photos and other memorabilia from Hemingway’s life.

I knew that he was an ambulance driver during WWI and was injured by trench mortar and machine gun fire while passing out supplies to soldiers in Italy in 1918. I knew that he fell in love with one of the nurses who cared for him and that she eventually gave in to his advances, but when he returned to the States, she wrote him a Dear John letter. It was fascinating to read Agnes Von Kurowsky’s letter. Little did she know that her letter would be displayed in a museum for all to read!

Some interesting things I learned: His high school teachers gave him a solid foundation for his writing. One teacher in particular had her pupils imitate the writing styles of well-known authors, which I think is a great exercise. Instead of going to college, Hemingway became a cub reporter for the Kansas City Star newspaper, which taught him to be the writer that he best known for: short sentences, short first paragraphs, and vigorous English. There were so many things to see and read that I could not get through in an hour. Another trip to Chicago warrants another trip to Oak Park, which is also a quaint, bucolic town by itself. After leaving the museum, I felt inspired and look forward to rereading some of Hemingway’s classic novels and short stories.

I leave you with this Hemingway quote: “My aim is to put down on paper what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way.”

The Simpson Dunlop House, 1896 by E. E. Roberts, 417 Kenilworth Avenue. Not a Wright design, but just another beautiful home in Oak Park.

Chicago: Architectural boat tour and Museum of Science and Industry

Posted on June 21, 2013 by Patty

What is the chief characteristic of the tall office building? It is lofty. It must be tall. The force and power of altitude must be in it, the glory and pride of exaltation must be in it. It must be every inch a proud and soaring thing, rising in sheer exaltation that from bottom to top it is a unit without a single dissenting line.
– Louis Sullivan, American architect, The Tall Office Building Artistically Considered, 1898

The few brave souls to take the river cruise on a cold June morning.

A River cruise of Chicago architecture
Upon recommendation of friends, we booked a boat tour of Chicago’s riverfront architecture. The morning of the tour was cold and foggy, but we persevered. The sites were no less impressive. Victor, our tour guide, was well versed in the history of Chicago’s architecture, as was expected, but he was so passionate about sharing that history and being a voice in preserving the riverfront’s architectural integrity. We started at the Navy Pier and worked our way up two of the three forks in the river.

Chicago’s riverfront skyscrapers on a foggy morning.

It is amazing to learn about the history of buildings. For instance, the U.S. postal building was this massive building built in the early twentieth century to accommodate the Federal Reserve printing notes and stock certificates and the large mail-order business of Sears and other retail companies. Snail mail has given way to the Internet as a common form of communication, which has led to the postal building’s demise. It has sat empty for years, awaiting redevelopment plans to transform it into residential and retail use.

The riverfront is home to a mix of buildings – some post-industrial and massive, others tall and slender, and created out of green glass and steel. All rising to create a beautiful cityscape. While there are disputes as to which city had the first skyscraper, Chicago’s Home Insurance Building, completed in 1885 but no longer in existence, has been recognized for being the first to be framed in steel. One of my favorite buildings is the Tribune Tower, with its Gothic crown and flying buttresses. Interestingly, Colonel Robert McCormick, the head of the Chicago Tribune requested that journalists embed fragments of historically significant buildings from all over the world into the base of the Tribune Tower. Such fragments include the Taj Mahal, the Great Wall of China, and the Alamo in San Antonio, TX. Another favorite is the Wrigley Building, owned by the chewing gum tycoon, which was the tallest building in Chicago when it was built in the early 1920s.

A skyline of old and new buildings.

Playing with shadows, magnetic magic, and falling colored chips on a screen.

Museum of Science and Industry
Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry (5700 South Lake Shore Drive, 773.684.1414), which opened in 1933, is the largest science museum in the Western Hemisphere. It houses 35,000 artifacts and nearly 14 acres of scientific experiences, and is located in a massive building near the University of Chicago campus. We were there for five hours, and it wasn’t enough time to see everything that we were interested in seeing. At times overwhelming, the museum is best approached in small chunks; we slowly made our way around each section of the floor, though some exhibits were sold out or we had to make decisions about what we really wanted to see in the amount of time we had.

