tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55055152481899572682024-03-24T00:22:40.451-07:00NoseCULTURE, PLACE, PLANET
("The sense of smell explores." - Brillat-Savarin)Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.comBlogger544125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-24419268570268797402022-11-11T15:04:00.000-08:002022-11-11T15:04:56.960-08:00Don't miss this success story: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/11/world/asia/nepal-reforestration-climate.html?action=click&algo=bandit-all-surfaces-variants-shadow-lda-unique-time-cutoff-30-alpha-0.03&alpha=0.03&block=editors_picks_recirc&fellback=false&imp_id=272466570&impression_id=27fdab7a-6213-11ed-a5c9-8b9df270dfa6&index=1&pgtype=Article&pool=pool%2Fe76d7165-92f7-4bd2-bc6e-298322d3680a®ion=footer&req_id=595139957&shadow_vec_sim=0.10214487901537198&surface=eos-home-featured&variant=0_pers_bandit-lda-uniqueJim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-36612567810296834122022-07-24T07:38:00.000-07:002022-07-24T07:38:30.813-07:00
Praise for Tio and the Blue Witch from the wonderful Mary Norris, former New
Yorker editor and author of Between You and Me, and Greek to Me: "The story
reminded me of The Wizard of Oz, the way the troupe of characters keeps
enlarging and traveling on. I love the Green Knight. And I love the Blue Witch
and Tio the mule. And the art is fantastic. How wonderful that you let your
experiments with ink grow into a story!" Go to: conawayjames.com
Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-71182704959623200582022-06-15T12:58:00.006-07:002022-06-15T13:07:27.881-07:00Tio and the Blue Witch just published. Go to conawayjames.comJim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-81583971831049621842021-11-28T11:41:00.004-08:002021-11-28T11:41:41.160-08:00New Book Coming Soon!<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Ly89vojjqj4/YaPa_Ys1C5I/AAAAAAAAGrA/gm87yJxi06ko_8bjKnzJpzsz4e2v7ITfwCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/Tio%2Band%2Bthe%2BBlue%2BWitch%2BJacket%2Bjpg.jpg" style="display: block; padding: 1em 0; text-align: center; "><img alt="" border="0" height="600" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1557" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Ly89vojjqj4/YaPa_Ys1C5I/AAAAAAAAGrA/gm87yJxi06ko_8bjKnzJpzsz4e2v7ITfwCLcBGAsYHQ/s600/Tio%2Band%2Bthe%2BBlue%2BWitch%2BJacket%2Bjpg.jpg"/></a></div>Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-18010131297968614362020-09-11T05:33:00.003-07:002020-09-11T05:36:25.442-07:00Trump deconstructed. Watch this video from Feral Studio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0-ViNeXwFMJim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-6603071479772382802020-04-03T07:11:00.001-07:002020-04-03T07:11:35.125-07:00More light<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rlU8QeGfiW4/XodD3ixhjMI/AAAAAAAAGQ8/p5b0kLmqFtMuai1KA36AswwOoLrEj-MRwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/Windows%2B2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rlU8QeGfiW4/XodD3ixhjMI/AAAAAAAAGQ8/p5b0kLmqFtMuai1KA36AswwOoLrEj-MRwCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/Windows%2B2.jpg" width="480" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;">Windows #2 (44 inches sq.)</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;">This piece is heavily imbued with paint (the blood isn't the bright permanent rose but the brown spots in the upper left corner) and the color pressed through the muslin. I added the frame - metallic green, not black as it appears - later and I think it makes the painting. It moves the eye to the right and tapers down to open the square to infinity.</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;">None of these Windows piece is stretched yet but simply draped on other paintings already hanging in our house. I like the baggy look but will probably stretch them later.</span></span></div>
Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-5714876937143601102020-03-31T13:12:00.004-07:002020-03-31T13:13:38.393-07:00Glass between us and the world<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Windows 1,</span></b> <span style="font-size: large;">acrylic, acrylic ink and gesso on muslin</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: , , "blinkmacsystemfont" , ".sfnstext-regular" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Eyes on a sequestered world:</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br style="caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;" /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: , , "blinkmacsystemfont" , ".sfnstext-regular" , sans-serif;"> I am working on a new series of paintings, called Windows, that began, in quarantine, noticing the patterns of sunlight on my studio wall. I began sketching the patterns and constantly shifting quality of light on muslin, then after a day or two spreading each canvas on the floor and trying to paint our world as it intrudes through glass panes.</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: , , "blinkmacsystemfont" , ".sfnstext-regular" , sans-serif;"> The medium is acrylic, acrylic ink, gesso, and once or twice my own blood mistakenly left on the canvas after intense application of paint included breaking glass.</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: , , "blinkmacsystemfont" , ".sfnstext-regular" , sans-serif;"> The canvases are then turned over and the paintings pushed through with pressure to appear on the flip side. They can't be viewed for several hours, so uncertainty prevails until the canvas is dry enough to lift and turn.</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: , , "blinkmacsystemfont" , ".sfnstext-regular" , sans-serif;">I'll be showing these and news landscape done in the way way.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: , , "blinkmacsystemfont" , ".sfnstext-regular" , sans-serif;"> Please let me know what you think.</span></span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-85468818704755001292020-01-07T05:59:00.001-08:002020-01-07T05:59:21.675-08:00Read it and weep encore<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/11/the-end-of-silence/598366/">https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/11/the-end-of-silence/598366/</a></span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-62098497588096880332020-01-05T07:41:00.000-08:002020-01-05T09:41:58.827-08:00It's the planet, finally<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: large;"> <span style="font-size: medium;">Please read my columns in </span><i style="font-size: x-large;">American Scholar</i></span><span style="font-size: large;">: <a href="https://theamericanscholar.org/author/james-conaway/">https://theamericanscholar.org/author/james-conaway/</a> </span></div>
Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-38026524965010853492020-01-04T05:37:00.001-08:002020-01-04T05:37:20.480-08:00Enviro cheat sheet<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: x-large;">From the good ole NY Times: </span> <br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"> <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/climate/what-is-climate-change.html">https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/climate/what-is-climate-change.html</a></span><br />
