From the Editors…

I am very pleased to announce that Maya Kilmer has officially joined me on the journal team as Copy Editor.  Maya teaches English and Creative Writing courses at Oak Harbor High School, and has joined the strong community of NWSSA sculptors on Whidbey Island.  If you were at the Washington symposium you probably got to see her sculpting an ambitious stone octopus.  Welcome Maya!

Pilgrim Firs and Suttle Lake were whirlwinds of creative energy.  If you had the opportunity and privilege of attending, then I expect you are charged up with new insights and ready to apply them. 

As you size up that next project, or that old project that’s suddenly demanding completion, perhaps consider some words of creative wisdom.  This quote from sculptor Edmonia Lewis seemed like a fitting sentiment after getting to carve among the trees at the symposiums during the days, and watch the sky for shooting stars at night.  I find it gives permission to accept that there is a reason for tolerating certain modern discomforts, and that the reason is worthwhile:

There is nothing so beautiful as the free forest. To catch a fish when you are hungry, cut the boughs of a tree, make a fire to roast it, and eat it in the open air, is the greatest of all luxuries. I would not stay a week pent up in cities if it were not for my passion for art. 
- Edmonia Lewis 

- The Death of Cleopatra, 1876, marble

Credit: Smithsonian American Art Museum

~Benjamin & Maya