We saw the film The Last Reef in the Omnimax Theater, a five-story, domed, wraparound theater. The reef is near the Bikini Atoll, part of the Micronesia Islands of the Pacific Ocean. It was amazing to see marine life from the ocean floor, magnified. What stood out for me is seeing the abandoned decommissioned ships and stone statues that are deliberately sunk to encourage coral and other life to grow and create new “communities.” The stone statues are, ironically, people with their eyes closed. Many already were covered with algae and other life forms. The statues are haunting and mesmerizing.

A real German submarine is on display for people to walk through.

Jacob’s favorite exhibit was the U-505 submarine, the only German submarine in the United States’ possession. This submarine was captured on June 4, 1944. There were 37 bunk beds in the submarine, but at one time 59 sailors were on the boat, which meant that while men slept in the lice-infested beds, others worked. They were often out to sea for roughly four months, with nary a shower or a washing of their clothes. Isabella’s favorite exhibit was Genetics and the Baby Chick Hatchery, which featured an incubator where new-born chicks had just chipped their way out of their shells. You could see many eggs with cracks, but we’re told that it can take up to 10 hours for a chick to get out of its shell, after 21 days of a hen laying an egg.

The massive Science Storms exhibit.

Science Storms was an impressive and expansive exhibit that showed how avalanches and tornadoes are created in large scale. The Great Train Story connects Seattle to Chicago through 1,400 feet of track and more than 20 miniature trains traversing across miniature mountains, valleys, and towns. We all love trains, especially older trains, so it was a thrill to pretend we were traveling on the Silver Streak, the Pioneer Zephyr, which was one of the country’s first diesel-electric streamlined passenger trains. Just like on the airplanes, cars were divided up into coach, business class, and first class, which was a private compartment that seated six in the last car. Farm Tech was a strange exhibit in that it was about the latest innovations in agriculture. Can you say genetically modified organisms?

Checking out how static electricity works.

After returning to the Loop, we attempted to catch dinner at Frontera Grill (445 North Clark Street, 312.661.1434), the Rick Bayless restaurant, well known for its Mexican cuisine. With two starving children, we couldn’t swing the two-hour wait. Another strikeout in terms of enjoying recommended Chicago food. We have not given up on making it to recommended restaurants. Stay tuned.

Airplanes from different time periods soar over a replica of downtown Chicago at the Museum of Science and Industry.

Chicago: The Shedd Aquarium, Field Museum, Millennium Park, and more

Posted on June 18, 2013 by Patty

Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning…proud to be Hog Butcher, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and Freight Handler to the Nation.
– Carl Sandburg, American poet and writer

The first and last time I was in Chicago was for an industry conference three years ago in early April. The first day of the conference at McCormick Place, I looked out the convention center windows with amazement as the snow came “down” horizontally, thanks to the cold and wind off Lake Michigan. Although I stayed a few days after the conference, I didn’t get to see much of the city, but I knew I would return.

The Chicago skyline from the Shedd Aquarium.

So it is June: Here we are on family vacation and I have my check-off list for the week. We gave the kids a list of sites and told them to look them up on the Internet, tell us something about each site, and let us know which ones they were interested in seeing and why. At the top of Isabella’s list was the Shedd Aquarium (1200 South Lake Shore Drive, 312.939.24380) – it was Jacob’s close second. She loves animals and marine animals the most, next to dogs and horses. I admit that thoughts of going off to antique shops while they went to the aquarium came to mind. I figured if you’ve been to the Monterey Bay Aquarium there was no need to go to another aquarium. I was pleasantly surprised.

The leopard shark at the Shedd Museum.

The Shedd Aquarium is huge – and not a crowded as Monterey. Isabella got to touch a sturgeon, we saw an exhibit of the marine life from the Great Lakes, we watched some amazing fish swim in the round tank that is the Pritzker Caribbean Reef, and we saw many sharks – including the leopard shark with its interesting tail fin – at the Amazon Rising and Wild Reef exhibits. We took in the aquatic show of beluga whales, penguins, and dolphins. I’m not usually a fan of watching these kinds of shows, but our emcee explained that they train the animals, which happens to be conveniently entertaining, in order to get them used to being handled for their medical check-ups. I appreciated knowing that piece of information. For the kids’ sake, I endured the Ice Age 4D mini-movie, which was also shown at the aquarium.

The impressive Field Museum.

