Edward Huse, Living Artist; Fancy News from the Earth

About this blog

2010-03-27T10:44:00.003-05:00

You may notice that this blog is not very active, please see instead my other blogs like www.springfieldvermont.org or edhuse.com, etc., thanks! El lectór verá que los otros blogs de Edward Huse son más interesantes, www.springfieldvermont.org y www.edhuse.com entre otros, si interesa.

Fancy News - New Fancy Mural!

2008-07-16T14:21:00.002-06:00

Well, another white wall bites the dust. Here is a detail of a new piece of decorative artwork in a local home, a handsome mural with imaginary views by Edward Huse, including one of his favorite guardian animals perched on a bit-o-architecture. The photo is taken now, before the final coat of polyurethane mixed with magic dust, because it becomes difficult for the camera to photograph after.

The artist's steed is re-shoed - another fine job by Ferguson's Automotive

2008-07-08T06:21:00.003-06:00

Yippee! No more clatter as we trundle across the patches and random staircases that we use for roadways here in Springfield, Vermont - New brake calipers up front for the RoadMaster!

You have to really look in this picture to appreciate it for the automotive splendor that it is, but the floor is a marvel of cleanliness and order at Ferguson's Automotive located in sunny downtown Windsor, Vermont, (just a little North East of the extinct volcano). The orderly state of the floor is merely a clear testament to the seriousness of their attention to detail here - if it isn't broke, don't fix it, but if it is, you can trust it to be well-cared for at Fergusons. El taller de Fergusons es un lugar ultra-professional, donde toman el tiempo para dar atencion a todo detalle.

Fancy News - Newly Acquired Vintage Image Capture Device

2008-06-24T07:18:00.008-06:00

It is certainly curious and more than funny to see how things can sometimes look like junk until you really give them a cold hard look.
Recently, we came across an old camera at a tag sale that I finally bought for a couple of dollars for the hell of it. Initially, I found it so unattractive and almost cheasy-looking (it sports an absolutely absurd atomic image) that I didn't let myself really focus on it too closely, having at first glance written it off as a crummy slr wannabe from like 1960's Korea or Blaabistan or somewhere equally dreary. I was almost too repulsed to touch it. It did seem clean tho', and I thought some kid might love to have it for a first camera to either use, or to finish ruining completely while trying to learn how to use it. Well, it also dawned on me to try auctioning it off online or something since it was so clean and it had it's case and all - someone might love it to complement their Trabant kit or Mao suit - but to research it I had to pick it up and look at it. The first thing I did was to look at the lense for info, and my eyes popped, for such an oddball it had a 1:1.7 lens which I know means a better grade than what I ever had on an slr, so I looked it up in real ernest now, and found that it is a commonly available, old-but-excellent range finder type camera, who would have known?
It turns out that this machine is a fourth generation (circa 1973), G series, Yashica 35mm Rangefinder Electro 35, GSN, and it has quite a following out there, loads of stuff about it on the net.
This one is in it's original banged-up case but it is very clean and shows little wear and no damage that I can see beyond somebodies clumsy efforts to remove a ring from the lense assembly, (scratching the hell out of the black ring with the lens info imprinted on it in the process). They were probably trying to get in to remove some offensive flakes of debris visible under the first layer of glass inside the actual lens assembly, and without success since the cruft is still there to tell the story. The outside face of the lens seems clean and unscathed, so I have hopes for it's ability to deliver knock-out pics even with the floaters inside. Luckily, while the last custodial guardian of this edsel with killer glass not only failed to open the lens, he did remove the old battery, so that the battery compartment is clean. I am in the process of cobbling together the recommended Rube Goldberg styled battery arrangement to replace the out-of-production mercury-based battery that would have originally powered the simple little electromagnet-based computer thing that makes this such a handy instrument of expression and all-round image capture device.
I can't wait to try it out with some real film this Summer, I am reluctant to take the new dslr so this electro might do nicely (even with the odd bits of dander under the lens).

Fancy News: First Cut to be Thrashed Soon.

2008-05-29T17:16:00.003-06:00

The first crop of silage is ready to harvest, here the work is being done - locally for local consumption

"Claudia Waite as Princess Turandot", etching by Edward Huse, 2007

2008-05-25T08:41:00.005-06:00

Fancy News - one of my favorite prints just turned up for me - this is one of the prints that I made from my drawings rendered during the dress rehearsals for Puccini's Turandot, at Opera North last year, in Lebanon, New Hampshire. It was great fun, and Claudia Waite put on a captivating performance in her role as the Princess Turandot.
I will have versions of this available soon as: 1) a US Postage stamp from my zazzle.com account, and; 2) a poster or card from my redbubble.com account [links on the right].

Fancy News: Flowers at Last! (yes, months behind most of you there in the Southland, still ... )

2008-05-24T13:26:00.004-06:00

these have begun to take over nicely.