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-30330439290693613882020-01-02T13:17:00.000-08:002020-01-05T06:42:09.260-08:00Tongass!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">I flew to southeast Alaska two decades ago straight into a fight among U.S. Forest Service officials, environmentalists, politicians, and investors over how many trees could be cut in the Tongass National Forest and under what conditions. It was a complicated story that went all the way back to Teddy Roosevelt, who established the protected area in 1902, our largest national forest and a source of interest to such disparate Americans as William Henry Seward, John Muir, and General Douglas MacArthur.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">The Tlingit word rings like struck bronze—<em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Tongass</em>—and denotes most of the Alexander Archipelago, a sloping handle of southeast Alaska fused to British Columbia by glaciers and deep valleys. It harbors, in addition to gorgeous coastal peaks, immense forested slopes, muskegs reflecting like mirror shards, and braided streams feeding an inland extension of the Pacific Ocean.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">Many of its beaches are defined by bleached logs—Sitka spruce, hemlock, and cedar—and all of its 17 million acres are under the aegis of the United States Forest Service. Lately, the question has again arisen as to how a federal agency—the Department of Agriculture, of which the Forest Service is part—can go against the wisdom of many of its own biologists, as well as the views of many American citizens in the long aftermath of the Exxon Valdez, the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill, and ongoing environmental degradation?</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">Americans should be more familiar with the Tongass, the world’s largest intact temperate rainforest and home to the world’s largest concentration of brown bears, which surpass in size even their grizzly cousins to the south. There are also distinct subspecies, like the Alexander Archipelago wolf; wild coho, king, and sockeye salmon like those that once thronged the Columbia and Snake rivers; and birds steadily winging over the threshold of the Endangered Species Act, including the marbled murrelet and the northern goshawk.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">MacArther allowed the bargain-basement cutting and shipping of the Tongass’s rare timber to Japan when he was that nation’s unofficial grand satrap after World War II, a dark period for the Tongass. Remnants of the companies that did this work controlled much of the cut for decades, leaving behind toxic mill sites that still need cleaning up.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">Fortunately, much of the forest has been protected since 2001 by the Roadless Rule, which prevented loggers from carving out new trucking corridors, and cutting rare Sitka spruce and other huge trees. But that is about to change.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">Forest Service lands harbor what writer and environmentalist Edward Abbey called the last of old-time America. By that he meant a wild vastness where Americans can pay homage to nature but also hunt, forage, and even mine as they have since the beginning of our democracy, contributing for better or for worse to what it means to be American.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">The historian Frederick Jackson Turner pointed out in his famous 1893 speech, “The Significance of the Frontier in American History,” that the American character was formed by dealing with the frontier. It fostered self-sufficiency and egalitarianism, and arguably still does. “American democracy was born of no theorist’s dream … nor in the Mayflower to Plymouth,” said Turner. “It came out of the American forest.”</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">Today standing trees on a prodigious scale inspire a broad spectrum of Americans, from tourists to back-packers. In the age of global warming, they have acquired an additional preciousness in that they absorb carbon dioxide and replenish breathable air. But despite all of this (and apparently emboldened by the present administration’s attacks on development restraints across the board), the Forest Service has decided to reject the heretofore sacrosanct Roadless Rule.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">In what appears to be a demonstration of democracy, the Forest Service has come up with no less than six proposals to build new roads and increase the cut. These proposals are open to comment by the public and the Forest Service will announce its decision in June 2020. All the proposals but the first would result in more logging, and the significant diminishment of America’s largest forest and the things that thrive in it—with the notable exception of the timber companies.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">If the Forest Service’s stated preference is adopted, which seems likely, it would “return decision-making authority to the Forest Service, allowing decisions concerning timber harvest, road construction, and roadless area management … to be made by local officials on a case-by-case basis.” This means that citizens and environmental groups will have little say and the timber industry can revert to its old ways of cutting roads – at taxpayers’ expense – through vast domains of relatively unspoiled land without restraint.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">The Tongass has long been a stepping stone up for Forest Service managers capable of pushing “the cut.” The blatant advocacy of over-riding of the near sacrosanct Roadless Rule has pleased local elected officials and timber companies that would potentially profit greatly from such a change. Alaska’s governor, Michael Dunleavy hailed the announcement of the prospective demise of the Roadless Rule in the Tongass as “further proof that Alaska’s economic outlook is looking brighter every day.”</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">It’s looking brighter in part because those who have been pursuing the bounty of the Tongass for close to a century will have easier, cheaper access to old growth timber that many Americans want preserved. We all depend on agencies like the Department of Agriculture to husband these diminishing resources.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">The public comment period ends in December. Americans thus have a short time to comment on such a momentous change. But they must—because, after all, the Tongass belongs to them.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">Permission required for reprinting, reproducing, or other uses.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;"><span class="post-author-author" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: bold;"><a href="https://theamericanscholar.org/author/james-conaway/" style="box-sizing: border-box;">James Conaway</a></span> is the author of the novels <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">The Big Easy</em>, <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Nose</em>, and <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">World’s End</em>. He recently published <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Napa at Last Light,</em> the final volume of a nonfiction trilogy about Napa Valley.</span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-43813364055610376982019-12-30T09:59:00.001-08:002019-12-30T10:02:19.912-08:00Modern-day Neanderthals<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="color: white;"><span class="post_date" style="font-family: "source sans pro"; font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 1px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase; word-wrap: break-word;" title="2019-12-27">Thanks to CounterPunch.org</span></span><br />
<span style="color: white;"><span class="post_date" style="font-family: "source sans pro"; font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 1px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase; word-wrap: break-word;" title="2019-12-27">DECEMBER 27, 2019</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "source sans pro"; font-size: 16px;"></span></span><br />
<h1 class="headline" itemprop="headline" style="font-family: minion-pro-condensed, serif; font-size: 34px; line-height: 34px; margin: 3px 0px 0px 10px; max-width: 570px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">