After the aquarium, we walked over to the Field Museum (1400 South Lake Shore Drive, 312.922.9410), Chicago’s natural history museum. We watched a 3D movie on the woolly mammoths and the other big animals of the Ice Age, saw a lot of dinosaur casts and original skeletons, including Sue, the most complete Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton ever discovered. Jacob used to love dinosaurs, and he and Isabella had a field day naming them all, which were housed in the sprawling and comprehensive Evolving Planet exhibit.

Sue the T-Rex.

We had spent so many hours at the aquarium that we rushed through the Field Museum, which is impressive for its massive building and numerous exhibits. We’ll have to catch the Inside Ancient Egypt and the other exhibits another time. I recognized Bushman, the giant gorilla who was orphaned as an infant and lived the rest of his life in captivity at Chicago’s Lincoln Park Zoo. I remembered reading about him when I was a child and being intrigued by photos of him, especially his human facial expressions. When he died on New Year’s Day 1951, his massive body was stuffed and is on exhibit at the Field Museum.

The peaceful Lurie Garden in Millennium Park, with the city skyline above.

We walked back from the two sites along the waterfront. It was a balmy warm late afternoon, perfect for seeing the Clarence Buckingham Memorial Fountain in Grant Park and the Lurie Garden – with its wooden walkways and shallow troughs of water that was home to coins and weary bare feet, including my daughter’s – at Millennium Park. From there we walked through a free concert at the Jay Pritzker Pavilion, which was designed by Frank Geary, who – David tells me – is a famous contemporary architect who designed, among other structures, the Disney Opera House in Los Angeles. The kids weren’t interested in staying for the concert, but afterwards I ventured back to listen to the music of Daniel Lanois, who is a producer for artists such as Bob Dylan and Peter Gabriel but also a songwriter and musician, known for his pedal-steel infused music.

Millennium Park hosts terrific free concerts all summer long.

After a long walk, the kids were relieved when we finally came upon one of our destinations – The Bean. I’d seen it before, but it is such a mesmerizing sculpture that I don’t think I will ever tire of or be jaded seeing it again. I was also looking forward to showing them the Crown Fountain, with its twin glass towers facing each other and faces of local residents reflected on the glass. After a certain amount of time they open their mouths to spout out a stream of water. When I first saw it, nobody was around with a chill in the April air. But today the shallow pool between the glass towers was a noisy playground, with a bunch of screaming kids in swimsuits skipping and running through the water and then clamoring beneath the gushing water coming from the towers’ mouths. It was a quintessential Chicago summer scene.

The Bean in all its polished glory.

We returned to Lurie Garden because The Purple Pig (500 North Michigan Avenue, 312.464.1744), which was highly recommended to us, was too crowded to get in. Dark clouds scuttled above us and soon sprinkles and then a light rain fell. We left our umbrellas at our hotel room, but I’m not sure we would have opened them if we’d had them, given that nobody seemed to notice the rain at all. It is the difference between hardy Midwesterners and Californians.

View of The Bean from underneath.

We ended up eating a late dinner at The Gage (24 South Michigan Avenue, 312.372.4243), which was recommended by local friend Maria Diecidue and not too far from where our hotel is. It’s a boisterous tavern restaurant. Jacob and I ordered seared sea scallops with Korean BBQ short ribs and Chinese broccoli with toasted peanuts and kimchi, which was nicely paired with a smooth Oregon pinot noir. After eating the tender scallops, I realized that all the scallops I have eaten before in my life have been overcooked. Isabella ordered chicken strips and fries. Being a French fry fiend, I couldn’t help reaching across the table to snag some fries. I couldn’t stop eating them. Crispy on the outside, the fries had a consistency inside that was like whipped potatoes – light and fluffy and like “buttah” – seriously. I have never had a better French fry, and I fear none will ever come close.

The Crown Fountain spouts off.

We’re staying at the Congress Plaza Hotel (520 South Michigan Avenue, 312.427.3800), which is close to many of the attractions on our list. It’s a historic hotel, of which many former Presidents have been guests. David pointed out that it is old in the classic European way. And, in the classic European tradition, we have a room with a view. The “L” train rumbles through the Loop below us and the skyline is graced with the Willis (nee Sears to the locals and will always be referred to as the Sears) Tower and the rooftop of the Chicago Public Library’s Harold Washington Library Center branch, with its painted aluminum – to look like copper with patina – owls sheltered by acroteria at the corners of the building. The architectural history, the architecture overall, the Loop – it doesn’t get any better than this.