Harper needs a good home.

2008-05-12T08:23:00.003-06:00

I would like to see this dog adopted, her current owners will take care of getting her to the new owners themselves, it is indeed a painless adoption for someone ready for a great pet. Please send the url for more info to anyone that might be interested - harpergooddog.blogspot.com

a fine tractor

2008-05-12T08:14:00.001-06:00

Hosta goes nuts

2008-05-12T08:03:00.004-06:00

Hosta is at it's coolest when it is first bursting at amazing speeds from the Earth's outer debris layer.

Firemen in nearby Ascutney, Vermont, gassing up the beast

2008-05-12T07:56:00.003-06:00

it's nice to see that you can still drive a gas-guzzler in matching outfits in this day and age.

Fancy News! Lucky Hay Wagon Makes Appearance in Jersey Girls' New Barn - can they be far behind?

2008-04-28T13:50:00.004-06:00

Here the new barn is being made ready for the happy cows to come - in one shot the lucky hay wagon makes it's fortuitous appearance, and in another shot Don Queso is seen to wave hello to the crowds of spirits of 'cheeses-to-be' that already jostle about for space in the great new barn.

Fancy News; our Moose has made an appearance!

2008-04-26T15:24:00.002-06:00

It may not be widely known, but our little Springfield, Vermont, besides having been elected the Official Home of the Simpsons, has the distinction of hosting a resident moose population, and last evening one of the younger members of that clan made an appearance in the public parking lot off of Mineral Street near the Comptu Falls.
It was a most pleasant visit at first. Now that it is Spring, neighbors are out and about - people and other creatures who haven't seen each other or been outside to enjoy nature at all in months. It was nice to see Moose come down to town and poke around with mild curiosity, at least until for some reason (unknown to man, or beast it turns out) a member of the Springfield police force decided to use the police cruiser as a communications device.
"You shouldn't do that officer!", offered neighbor Bob, but no, the officer proceeded to go through the complete Moose vocabulary offered by a small-town squad car, and when he was done the little moose came over and most deftly crushed the hood to the pavement with one smooth, almost elegant gesture - with an apparent ease and effortless grace that left all breathless with astonishment, and full of admiration for a critic of bad behavior that doesn't mind being forceful in the pursuit of decorum.

When cats garden

2008-04-16T09:29:00.005-06:00

Fancy Cherry Blossom News from our Nation's Capitol

2008-04-14T11:15:00.004-06:00

the obligatory cherry blossom picture, taken with the Sony DSLR and it's stock lens kit on April 2nd.

Fancy News from the Past

2008-04-14T10:28:00.003-06:00

On my recent trip I barely budgeted enough time to take some photos of my old artwork in Washington, DC, but here is one - a leaded/stained glass entry transom window that I designed and made in about 1981 or so.

Fancy News, it is still Springtime in Vermont

2008-04-12T20:35:00.006-06:00

Springtime in Vermont is a good time to get outside and say hello to neighbors.

Springtime in Vermont is a lot like Fallas, though not as well-attended. La Primavera en Vermont es muy parecido a las Fallas, pero sin botellón.

another bread shot, (I am still knocked out by the New York Times bread recipe).

Fancy News - home again, home again, jig, a jig-jig

2008-04-09T08:55:00.002-06:00

Here in Springfield, Vermont, (Official Home of the Simpson's), the snow has melted enough for me to sweep the sidewalk, the solar collector is going full blast, and I am busy doing hand-built forms in clay for a primitive firing later in the Spring or in the Summer.
I continue to have great success with that recipe from the NYTimes for killer breads, the recipe that appeared last Fall.
Then there is the garden, it awakens suddenly and it's first words are to the birds of course, but it's second call is for me to come and groom and ready it for a Summer of fun! (LMAO/MPEC) Hay que ver, que enseguida llegan dias largos, por frio que siga siendo, el jardin llama desde el primer dia que llegan los pajaros, ni siquiera dirritido toda la nieve! Vale pues, no hay remedio, el jardin es un trabajo y hay que hacerlo y ya. Vuelto de Washington, y lleno de historias ...

Fancy News - it's Springtime in Vermont - sidewalk café in Brattleboro, can more public nudity be far behind?

2008-03-27T10:02:00.005-05:00

You know it's Springtime when the people begin sprouting up in the sunshine!

FancyNews: a manipulated Moon image

2008-03-21T13:46:00.003-05:00

Fancy News: Last Moonrise of the Winter

2008-03-21T13:00:00.006-05:00

Yesterday the turbulent skies guaranteed something to photograph, and when I saw the Moon shoot into view I knew what I had to do - the trusty Saab lept like a gazelle at my command, to fly up, up the hill to the transmitter and find a clear shot.
Moments later the snow shower that had been threatening to horn in finally caught up and ended the creamy blue sunset/moonrise. This is one of the resulting images captured on the digital slr which I like very much, the Sony Alpha 100, (handheld capture in raw file at automatic settings, cropped, but otherwise unadjusted).

