home to birds

BIRDS ARE FREE  to fly about. They make their homes in trees. They navigate thin air. They eat, well, like a bird. They sing songs whenever they like. Direct ascendants from the dinosaur, they hold the wisdom of the ages. They are gifts of hope and happiness.

MY FASCINATION with birds continues to grow. Aside from the real ones, I see birds in art everywhere I look—Twitter's logo (follow me here), the symbol of the country where I live and even the name of one of my favorite local places to eat, Ria's Bluebird.

FITTINGLY, I met my friend David Schump at Ria's for a delicious brunch this weekend and he graciously brought along a piece from his folk art collection for me to photograph. I had long admired his bird tree—a natural limb decorated with a flock of nine unique birds. Hand-carved and painted (circa 2004) by American folk artist John Carlton (in Delaware), this celebration of birds is quite a beautiful work of art.

ARTISTS CELEBRATE birds in their artwork in every discipline it seems. Two other artist's works I'm picturing here are an illustrated book by Australian artist Jeffrey Fisher and hand-turned birdhouse ornaments by local Georgia woodworker Betty Fugate.

ACKNOWLEDGED as having influenced a generation of designers and illustrators world wide, with birds being his preferred muses, Jeffrey Fisher's book offers up 46 different bird species in illustrated portraits. Each bird is painted in his unique style—unexpected, colorful and beautiful—and paired with quirky musings by his wife, Christine Fisher on each species' history and lore. Jeffrey states in the preface of Birds: "This book is nothing but an enthusiasm for birds. There being a bevy of collective terms for our winged friends—a murmuration of starlings, a ubiquity of sparrows, an unkindness of ravens, an exultation of larks, a pandemonium of parrots—here be an enthusiasm for birds."

WOODWORKER, Betty Fugate of Whirlingwood Studio in Georgia made the birdhouse ornaments pictured alongside the book. A crafter with a myriad of materials from embroidery to pyrography since childhood, Betty hand-turned these ornaments out of exotic woods. They will be beautiful and fun additions to a decorated tree. I've long thought of designing a tree with nothing but birds, and since trees are homes to many types of birds, it only makes sense. What better way to celebrate nature than to celebrate a home in nature?

FOLK ART FLOCK | (Above, top) This tree of birds was crafted by American folk artist John Carlton in 2004. The bird vase is from Target several seasons ago. The cast iron basket (filled with moss) was purchased in the Garden Gift Shop at Atlanta Botanical Garden.

FOR THE BIRDS | (Above, bottom) The illustrated book simply titled Birds is by Australian artist/illustrator Jeffrey Fisher (Chronicle Books) contains some of the most unique celebrations of birds in art I've seen. The hand-turned wooden birdhouse ornaments were made by woodworker Betty Fugate who resides locally in Georgia.

©2010 DARRYL MOLAND | ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

photography and styling by Darryl Moland, 
folk art bird tree by John Carlton, 
birdhouse ornaments by Betty Fugate

BEYOND WORDS | A heartbreaking scenario played out all-too-often because of Big Oil's unbridled greed, corruption and self-regulation: An oil-soaked bird against the side of the HOS, an Iron Horse supply vessel, at the site of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on May 9.

hindsight is twenty-"ten"

LOOKING BACK as one is wont to do at the beginning of the first decade of the second millennium, it's always the practice to resolve to not make mistakes of the past. As for the future though, superstitious beliefs abound. In the American South, eating collard greens for prosperity and black-eyed peas or Hoppin' John for luck is part of the New Year's ritual. I had some of each, although on New Year's Eve at an early dinner at the Collonade. Maybe by doing that, it only helped me through the last few hours of 2009. It has not been an especially easy year for anyone (that I know, at least). Our vision is not always perfectly clear in looking back. We have to "be in the now" to really find that elusive moment of clarity. That is a resolution for anyone—to be aware of and in the moment when conducting daily life.

IT WAS THE SECOND year that I've adopted the Spanish tradition of consuming “las doce uvas de la suerte” (or the 12 grapes of luck) at the turn of the clock at midnight, along with a glass of bubbly (or wine, as we did this year). Each grape represents a month in the new year—some sour, some sweet—as I'm sure they will be. We're ushering in a new decade and have that chance again to make this the decade known for something. I'm not sure what label we'll stick on the decade that began with a two and three zeros. With the word "Twitter" being the top word of 2009 (in the English language at least), I wonder if anyone can sum up the decade in 140 characters? It has been quite a time of upheaval and limbo in many ways. 

IT'S NOT ALWAYS what we say but what we do. The following quote from one of the most notorious people in the last decade really sums up what unsettling and contemptuous rhetoric the decade has brought:

"As we know, there are known knowns. There are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns. That is to say, we know they're some things we do not know. But there're also unknown unknowns; the ones we don't know we don't know."

Did you get that? That quote was from U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on February 12, 2002. No matter whether it effectively explained why the U.S. government had no idea what it was doing by invaded Iraq—in taking it out of context it points not so succinctly to many unsure missteps we have made collectively. 

ALL I CAN SAY is that I still believe in and wish for peace in the world. As time continues to tick away, the planet is getting smaller every day technologically and the people of the world are understaning and reasoning with each other in more civilized and succinct ways.

HATS OFF | Toasting 2010, Jon and I had a glass of wine with a skewer of 12 grapes, representing each month of the year—a Spanish tradition (above, right). The 2009 top hat ornament is from Martha Stewart Everyday Modern Celebration line at Kmart. The 2010 headband is from Target. 

TIME FOR PEACE | A delicate hourglass from Target (above, left) sits next to a past season's top-hatted Dee Foust licensed snowman figure produced by Bethany Lowe Designs that resembles an iconic New Year's image. It all overlooks a mercury glass globe ornament from my personal collection atop a glass-glittered peace sign ornament from Pottery Barn.

©2010 DARRYL MOLAND | ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 

collecting, photography and styling by Darryl Moland

REAR VIEW | This surrealist image (above) of an uprooted fir tree as car air freshener was found on a Catalonian blogger's site that commented on my blog this past August from French photographer Cédric Delsaux. I'm sharing the smile of irony it gave me. Hindsight is not unlike a rear-view mirror.