My blog tradition of posting my room with a view.

Vintage love: antique document holder necklace

Posted on May 29, 2013 by Patty

She’s a hypnotist collector
You are a walking antique
– Bob Dylan, American musician and singer-songwriter, from She Belongs To Me

The cut-out patterned back of a retro-inspired jacket from D’Jour Floral.

Across the street from Fat Apple’s Restaurant in El Cerrito is a store called D’Jour Floral (7512 Fairmount Avenue, El Cerrito, 525.7232). I have never gone in the store, though every time I see it I think to myself, I should check it out. A few weeks ago, after Mother’s Day breakfast, I ventured in for only a few minutes. Nobody else in our family wanted to go inside, so I took a quick inventory and made a mental note to return.

The following Sunday, after meeting my Monday Mom’s group for breakfast at Fat Apple’s, I ventured in again and this time I had the luxury of wandering around the shop. As one neighbor described it, there’s a lot of kitsch. It is a confusing store – floral shop, new vintage-inspired clothing, vintage items, and, okay, a lot of kitsch. But for those of us who love a good vintage hunt, I rolled up my sleeves and examined everything on the walls and in the display cases. That’s when I found Vivian.

Antique sterling silver document holder necklace.

When I asked to see this unusual sterling silver very thin case, the older woman, who was the owner, said, “Oh, you want to see Vivian.” The name was engraved on the piece. It was lightweight in my palm. It was intricate and in incredible shape (save for two dents in the bottom corners), and it looked like it came from the Victorian era. There are no markings and it is unsigned. The owner told me it was made in the 1880s and was used to store documents. She told me it belonged to a woman who had come through Ellis Island and had kept her important papers inside. I had this romantic vision of this woman coming from some Eastern European country and making her way out West. Do I believe the owner of the store? Perhaps it belonged to a relative of the person who had sold it to the owner and told her this story. I do want to believe it. I went home and looked up on the Internet variations “antique sterling silver document holder necklace,” but I didn’t come up with anything that looked like Vivian. I saw vintage filigree sterling silver scroll document holders that were cylindrical-shaped, but not shaped like a flat compact, which I assumed was likely more common.

Like a lighter, the top or cap is on a hinge.

The price was too dear for the piece, but the owner told me she was closing down the store because she couldn’t keep using her retirement money to keep it open. She was planning on discounting everything starting the following week. So I returned the following week, we bargained, and now Vivian is home with me. I continue to search on the Internet, but if any of my vintage-loving friends come across the history of the document holder that looks like Vivian, please share!

My I Love Lucy look: retro jacket on the clearance rack at D’Jour Floral and slim trousers.

Oh, the treasures you’ll find when you least look for it. But you have to be open to opportunities and allow your curiosity to take you to those places you keep telling yourself you don’t have time to seek out. The shop is scheduled to close mid-June. I will go back to get some chandelier crystal pieces that the owner removed from a vintage chandelier. I am intrigued by a WWII Japanese gas mask that is hanging from a rack. It is fascinating, and yes, haunting and dark. So, I ask: How do you style that, or display that? David just merely asks: Why? Indeed!

Mixing vintage, retro-inspired, and contemporary: earrings from a trip to Boston, Anthropologie etched clear bangle, and my mother’s ring given to her by her parents.

Red trousers are a shoo-in to pair with this cut-out jacket, while keeping the accessories clean and simple.

Tana Hakanson: The Artist’s journey home (Part II)

Posted on May 27, 2013 by Patty

Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.
– Maria Robinson, American writer

Tana working on a painting of a figure in her home studio.

Abstract painting: The Balancing act
Abstract painting is much more difficult than many people may imagine, according to artist Tana Hakanson. Balance, composition, color, and contrast are as equally important in non-representational art as they are in representational art. “I’m learning to let go of thinking about what I’m doing too much and let the painting process evolve naturally, while at the same time evaluating the piece along the way for all of the elements that make a painting work,” she said. “It’s a balancing act between letting it happen and making it happen.” Artists can plan out the process when working on a representational piece of art, such as a painting of a still life, because they have a preconceived notion of the end product. In abstract painting, however, the work evolves as you go along, according to Tana.