<a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/12/27/backstory-on-a-billionaire-mayor-petes-favorite-wine-maker-hasnt-been-a-good-napa-neighbor/" rel="bookmark" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="color: white;">Backstory on a Billionaire: Mayor Pete’s Favorite Wine-Maker Hasn’t Been a Good Napa Neighbor</span></a></h1>
<span style="color: white;"><span class="post_author_intro" style="font-family: "source sans pro" , sans-serif; font-size: 15px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">by</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "source sans pro"; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="post_author" itemprop="author" style="display: inline-block; font-family: "source sans pro" , sans-serif; font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 1px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px; text-transform: uppercase; word-wrap: break-word;"><a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/author/steve-early-suzanne-gordon/" rel="nofollow" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 1px; padding: 0px 0px 10px; word-wrap: break-word;">STEVE EARLY - SUZANNE GORDON</a></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "source sans pro"; font-size: 16px;"></span></span><br />
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<img alt="" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-117987" class="wp-image-117987" height="383" sizes="(max-width: 510px) 100vw, 510px" src="https://uziiw38pmyg1ai60732c4011-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/dropzone/2019/12/1920px-Clos_du_Val_Winery_Napa_Valley_California_USA_6863361815.jpg" srcset="https://uziiw38pmyg1ai60732c4011-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/dropzone/2019/12/1920px-Clos_du_Val_Winery_Napa_Valley_California_USA_6863361815.jpg 1200w, https://uziiw38pmyg1ai60732c4011-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/dropzone/2019/12/1920px-Clos_du_Val_Winery_Napa_Valley_California_USA_6863361815-510x383.jpg 510w, https://uziiw38pmyg1ai60732c4011-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/dropzone/2019/12/1920px-Clos_du_Val_Winery_Napa_Valley_California_USA_6863361815-840x630.jpg 840w, https://uziiw38pmyg1ai60732c4011-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/dropzone/2019/12/1920px-Clos_du_Val_Winery_Napa_Valley_California_USA_6863361815-768x576.jpg 768w, https://uziiw38pmyg1ai60732c4011-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/dropzone/2019/12/1920px-Clos_du_Val_Winery_Napa_Valley_California_USA_6863361815-1536x1152.jpg 1536w" style="border: 0px; display: block; height: auto; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;" width="510" /><br />
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<span style="color: white;">Photograph Source: Jim G – <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">CC BY 2.0</a></span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">When wealthy Californians pay $2,800 to meet a presidential candidate, they expect to be wined and dined.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">But, thanks to a recent debate exchange between Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg, future fund-raisers among members of the Democratic Party’s donor class will probably not be held in the nearest wine cave.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">Warren made this venue a bit radioactive on December 19 when she denounced Buttigieg for partying with several hundred well-heeled supporters at the Hall Rutherford winery in Napa Valley.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">The vineyard owners, Craig and Kathryn Hall, have given $2.4 million to Democratic candidates, party campaign committees, and PACs since the 1980s. But, on this occasion, the disclosure that the Halls served $350 bottles of cabernet sauvignon under a chandelier with 1,500 Swarovski crystals drew the populist wrath of Senator Warren.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">“Billionaires in wine caves should not pick the next president of the United States,” Warren declared, a sentiment shared by Bernie Sanders, who later needled Buttigieg, during the same debate, about the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2019/12/21/here-are-the-billionaires-backing-pete-buttigiegs-presidential-campaign" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">40 or more billionaires</a> and their spouses who have contributed to his campaign.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">Amid the resulting negative publicity, Mayor Pete’s own billionaire hosts tried to position themselves as ordinary civic minded Democrats, sympathetic to his positions on climate change, gun safety, and immigration.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">“I am just a pawn here,” real estate developer Craig Hall complained to the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/20/us/wine-cave-craig-hall.html" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-family: "ssit"; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; max-width: 560px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">New York Times</span></a><span style="font-family: "ssit"; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; max-width: 560px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">.</span> “They are making me out to be something that’s not true. And they picked the wrong pawn. It’s just not fair.”</span></div>
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<strong style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="color: white;">Wine Cave Defenders?</span></strong></div>
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<span style="color: white;">Rallying to the Halls’ defense were several neighbors in swanky St. Helena, CA, all well versed in the ways of wine caves. One denied that partying in them “connoted something snobbish.” Another noted that such storage places provide cheaper, natural temperature control, thus reducing the industry’s carbon footprint.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">“It’s the green way to keep wine and preserve it for aging.” explained Jonathan Ruppert, general manager of Gary’s Wine & Marketplace, a local purveyor of Hall Rutherford wines.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">James Conaway, author of the <span style="font-family: "ssit"; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; max-width: 560px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">Times</span> best-seller <span style="font-family: "ssit"; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; max-width: 560px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0618257985/counterpunchmaga" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">Napa: The Story of an American Eden</a> </span>and, a more recent sequel, <span style="font-family: "ssit"; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; max-width: 560px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1501128469/counterpunchmaga" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">Napa at Last Light: America’s Eden in the Age of Calamity</a>, </span>has a very different view of nouveau riche “vintners” and their environmental impact.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">In <span style="font-family: "ssit"; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; max-width: 560px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">Napa at Last Light, </span>Conaway chronicles the Halls’ relocation to Napa from Texas, where Craig made his real estate fortune and once owned the Dallas Cowboys. In Dallas, the Associated Press has reported, “Craig Hall’s role in the 1980s savings and loan crisis” included making “risky investments” during the savings and loan meltdown” that required a $300 million federal bailout. His lobbying of House Speaker Jim Wright triggered a congressional ethics investigation that drove Wright from office in 1989.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">Rebounding from that scandal, Hall arrived in Napa where, according to Conaway, “they quickly became benefactors of charities, the arts, and political causes.” Being big Democratic Party donors during the 1990s helped make Kathryn Hall our ambassador to Austria during Bill Clinton’s scandal-scarred second term.</span></div>