Fancy news for real

2008-02-18T12:57:00.003-05:00

Recently, my favorite client of all time and old friend down South in Washington called on me to come there and do some remedial decorative work in her little mansion in that city - the thought of a house repair that required cutting into a very elaborately developed mural in her home had us all bothered, but not much. After all, it gives us a fine chance to get together and run around and see the museums and have mild adventures motoring about the Nation's Capital.
You have to admit, a lush, lyrical, moody or misty decorative finish, or a full-blown mural, that results from the happy interaction between the patronesse or patron and the artist is a joy to live with, especially when the alternative is "eggshell white" out of the can.
Isn't it time for you to graduate from that "dorm room" look and dress up your crib, pad, pied a terre, flat, mansion or petit palaise with artwork or decorative treatments by Edward Huse?
Treat yourself today, send a plane ticket and a big check, and see your ordinary drywall turn into a unique and special setting for you and your family and friends.
Line forms to the right.

Fancy News - A Barn Raising!

2008-02-16T11:22:00.007-05:00

"Barn Raising" - it sounds bucolic, old-timey, and fun. And it was - even if at the end it seemed more proper to call the event a canopy deployement rather than a barn raising since there was little timber framing, and none aloft, where the high arched components did however create a fine looking barrel vault that amazingly creates quite the "basilica/barn" effect. The aerodynamics of this kind of canopied service structure are so far more important a variable than it's weight, that it is more like a glider than a barn, so I hereby coin a new phrase analogous to "barn raising" and to be used in the same way: "barn mooring", which refers to the permanent assembly and fixed location of any inflated, canopy type, air-pressure-dependent, or otherwise aero-static barn or outbuilding, in deference to it's innate preference for flight.
Very interesting it was indeed to see it happen over the last few snowy weeks. This new cow barn has a lot of what is beautiful about a barn, even though it is so odd to see that kind of a big bubble structure in a pastoral setting - like a giant Bibelót lying in a field sleeping off a night of clubbing.
The work has all happened in cold weather. In particular, Chip told me that it was a bear just to sink the holes for the wooden beams that sit deep in the ground to anchor the structure. It has been a comparatively mild Winter, yet on any given day it has been as cold as it needs to be outside if you are working with your hands.
Above is a picture of the activity surrounding the creation of that new cow barn at Lisa's new W.A.W.W.E Farm Store the other day, that I took with the Sony digital DSLR A100k camera. I am still learning to use this image capture device, (but it is an easy study).
This barn will serve as a festive, convenient, and easy to maintain cow barn for Lisa's exquisite milk cows - for the famous Jersey Girls of Chester, Vermont, as a matter of fact.
The milk from these cows is like something you thought you had to take a time machine to find anymore.

More Fancy News from Exciting Vermont

2007-07-27T07:56:00.000-06:00

What a riot! I thought I left the big city behind when I moved here! The Simpsons Movie opening on the twentyfirst is still having repercussions. Yesterday I was interviewed by telephone by a popular national radio station in Spain, (www.cadenaser.com - find Maria Guerra's Ventana show for the 26th, it will probably be available as a podcast) quite thrilling to prepare for, and when it happened it was flat out fun. I rec'd several telephone calls from friends in Spain letting me know how surprised and amused they were too, LOL/MPEC.

Ayer me entrevistaron en la Cadena Ser (www.cadenaser.com - hay que buscar "la Ventana" de Maria Guerra, del dia 26 del presente, a lo mejor se encuentra como podcast en iTunes). Me conocieron atraves de la reportera Barbara Celis quien tuve placer de conocer esa tarde del estreno. Buscava un lugar central, para observar a ver que puedo hacer o ver, ya que la tarde iva terminandose aunque seguia movimiento. y dentro de poco veo una reportera muy interesante poseando con su fotografo en frente de donde todos los estrellas havian hecho su pasarela en frente del teatro, con camiseta en castellano -
Le pregunto -"Hola, sois de la prensa de alguna parte?"
ella - "Si, de Espanya ... "
yo - "No me digas, de El Pais?"
ella -"Vaya, pues si, espera, eres de aqui? Como es que hablas
espanyol?"
yo - "Si Ms Corresponsal, soy de aqui, y si, hablo espanyoooool"
ella entonces saca su boli y me hace preguntas, hablamos media hora, cambiamos tarjetas y tal, y terminamos invitandole a ella y al fotografo a una paella esa noche (no llegaron, pues se les hizo tarde y estavan de trabajo, pero me escribieron un email gracioso dando las gracias y para darme el pdf del articulo que salio en "El Pais" hoy dia 26 en la seccion de Cultura, lo has visto?)
Ella se llama Barbara Celis, reportera en NYC para El Pais, y me dijo por email esta manyana que le havia dado mi tarjeta a un socio en Cadena Ser/radio Valencia, llamado Javier Del Pino creo.
Entonces llamo ella a Javier en Barcelona, averiguando los detalles, y me explico de que dentro de poco llamarian para poner me en vivo en la radio.
Hace poco rato mas, llamo una assistenta para entrevistarme y sacar algunos mas detalles, y dentro de poco llamo Maria Guerra y me presento a los RADIO AUDIENTES EN ESPANYAAAA!!!! que risa, y sigo riendo!!!
Now back to the garden.