Tana’s sketch of a dancer.

“Each painting seems to takes on a life of its own, so trying to get the materials to do the same thing that they did the day before is futile,” she said. Her best paintings have “seemed to come easily and happen by themselves.” The director of her graduate program’s art department painted while watching television to distract him from the act of painting so his art would just “come out.” While Tana appreciates his theory, she prefers to be more engaged in the moment. “I wouldn’t want to miss anything!” she said. Being in the moment happens away from the canvas, as well. Sometimes she’ll wake up in the middle of the night or be walking outdoors and “get colors in my head.” When those moments come to her, she says, with a big smile, “I get inspired. And that’s the magic of it.”

Art and nature
Not surprisingly, Tana is inspired by nature and glazed pottery, specifically textures that occur through natural processes such as geologic formations and colors in rocks, which make the end product unpredictable and unique. Last year she experimented with paint flowing vertically. This year she is playing with organic shapes, as well as letting paint flow around the canvas, with her only manipulation being the choice of colors and size of the canvas, then working with what comes out of it. With each painting changing as it dries, Tana says she never knows what the outcome will be. “I would like to think that my paintings are like nature at work and I’m participating in the play of nature,” she said.

Tana’s painting from her series of wood paintings.

Tana is fascinated by quantum physics, fractals, and how nature creates “incredible, beautiful things.” She’s also interested in chaos theory and how nature is predictable in its unpredictability. “Perhaps since we are nature ourselves, we are drawn to nature’s aesthetic, which, though it has patterns, also always has something different thrown in which creates vibrancy,” she said. The works of artists who inspire her share similar themes. San Francisco artist Saundra MacPherson, whose work of layers upon layers of texture is informed by geology, invited Tana to her studio six years ago when Tana saw her work online and wrote her a letter of appreciation. She credits MacPherson with encouraging her to keep going and keep experimenting with her art. Local artist Stephen Bruce, who works with acid on metal, which creates forms via natural processes, is another source of inspiration.

Tana captures the fluidity of dancers in her sketches.

Doing what you love: Tana as inspiration
A philosophical person at heart, Tana has experienced “a lot of existential angst” in her 46 years. Finding daily tasks “often dull and boring,” and “modern life to be sometimes disjointed and vapid,” she has always been on a quest to get deeper into the “essence of things,” which is why she was drawn to art early on and why it was inevitable that she returned to painting. “I’m not sure what it all means, but I have learned that life is short,” she said. “If you’re cutting yourself off from the things that you love and that have meaning to you, you’re not helping the world. So do what you love – even if it’s carving out a bit of time for it initially. Make it work somehow, no matter where you are in your life.”

Tana Hakanson will show her new work at this year’s East Bay Open Studio, sponsored by Pro Arts the first two weekends in June (1-2 and 8-9), from 11am to 6pm, at her home at 1633 Mariposa Street, Richmond, CA 94804. You can also see her work at Tana Hakanson Studio. Support the arts! Let Tana know that you read about her work here.

Editor’s note: Part I of Tana Hakanson: The Artist’s Journey Home was published here on Friday, May 24.

Tana Hakanson: The Artist’s journey home (Part I)

Posted on May 24, 2013 by Patty

The object isn’t to make art, it’s to be in that wonderful state which makes art inevitable. – Robert Henri, American painter and teacher

Preface
I’ve known Tana Hakanson going on eight years this autumn, when our first-born sons entered kindergarten. Thus began years of volunteering at our children’s elementary school and seemingly endless, idyllic afternoons on the playground, our homes and other friends’ homes, and at various child-centered venues for playdates – while we worked outside of the home full-time. As we got to know one another, we developed a special kinship centered in the arts: Tana is an artist, a painter, and I am a fiction writer. Our bond was deepened by our love of paint and words, respectively, and the shared frustration of not having the time or energy to explore our craft and nourish our souls. Through the years, we commiserated with one another, offered encouraging words, and congratulated the incremental victories of finishing a painting and completing a revision of the novel.

Two-thousand thirteen promises to be an important year for the both of us, as we dive deep and make headway into living our creative lives: My novel, after a 16-year journey, will finally be completed later this year, and Tana, who launched her art studio website earlier this year, is preparing for her second open studio.

Tana Hakanson works on a painting at her home studio in the Richmond Annex.