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<strong style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="color: white;">An Environmental “Hall-O-Caust?”</span></strong></div>
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<span style="color: white;">Since 2008, the Halls have been trying to expand their existing wine making operations in both Napa and Sonoma Counties by creating new vineyards on the Walt Ranch, a 2,300 site they purchased for $8 million in the Howell Mountains. Concerned neighbors and local environmentalists have opposed this project because it would require cutting down 14,000 trees, resulting in hill-side erosion and damage to Napa City’s drinking water supply.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">As Conaway reports in his most recent book, critics “fear that houses will soon follow, vineyards having become stalking horses for serial McMansions and more ambitious development.”</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">The Halls are used to getting their way in wine country, even amid protestors brandishing signs warning their customers about “Chainsaw Wine” and an environmental “Hall-O-Caust.” According to Conaway, one of their earlier winery expansion schemes involved tearing down a nearby trailer court, thereby “eliminating a significant portion of St. Helena’s rare affordable housing.” Meanwhile, Craig and Kathryn live in a lavish home of their own– located above the Napa Valley resort known as Auberge du Soleil–where their house guests have included Bill and Hillary Clinton.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">In 2016, the Halls lawyered up again and used their political clout and bottomless bank account to persuade county supervisors to back their plans for the Walt Ranch. But, as the <a href="https://www.pressdemocrat.com/business/10124021-181/appeals-court-stalls-controversial-napa" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-family: "ssit"; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; max-width: 560px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;">San Jose Press-Democrat</span></a> reported three months ago, foes of that project won a partial victory in what is now an 11-year legal battle,</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">A state appeals court ruled that “county officials did not properly show how preservation of an unspecified swath of woodlands on the site would offset the harm to the climate by the tree removals”—and sent the case back to a trial judge. Says Aruna Prabhala, a lawyer for the Center for Biological diversity:“We see this as a victory for the Napa forest.”</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">In a phone interview this week, Conaway described the Halls’ overall environmental record as “appalling.” He warned that they remain committed to cutting “down thousands of oak trees, among them old oaks that are crucial to holding up the hillsides” on one of the largest remaining undeveloped tracts of oak forest, chaparral, and open meadow in the area. According to the author, “Napa Valley doesn’t need to lose whatever hillside it has left just to make another $900 cabernet for a billionaire’s vanity project.”</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;">Conaway believes that the Buttigieg event hosted by the Halls illustrates how ultra-rich Californians cultivate friendly Democrats— as candidates for president or county supervisor. “Their wine cave,” he says, “is a wonderful metaphor for the ways in which these people are divorced from the average American.”</span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-62774669227843572922019-11-27T06:41:00.000-08:002019-11-27T06:47:21.529-08:00Reassigned BLM workers get a pay cut, too<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">From <i>The Hill:</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">A new internal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) website designed to answer employees’ questions about the agency’s upcoming relocation out West says staffers should expect a drop in their overall pay.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The information was included in an internal page available to staff seen by The Hill that contained questions and answers about the controversial plan to move most D.C.-based BLM employees and establish a new headquarters in Grand Junction, Colo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">In the page, BLM leaders lay out their rationale for the move, touting one of the benefits of relocating as “general cost savings for the bureau because of less expensive office space, in most cases, and decreasing travel costs.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">“An employee reassigned to a relocated position will remain at the grade and pay of his or her current position; however the respective locality pay will vary based on the location of the position,” the website says. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">A question about whether employees can keep the locality pay that contributes to their current salary, the answer is a simple, “No, this is not an option.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">When reached for comment, BLM said in a statement that the agency has "given multiple briefings to committee members, testified before the committee and provided numerous supporting documents to answer all of their questions about the relocation."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"While we hope all affected employees will be able to follow their positions to the new locations, we understand that the decision for most people has many factors," the agency added. "We are committed to making sure that all employees have the information and resources they need to make the best decision and will continue to work with employees to ease the transition."</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: large;">The website follows letters sent to 159 Washington-based employees who must uproot to various locations across the West or</span><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: transparent;"> </span><a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/470124-bureau-of-land-management-staff-face-relocation-or-resignation-as&source=gmail&ust=1574866924289000&usg=AFQjCNF8dzJkPA1YCsmb_6i49zgmh0ZBEA" href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/470124-bureau-of-land-management-staff-face-relocation-or-resignation-as" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; border-bottom-color: rgb(42, 83, 193); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; box-sizing: border-box; display: inline; outline: none; position: relative; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">face being booted</a></span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: large;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: large;">from the federal workforce, as the relocation plans would leave just 61 of the agency’s 10,000 employees in the nation’s capital. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The BLM has argued the moves will bring those employees closer to the lands they manage. But critics see it as a way to dismantle the agency and upset the balance between conservation of public lands and prioritizing energy interests. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Lawmakers have spent months pushing the agency to justify its claims that the move will save money — requests that have thus far gone unfilled.