I have discovered – again – a wonderful secret garden, a walled space full of shadows and overgrown with vines, hidden just steps off an alley in downtown Natchez,  Mississippi.

When my daughter graduated from college we drove from her school in South Carolina to Natchez where she was to begin an art residency. The housing provided was a very quirky apartment buried behind an out-of-way garden accessible through a locked gate in an alley downtown. As it turned out, the apartment had both quirky charm and a lot of mold and mildew. It was not to be where she stayed for long.

But, while I was there, I took many photos of the fabulous untended garden behind the brick walls. Even now, seeing them again, I remember how swept away I was by the experience of being in that place.

I loved the evocative gates. I loved the sense of things partially hidden, partially revealed. I loved the warmth of the sun on the bricks. And against all this age and mystery, vibrant green spring leaves.

Through a series of hard drive clean-ups, I lost the original photos. Then, just this week I discovered I have good quality color paper copies. I can capture them digitally and use them in artwork.

What inspiration!

Other photos I might find or purchase of old walls and gardens would not be the same. This was a real place that I’d really been in and photographed myself; and it was part of a journey in the lives of my daughter and me. 

Before this discovery, I’d been sketching a new series that will incorporate silkscreened trees and limbs and stenciled rocks and leaves. But I wasn’t happy with the way they were coming together. The idea of incorporating photos of the Natchez garden has breathed new life into my concept-development.

Around 2010, I began experimenting with fabric and paper collages. At that time I created Portals, using one of the Natchez photos incorporated into an imaginary journey composition.

I looked again at this work this morning, and remembered creating it. I also began to think about my work and how it’s changed, and my life and how it’s changed.  All of this – plus the rediscovery of the garden photos – will be a part of what comes next.

That’s how the journey works.

If you would like more information about Portals, it’s on my website HERE

If you’d like to see more work in the series I call Journeys and Stories, that gallery is on my website HERE.

Thank you for reading. I always enjoy questions and comments.
--Bobbi

bobbi@bobbibaughstudio.com

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