The Artist emerges
This time, last year Tana Hakanson reluctantly signed up to participate in Pro Arts’ East Bay Open Studio last June, at the urging of her husband Mauricio Monsalve. She had returned to painting a year and a half ago, when Mauricio suggested that she reduce her hours as a systems specialist for an adventure travel company to four days a week. But at the time, she felt she didn’t have enough work to present, even though her free Fridays allowed her the block of time she needed to paint. Mauricio knew she was ready, but just needed a push. By the end of the open studio, she had sold 21 paintings and was overwhelmed by the enthusiastic response to her work. As Tana sets up for her second open studio next month, she is better prepared with more work to show and more inspired. More importantly, she has grown so much as an artist.

Tana as a child and budding artist.

Artistic beginnings, hiatus, and return
As a child, Tana loved to draw. When she went to college, however, she studied music under scholarship. She switched majors and graduated with a degree in English and a minor in music, although she managed to take a lot of drawing and painting classes. When she went on an overseas study program in Indonesia, she fell in love with the local art and was inspired by the colors and how art is part of everyday life in Bali. She studied traditional Balinese art and stayed on after the program ended, painting and selling her work to individual art patrons and in a local art gallery in Bali.

After graduation, Tana tried her hand at commercial art, attempting to combine her love of art with earning a living. She did illustrations of books on dogs and cats. “It was really fun, but I realized it wasn’t exactly what I was trying to get out of art,” she recalled. For Tana, art is “personal and spiritual.” She applied to graduate school, hoping to explore that aspect of art. Most of the programs out there, according to Tana, were more conceptual, socially driven, and intellectual, and not focused on the spiritual or philosophical experience of art. The arts and consciousness program at John F. Kennedy University in Berkeley stressed the process of art over art itself and the transformative aspects of art making. Many graduates of the program become art therapists; but Hakanson said, “I didn’t know what I wanted to do with it [the degree], but I knew it was what I wanted to study.”

Getting her masters jump-started her to develop her art further. When she gave birth to her son Marcelo in 2000 and then her son Mateo in 2003, however, Hakanson focused on motherhood, which she describes as a “deep and ongoing experience.” Although she continued sketching – taking her sketchbooks on family road trips – she stopped painting altogether. Working at Wilderness Travel (1102 9th Street, Berkeley, 94710, 800.368.2794) and taking care of her sons after school didn’t leave any time, especially big blocks of time, for painting.

Tana and her family on a recent trip.

She carved out a little time to take up dance, specifically flamenco, which was a different medium for releasing her creativity. “I love the body and I love movement,” she said. “Movement is a way to connect to nature and that energy of life, and it’s transformative in the same way art is.” When her Fridays were freed up, she contemplated dropping flamenco to focus completely on painting. But the movement aspect of dance and dance’s ability to fuel her art and give her energy were important enough to keep both going. “For me, a big aspect of my work is movement,” she said.

Tana’s sketch of a dancer.

Abstract painting: Freedom to experiment
Tana is devoting the next two years to developing her painting, and then marketing her work. For now, with Fridays as her only day for painting, she has just enough pieces for next month’s open studio. Tana feels that she’s learned so much in the last year in terms of working with the materials. “The more I paint, the more I understand how to use the material for what I want to do,” she said. One of her many goals this year is to work with disparity in the tones to create more contrast, which creates depth. “I tend to avoid contrast, because this kind of boldness doesn’t come naturally to me – in painting or in real life,” she explained. “But just like in any aspect of life, you have to face it and keep trying if you want to grow. I have a vision of where I want my art to be, but it’s not something I can really pinpoint.”

An abstract painting from Tana’s series of water paintings.

Experimenting with “liquidy” paint gives her the sense of movement that she is seeking, in both the process itself and the work. “As the paint settles, you can see the energy and flow of movement,” she said. “For me, it’s about freedom to try new things, seeing where it takes me, the unexpected, and surprises along the way,” she said. “The process is the thing for me – then something interesting comes out of it that eventually becomes a painting. Sometimes it just happens naturally – like magic. Sometimes it involves some working and struggling along the way. Mostly it’s some of both, and that interplay makes it compelling.”

A painting dries at the artist’s studio.

The Dress at 50

Live the creative, meaningful, and full life

Category Archives: Arts

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