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Steve Ellis, who retired from the top career position within the BLM in 2016 after 38 years of federal service, said losing that locality pay is to be expected — it’s simply tied to where the employee lives. But he questioned why the BLM won’t turn over the financial justification for the move that lawmakers have requested.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">“They may save a few bucks here or there on rent and salaries. However, they’ve not provided this cost-benefit analysis that takes into account flying people back and forth, that takes into account the lack of presence in the nation's capital of the senior career people that have to work with all the other agencies and NGOs and so forth," he said, referring to nongovernmental organizations.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"How do you put a dollar value on that?” he said. “So at the end of the day what’s broken here that they have to fix to move 3 percent of the workforce out West and move leadership out to the briar patch, so to speak? What are they trying to fix? I’d argue they’re going to create more problems in the long run by not having that presence in the nation's capital.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">A letter to lawmakers when the move was announced in July said the agency planned to save money on staff salaries, but it was not clear whether the BLM anticipated saving money with new hires or if they would change the salaries of current employees. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">There are upfront costs to the move. The Interior Department, which oversees the BLM, plans to use $6.6 million within last year’s budget to cover the costs, but lawmakers in both chambers have thus far blocked funding for the move in the 2020 budget.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Costs of the relocation include a house-hunting trip for each employee, moving costs and one-time incentive payments. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The website also further spells out the agency’s thinking behind selecting Grand Junction for its new headquarters. The 60,000 person town on Colorado’s western slope is at least four hours from any major city and has only a small regional airport and no direct flights to D.C. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The site says the agency considered cities where the BLM already has a presence, including “large cities as well as smaller communities.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The list was further narrowed to Colorado, Utah and Idaho, and potential locations were evaluated based on locality pay, cost of living, relative purchasing power, ease of air travel to the BLM’s most frequent travel destinations and office space lease rates. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: large;">“Grand Junction was selected because of its significant cost savings, travel accessibility, quality of life attributes, and other factors, such as our desire not to place the headquarters in the same city as a state or district office,” the website says. </span><span style="font-size: large;"><iframe data-google-container-id="6" data-load-complete="true" frameborder="0" height="250" id="google_ads_iframe_1107919/Content_300x250_ROS_3_0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" name="google_ads_iframe_1107919/Content_300x250_ROS_3_0" scrolling="no" style="border-width: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; vertical-align: bottom;" title="3rd party ad content" width="300"></iframe></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Lawmakers have been particularly hung up on the ease of travel from Grand Junction as well as how the move will actually save money. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">“Why Grand Junction? What is the justification for locating there?” Rep. TJ Cox (D-Calif.) asked the BLM’s acting chief, William Pendley, at a <a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/460764-dems-grill-blm-head-over-relocation-that-leaves-virtually-no-one&source=gmail&ust=1574866924289000&usg=AFQjCNGNNZqKnt0GVxb0Ha-xPMOcdWg6CQ" href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/460764-dems-grill-blm-head-over-relocation-that-leaves-virtually-no-one" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(42, 83, 193); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; box-sizing: border-box; display: inline; outline: none; position: relative; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">hearing in September</a>. “There’s no major airport there. Denver is 250 miles to the east, Salt Lake is 200 miles to the northwest. There’s no other federal agencies in Grand Junction. How can Grand Junction be more efficient than someplace else out west, be it Denver or Reno?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The website also gets to another point of concern of critics: that the move will lead to a flight of expert staff as longtime employees will refuse to uproot with their jobs. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">“We hope employees will be able to follow their positions to the new locations but there are many factors that an individual may consider when deciding whether or not to relocate, so, it’s difficult to say at this time exactly how many people will choose to relocate,” it says. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">“For these employees who are directly affected there are opportunities and benefits, but also difficult decisions as some people will not be able to or will not choose to relocate to the western offices.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">In other cases, relocations of federal agencies have gut them of staff. When the Agriculture Department moved the Economic Research Service to Kansas City, Mo., nearly <a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/463414-usda-nixes-reports-as-nearly-all-research-staff-flees-agency-during&source=gmail&ust=1574866924289000&usg=AFQjCNFO4UMILm1mlLoCyvVfUFvrNFrJ7Q" href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/463414-usda-nixes-reports-as-nearly-all-research-staff-flees-agency-during" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(42, 83, 193); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; box-sizing: border-box; display: inline; outline: none; position: relative; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">80 percent of employees</a> left the agency rather than relocate. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The site says the BLM may allow staffers who choose to move to extend their time in D.C. in order to allow children to finish the school year or if an employee has holiday travel or medical concerns.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The website also has information about many of the places BLM employees have been slated to move, giving tips on where to live.</span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-67502953761900453682019-10-29T13:14:00.001-07:002019-10-29T13:15:16.248-07:00For the record, westerners are the grabbers<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://theamericanscholar.org/no-home-on-the-range/#.Xbicgi2ZN0s"><span style="font-size: large;">https://theamericanscholar.org/no-home-on-the-range/#.Xbicgi2ZN0s</span></a></div>
Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-38315826709623132942019-10-29T07:10:00.004-07:002019-10-29T07:10:50.989-07:00My environmental essays in The American Scholar<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://theamericanscholar.org/author/james-conaway/"><span style="font-size: large;">https://theamericanscholar.org/author/james-conaway/</span></a></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-79592658396643523602019-10-27T08:12:00.003-07:002019-10-27T08:56:06.028-07:00Real help<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="color: white; font-size: x-large;">Good news from the Philippines</span><br />