Fancy News - Exciting Times in Vermont, by Edward Huse, 2007

2007-05-05T19:16:00.000-06:00

Today was an excellent weather day.
The tomato seedlings are looking mighty beefy, and next week they will start living outdoors, or maybe the week after next, (or wheneverthehell Summer finally starts and the nights don't frost over anymore).
There are also very robust lavender seedlings, and some annuals.
Both the tomato plants and the lavender plants each are grown enough by now to produce fresh floral smells, however neither one as yet smells the way it should (the tomato smells not a whit like a tomato plant on a summer day, etc.) but rather each has some odd smell that our acquaintance Dr. Macrovertigo ascribes to the plants' ancient alien roots, a juvenile characteristic that quickly fades as a given plant matures. All present expressed amazement or amusement, one laughed out loud, and very soon a party was in full swing.
Recently, I took the good old Saab to the new mechanic, for diagnosis and repair of unnerving hard shifting symptoms - I already knew that they are incredible at this shop, so I was glad to have them go over the machine. Even so, I was pleasantly surprised.
Instead of diagnosing the problem as some exotic mechanical crisis and charging us any amount, they charged less than an hour of labor to clean an accumulation of dirt in what is apparently is characteristic for good old Saabs - (a bearing on a shaft that moves to push the plate against flywheel sits in a channel that can collect dirt sometimes). Ray even showed me how to access and clean out the channel myself whenever it happens again!
And wait, there's more - suddenly like magic, the key no longer gets stuck in Lock position - huh!?
Unbeleivable! All of this instead of a 6 or 7 Hundred Dollar Repair!
(I express glee because I have gone through the experience of hunting for a mechanic in a new town. For example, I once had a car with that developed a rattle that I took around to different mechanics - each of 7 mechanics told me some variation of impending transmission and/or engine failure, one cautioned me to stop driving it for my own safety and to sell it to him for seventy five dollars! I finally found the right place when they diagnosed a U-joint prob that was fixed in twenty minutes for 60 dollars.)
The Artist is way pleased.
Who says nothing exciting ever happens in Vermont?

Turkeys and ruined bridges in Vermont, by Edward Huse, 2007

2007-04-30T19:16:00.001-06:00

[This was written on April thirtieth.]
Today I drove the back roads to Rochester. The weather was beautiful. The rivers are busy this time of year - full but not ferocious. They are still wicked fast though, like thick viscous clear liquid glass running by as fast as possible.
It is a definately scenic route, so that the drive itself was great in the trusty, zippy old Saab. And then to arrive itself is a pleasure, it is so nice there in the little town of Rochester, Vermont. Everyone's gardens are perking up there, things are looking crisp and green already, the chickens were out busy, and the mechanics were taking a break watching traffic while I made a judicious u-turn to visit a bike shop.
The turns can be decieving, and on the way home I almost ran over a couple of turkeys - Who says they can't fly?!
They split in different directions. One played possum at the side of the road, but the other lept instantly into muscular flight and sailed through the woods and over the river with apparently just one initial swift stroke. I was very impressed. It was like watching a C5 cargo plane taking off from a hot zone at dawn or something.
This happened right after I passed a favorite view of a ruined bridge that is only visible during 'stick season' - that, plus the awe-inspiring turkey exhibition of powered flight, made me stop at the next turn-off and make a few drawings, one of them is here.

Edward Huse, Artist, in the garden in Spring, item 1,

2007-04-27T18:17:00.001-06:00

Here we see my all-time favorite cat, the accomplished Huntress, Miss Kitty - she was allowed to rest in the seedlings because she was such a good cat.
This image is of my recent hand-pulled drypoint engraving, from a drawing of MK that I made several years ago, it is on display during May of this year, at the Howe Library, in Hanover, New Hampshire.

According to the older neighbors, the folks who lived here for half of the last century brought a cartload of horse manure to spread out every Spring and now the fine rich black topsoil is a foot and a half thick and we can grow anything that has enough time to mature in the short New England growing season.
One neighbor told us that during WWII, everyone in the neighborhood cultivated food crops all over, treating the whole of the lawn as a garden from property line to property line, imagine!