<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">By Morgan Conaway and Natalia Martin</span><br />
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;">OCTOBER 27, 2019 </span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;"> This week we are writing to you all from the island of Bohol. The island is in the Central Visayas region of the Philippines and approximately a two hour ferry ride from Cebu City. For those of you who don’t know, Bohol is home to all of WI Microfinance’s current loan recipients. Over the past few days, we have had the pleasure of revisiting many of the beneficiaries to learn more about their business ventures, ranging from hog raising to hairstyling and beyond. Every beneficiary that we have spoken to has expressed an immense amount of gratitude for all of the support that WI Microfinance has been able to provide since the 2013 earthquake. </span><br />
<span style="color: white; font-size: large;"> Although these individuals continue to endure socio-economic hardships, they have not remained victims. We have found that these entrepreneurs take pride in improving their lives, as well as contributing to the sustainable development of their communities.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;"> Witnessing first-hand the radiant smile of a mother who has been able to fund her child’s education or the relief of a wife who was able to afford the medication needed to nurse her husband back to health has made us interns hopeful for future of the project. It is incredibly inspiring to interact with the loan recipients on a more personal level and build upon the existing WI Microfinance relationships and partnerships. Furthermore, we have realized the importance of visiting our beneficiaries more than once. Upon returning for the second round of interviews, the beneficiaries seemed much more comfortable with our presence and expressed genuine enthusiasm in getting to know us.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"> More often than not, the loan officers/collectors of our partner cooperatives are the only people who interact with the beneficiaries on WI Microfinance’s behalf. This, of course, is due to the resource constraints of both WI Microfinance and its partner entities, however, we hope that with increased donor support more funds can be allocated to meaningful interactions to educate and empower. It is important to note that despite the project’s achievements, many of the entrepreneurs still lack the training, capital, mentorship, and market access to bring sustainable change to their communities. At the same time, beneficiaries across various industries have expressed interest in moving beyond a transactional relationship with WI Microfinance to one that includes business education and training. We believe that this kind of relationship building is an integral and mutually-beneficial component of ensuring the long-term success of both this program and the micro-lending movement as a whole.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: large;"> As we travel around the island, it is a privilege to represent WI Microfinance and all of its donors. After all, we interns just recently became a part of the project and much of the its current success is rooted in the contributions of those who have supported the organization over the course of the last ten years. We would also like to acknowledge the overwhelming support of VICTO and our cooperative partners Carmen Multipurpose Cooperative and Bohol Community Multipurpose Cooperative. Our partnerships here in the Philippines play a crucial role in helping us develop and maintain a sustainable plan for micro-lending and social entrepreneurship. We hope that our work together this fall will continue to attract and inspire the kind of enthusiasm that has fueled the project from the beginning.</span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-63570316736566148842019-09-30T08:02:00.001-07:002019-09-30T08:06:33.850-07:00The back has it<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none;"><span style="color: white; font-size: x-large;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: "times"; white-space: pre;"> </span><span style="font-family: "times";"><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;">One of the prettiest backs in all of art is currently on display in a new exhibit at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, <i>The Touch of Color</i>, featuring works in pastels from the 18th </span><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); caret-color: rgb(38, 38, 38);">century's</span><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"> Benedetto Luti to Jasper Johns in the late 20th century. The pretty back in question, "painted" by William Merritt Chase in 1888, is entitled <i>Study of Flesh Color and Gold</i> (above) and, like all the works in the show, belongs to the </span>National<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"> Gallery.</span></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-size: x-large;"><span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; -webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; font-family: "times";"> </span><span style="font-family: "times";"><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;">The expertise of the masters of pastel, including those of the Venetian, Rosalba Carriera, became so </span><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); caret-color: rgb(38, 38, 38);">popular</span><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"> </span>that one critic in the 19th century complained of pastels having "inundated" Europe. Artists working in pastels would come to include Monet, Manet, Degas - yes, ballet dancers - Cassatt, Whistler, Luks, and Matisse. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "times"; font-size: x-large;"><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"> </span>During<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"> the Renaissance pastels were widely made from pigment with chalk or clay as a binder. The subtlety of flesh tones was often unsurpassed when smudged to blend colors. The medium proved to be as versatile and as stunning as oil or watercolor.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: white; font-family: "times"; font-size: x-large;"><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;"> This unusual show, in the West Wing of the National Gallery, runs from today through January and is a rare chance to see the variety and quality of a medium almost as old as painting itself.</span></span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-27788928081575033402019-09-13T06:39:00.001-07:002019-09-13T06:39:36.508-07:00Clean water trumpts even clean energy<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;">My latest column from American Scholar:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://theamericanscholar.org/its-not-easy-being-green/">https://theamericanscholar.org/its-not-easy-being-green/</a></span><br />
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-56823239621116863112019-09-03T12:30:00.000-07:002019-09-03T12:30:27.004-07:00My new column in American Scholar<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">It's about the environment and comes out every month. Please take a look:</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">/<a href="https://theamericanscholar.org/author/james-conaway/">https://theamericanscholar.org/author/james-conaway/</a></span></span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-72763758658090189632019-06-11T11:11:00.001-07:002019-06-12T04:50:16.878-07:00Animals and us, Japanese-style<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="Apple-converted-space" style="color: white; font-family: "courier"; font-size: 15px;"> </span><span style="font-family: "courier"; text-align: left;">From </span><i style="font-family: courier;">The Twelve Zodiac Animals</i><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); font-family: "courier";"> One of the most stunning exhibits of Japanese art ever at the National Gallery of Art in Washington just opened. The entire lower gallery of the East Wing is dedicated to </span><i style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); font-family: Courier;">The Life of Animals in Japanese Art</i><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); font-family: "courier";">, a gorgeous dip into Japanese culture as a whole that’s unique in presentation: paintings, sculptures, prints, screens, ceramics, kimonos, carvings and even costumes from the fifth century to the present.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); font-family: "courier";"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "courier"; font-size: large;"> <span style="color: white;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "courier"; font-size: large;">Animals there certainly are, all </span><span style="font-family: "courier"; font-size: large;">integrated into the Japanese aesthetic, a kaleidoscope of pleasurable, exquisitely rendered objects and images. These animals often reflect human aspirations and desires, and many of the pieces are beyond the western imagination - and much of the east’s, too.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><i>Twin Monkeys</i>, sixth century, wood</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;"><span class="s1"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: white; font-size: large;"> </span></span></span></span><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; font-size: large;"> </span><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-converted-space" style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); font-family: "courier";"> Some of t</span><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); font-family: "courier";">hese works astound with their sheer beauty, complexity, and audacity. Check out, for instance, the erotic </span><i style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); font-family: Courier;">The Octopus and the Diver</i><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(38, 38, 38); font-family: "courier";"> in the catalogue, in which one “pleasures” the other. I’ll let you discover how: </span></span><span style="color: black;"><a href="https://shop.nga.gov/item/752464p/the-life-of-animals-in-japanese-art-exhibition-catalog/1.html" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; font-size: x-large;"><span class="s2"><i>https://shop.nga.gov/item/752464p/the-life-of-animals-in-japanese-art-exhibition-catalog/1.html</i></span></a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; font-size: large;">))</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><i>New Year's Eve Foxfires at the</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><i>Changing Tree</i>, Utagawa Hiroshigo,</span><span style="font-size: large;"> 1857,</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;"><span class="s1"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span class="Apple-converted-space"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: white;"> </span> </span><i> </i></span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: "courier"; font-size: large;">As the excellent commentary points out, many of these animals enact human narratives and human desires, a kind of marriage in the shared drama of life. The yearning reflected is both fond and prophetic here at the outset of our common, disastrous</span><span class="Apple-converted-space" style="font-family: "courier"; font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-family: "courier"; font-size: large;">Anthropocene.</span></div>
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<span style="color: white;"><span style="font-size: large;"> </span> </span><span style="color: white;"> </span><i><b>Swallow-tail</b> </i><b><i>Pleats Issey </i>Miyake Miyake, 1999, polyester</b><br />
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For more read Phillip Kennicott's piece in the <i>Washington Post: <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/museums/cute-puppies-and-octopus-sex-a-japanese-art-exhibition-reveals-our-fascination-with-animals/2019/05/29/7b4c0c8e-8221-11e9-933d-7501070ee669_story.html?utm_term=.06f70068571f">https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/museums/cute-puppies-and-octopus-sex-a-japanese-art-exhibition-reveals-our-fascination-with-animals/2019/05/29/7b4c0c8e-8221-11e9-933d-7501070ee669_story.html?utm_term=.06f70068571f</a></i></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-48300419881367121892019-06-07T07:22:00.000-07:002019-06-07T07:22:03.760-07:00Integrity can be contagious<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: large;">The following is an excerpt from a reader's hopeful letter:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> <i>There is no way not to notice the lifestyle marketing of wine that has taken over advertising, online and beyond (and which bears not a small resemblance to some form of fraud). It has reshaped communities left and right and asserted a very smothering to to my eye an odd vision of luxury that drowns out other values such as hard work, knowledge, quality, and more.</i></span><i><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> I hope that the better wine makers and enthusiasts are preparing new generations and have thoughtful proteges... The greatest thing [winemakers] can do is to light a spiritual fire where one can and encourage people to pick up the training they need to become the stewards of the next generations. In our drive to create monuments to ourselves we lose sight of our better contributions. The better stewards aren't always who we expect. They could be from the environmental community or from the distribution community, or even an outcast from the USDA who falls out of favor with the administration.</span></i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i> Napa ultimately may have more value for wine makers across the country who decide that what works for their communities is some other model, and who are somewhat more isolated from the lure of big money. As you have said, there is a discerning clientele forming across the United States. </i></span></span></div>
Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-63316827445961375442019-05-20T14:21:00.000-07:002019-05-21T05:05:30.306-07:00More than the land (and citizens) can bear<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: large;"> The latest ploy by Napa Valley's developers and advocates for more growth is to pass new regulations for "small" wineries that would in fact be big wineries. The Board of Supervisors knows this full well but is afraid to cross the big producers and the organizations behind these pro-development schemes.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> Here's a letter written by a long-term responsible vintner to the board, which is now considering this latest scam to justify yet more building on the hillsides and more tourism:</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><i style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Ladies and gentlemen, </span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span></i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> For those of you who are not familiar with my last 40 years: I started Dunn Vineyards in 1979.The first vintage was 650 cases or 1600 gallons; about 10 tons, coming from about 4 acres. So things progressed; up to 2000 cases, 5000 gallons, 33 tons, off of about 13 acres.</span></i></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><i style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> You see where I am going--- 30,000 gallons is by no means a small, family, farmer, winery. This would mean a crush facility for about 200 tons of fruit, coming off of 50-70 acres!! Do you really think that this is within the economics of a small, family winery. This is about $10 mil in vineyard value, then, how much for the small winery?</span><br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif;" /><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I invite each of you to visit my winery. We produce about 5000 cases, or 12,500 gallons. We are small in the grand picture of the wine world, but an operation about 2.5 times our size is not. Come see for yourselves. </span><br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif;" /><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> Trying to push 30,000 gallon winery permits thru to protect the small guys out there is ridiculous, and I think that you all realize that. Sometimes, a person should look in the mirror.</span><br style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif;" /><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">R.L.Dunn</span></i></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"> I think h</span></span></span><span style="background-color: black; font-size: large;"><span style="color: white;">e means that the supervisors should look in the mirror since they know more wineries added to the hundreds already there is the opposite of conservation. It flies in the face of the intent of the Agricultural Preserve established in the sixties. Young people who want to get into the business cheaply are half a century too late.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: black; color: white; font-size: large;"> Land can't remain healthy, productive, and appealing if at some point people don't say no to development. That realization is part of growing up. </span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-31424419973579753642019-04-26T09:06:00.001-07:002019-04-26T15:03:01.272-07:00Get Real<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-converted-space"> <span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span></span>John Ruskin, the pre-eminent art critic in Victorian England, wrote that painters should get out of their studios and into their subjects, so to speak, “rejecting nothing, selecting nothing and scorning nothing.” That meant painting every detail of rocks and anything else before the painters' easels, as Ruskin attempted in his famous watercolor, <i>Fragments of the Alps </i>(above).</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span> He mightily influenced such artists (and poets and other critics) as Dante Gabriel Rossetti and John Everett Millais in his native England, where they became known as the Pre-Raphaelites. That meant rejecting the “mannerist” approach of artists who had followed Raphael and Michelangelo, in other words reject academic perfection and get real.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RkaT1eUw13w/XMMmzPQDunI/AAAAAAAAGBQ/1gRhksj81acX3tl4kyEsWGWrtA1hXf83wCLcBGAs/s1600/4104-015.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1205" height="320" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RkaT1eUw13w/XMMmzPQDunI/AAAAAAAAGBQ/1gRhksj81acX3tl4kyEsWGWrtA1hXf83wCLcBGAs/s320/4104-015.jpg" width="241" /></a> </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-size: large;">(<i>Mon Brave</i> by William John Hennessy)</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span> A whole raft of American painters followed. Now the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, has brought many of them together in a small but exquisite exhibition called <i>Radical Realists. </i>It opened at roughly the same time the gallery launched its sumptuous exhibition of the works of Tintoretto, which sucks a lot of oxygen out of building, but in fact <i>Radical Realists</i> provides the ideal respite from Tintoretto’s exuberant genius.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span> American Pre-Rapaelites were also staunch supporters of the Union during the Civil War, and committed Abolitionists. Ironically they, like their British counterparts, often portrayed beautiful (clothed) women in great detail and in a manner sometimes suggesting the Middle Ages, as opposed to the Victorian. Colors are sumptuous and the guises tinged with tragedy, but all fascinate and can demonstrate to all <i>plein air</i> painters today that beauty and inspiration reside in detail as well impression.</span></span><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><br />
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eLZWC8QSmYs/XMMr2EIQhbI/AAAAAAAAGBk/rzOfvRT8-ngmYUEhQfLYDbozjkj_FxQggCLcBGAs/s1600/4104-039.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1337" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eLZWC8QSmYs/XMMr2EIQhbI/AAAAAAAAGBk/rzOfvRT8-ngmYUEhQfLYDbozjkj_FxQggCLcBGAs/s640/4104-039.jpg" width="532" /></a></span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-size: large;">(<i>A Study of Trap Rock</i> by John Henry Hill)</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span> If you’re not in DC your can buy the excellent catalogue, <i>The American Pre-Raphaelites</i> online at:</span></span></div>
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<span class="s2"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://shop.nga.gov/item/751989/the-american-pre-raphaelites-radical-realists-exhibition-catalog/1.html">https://shop.nga.gov/item/751989/the-american-pre-raphaelites-radical-realists-exhibition-catalog/1.html</a></span></span></div>
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-12236599444909104422019-04-21T05:21:00.000-07:002019-04-21T05:21:00.174-07:00The earth's an organism, believe it or not<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: x-large;"> <b> And too many people don't</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Read this piece in the <i>New York Times: </i></span><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/20/opinion/sunday/amazon-earth-rain-forest-environment.html"><span style="font-size: large;">https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/20/opinion/sunday/amazon-earth-rain-forest-environment.html</span></a><br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9JvYoFkwTaI/XLxbXBXeLUI/AAAAAAAAGA0/5W_cbmnBQLM7THuUiBI9BaxOXg_Fr9LhgCLcBGAs/s1600/Dawn%2BHouse.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9JvYoFkwTaI/XLxbXBXeLUI/AAAAAAAAGA0/5W_cbmnBQLM7THuUiBI9BaxOXg_Fr9LhgCLcBGAs/s640/Dawn%2BHouse.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Dawn House</i>, oil, vine leaves (<i>Euonymus</i>), and hammered gum</span></span><span style="font-size: large;">balls (<i>Liquidambar styraciflua</i>) on wood panel, 31" X 15"</span><br />
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Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5505515248189957268.post-8158890319529502062019-03-31T11:31:00.002-07:002019-03-31T11:45:20.859-07:00Merlot<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4legj2KBpTE/XKEHXT41gtI/AAAAAAAAF_4/zTMgiIAONq8eA3pRtJspKo00Y1Ag0xhzgCLcBGAs/s1600/unnamed-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4legj2KBpTE/XKEHXT41gtI/AAAAAAAAF_4/zTMgiIAONq8eA3pRtJspKo00Y1Ag0xhzgCLcBGAs/s640/unnamed-1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<span style="font-size: large;">This vine is from RDV Vineyards of Delaplane, Vir. and one of the components of the first Bordeaux blend on the East Coast selling for more than $100 a bottle. Other components in the painting are crushed granite, bluestone, greenstone, clay, vetch and one worm, as well as oil paint, dirt, and water-based polyurethane on maple panel, 30 inches by 8 inches.</span></div>
Jim Conawayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00985392115800948664noreply@blogger.com0