JUST WAR NO MORE: Dorothy Day, Pierre Maurin + CATHOLIC PACIFISM

+++  With the CBC Radio report announcing that the so-called ‘Conservative’ government in Ottawa is getting set to try to extend the tour of duty for Canadian troops in Afghanistan to 2011, my mind is preoccupied on this first Sunday of Lent with thoughts of war and peace.  The silence of the Canadian Catholic bishops on this unjust war is stifling and shameful.  One does not need to be a Christian pacifist, which I hope I am, to understand that this war does not by any means conform to the so-called ‘just war doctrine’ of the Roman Catholic  Church.  So, there has been a huge abrogation of responsibility here not just by the bishops, but also by the priests, deacons and lay presiders who never say a thing about it from the pulpit, and by the Catholic press, which has yet to have a serious nation-wide discussion on these issues.  Perhaps now that the Afghan matter looks set to be made an election issue by the parties, it is time that the national debate on what we are doing there should happen.  ++   Some people think that an election at this time would be unwise, mainly, its seems, because they can’t stomach the idea that the bumbling grey man who leads the Liberal Party of Canada, might just win the contest by default.  I don’t particularly like Stephane Dion either, and his position on the war is confused as only Liberal Party policy can be, but in terms of incremental disengagement, he makes just slightly more sense than the Prime Minister.  ++  If I understand his position, it is to have troops left there in a peacekeeping and protective-defensive capacity after the current period ends next year, but not engaged in pro-active offensive patrols.  He condemns the Tories for their ‘never-ending war,’ but does not say how long Canadians would act as peacekeepers there. The Bloc, the NDP and the Greens want immediate withdrawal of troops.  The latter position is the one that the left wing of the Liberal Party should pursue in order to change Dion’s mind.  The Liberals should then enter into talks with the other opposition parties to form a peace coalition to dump the Tories.  Otherwise, divided as they are into four opposition parties, the Tories are likely to get re-elected again with a minority parliament that will continue to squander innocent Canadian and Afghan lives without any kind of real mandate by a majority of voters.  ++  To better enable Catholic pacifists and other Christian pacifists in this country to understand the history of the American Catholic Pacifist movement, I provide a link here to a short outline from the Houston Texas Catholic Worker online newspaper:   http://www.cjd.org/paper/pacifism.html  ++  This link is also found in the tags and in the blogroll to the right under the heading ‘CATHOLIC PACIFISM: Dorothy Day, Pierre Maurin + Catholic Workers.’    +++

MARSHALL STOKES, genius pyrographic artist, opens @ Incite + Concyse, 2514 Douglas, 7 pm, February 1st 2008, for 1 month expo

+++  Just met Marshall Stokes, the genius pyrographic artist from Portland Oregon who is hanging his work at Incite & Concyse, 2514 Douglas Street, next door to the 50/50 Gallery, opening February 1, tonight at 7:00 pm for a one month show.  I found my way there after noticing unusual 20 cm. x 15 cm. miniposters for the show nailed to telephone poles in Fernwood.  These are screen printed with black ink on thin cedar board, showing Koi fish in a design that owes a debt to Japonisme and Art Nouveau.  As I had not arranged for an interview, I didn’t want to interupt, as Marshall was still busy this afternoon hanging his show, so I just introduced myself as a fellow artist who is amazed at his genius after visiting his website.  That site, which is found at popicon1.com, and here to the right in our CCC Weblog blogroll under ‘MARSHALL STOKES,’ gives the viewer-reader a comprehensive catalogue of works by this very talented young man, his bio, contact info, history of expos, gallery of work in different media, etc.  I encourage viewers to visit the  site to get a better understanding of Marshall Stokes’ work, pyrography, and the link between Asian art, particularly that of Japan, and the contemporary skateboard design and screen print scene in Victoria, Portland and throughout Pacifica.  ++   Like FMR, or the CCC site, if I may be so bold, even though we are still very much in the primitive stages of blog development and don’t have pix here yet, the Pop Icon site is premised on the essential design fact that the colours of pictures exhibited on black backgrounds are seemingly visually enhanced as a result.  I left a copy of the January number of Island Catholic News showing my colour art with Marshall, and referred him to Jack Wise’s work, which I think he would appreciate.  He carefully wrote Wise’s name down in a notebook before giving me one of his beautiful little cedar posters.  I was honoured by the gesture, and said that I would tell all my friends about his one man show that will have a couple of local music groups playing for the opening party tonight.  I neglected  to note the names of the groups, however.  +++ 

ALEX CUBA @ University of Calgary, Alberta, Dec. 12, 2007, CBC Concerts on Demand @ CCC Weblog

+++  Goyo de la Rosa writes:  Peter Cook from CBC’s Concerts on Demand alerted us to ALEX CUBA playing solo at the University of Calgary late last year.  The concert is available here at the Concerned Citizens’ Coalition Weblog in our blogroll under ‘ALEX CUBA.’  ALEX CUBA is the new moniker of Alexis Puentes, late of the celebrated Puentes Brothers son duo with his blood brother Adonis, both from Cuba.  I appreciate the notice from Mr. Cook at CBC, and refer listeners of fine music to their wonderful on demand concert listening service with enthusiasm.  +++

MARGARET PATRICIA HARRIS 1923-2007 by Patrick Jamieson, Island Catholic News, February 2008, Vol 22, No 1

+++  ICN FEB 2008:  MOURNING MARGARET: ONE YEAR ON…One year after the death of his dear mother Margaret Patricia Harris (1923-2007), ICN Founding Editor and former Concerned Citizens’ Coalition  candidate Patrick Jamieson writes about the mourning process in these excerpts from the original longer piece printed in the latest February 2008 number of the Island Catholic News in a full page article, on page three.  The article is accompanied by a black and white photo of the author’s late mother with his father James Jamieson, with the accompanying caption: ‘Margaret and Jim Jamieson circa 1951 in Edmonton.  At that point they had two sons with four more children to follow in the decade of the 50s.’  +++  It will be a year February 8th since my mother died and seems time to remember a few more significant aspects of her personality, life and dynamics in our collective family.  ++  We are all having a very difficult time, I would say, in integrating her physical disappearance.  ++  My sister Christine and I wrote tributes and eulogies a year ago at the time of the death which were printed in Island Catholic News.  ++  Mourning, it seems to me, requires self-conscious processing if we are to truly grow through it.  If we are to reap the benefits mourning grants to us as a grace.  ++  Too often the funeral itself is seen as a sour imposition upon family and friends and perhaps should be done without.  As Christians and Catholics my family feel they have no real choice.  It is spiritually too important to say goodbye properly and start the process of living beyond.  ++  The funeral and the year following were a critically important period of growth for those left behind, a gift just as much as the ones granted when she was alive.  ++  For my mother was someone who in her being granted gifts by her mere presence.  It was always a pleasure as a youth to introduce my close friends to her, knowing her charm would work on them.  I enjoyed watching how they reacted as it would reveal something about them, their character.  ++  She was hospitable and graceful in her loving way.  Personally what I miss most is just being able to sit in her presence and connect.  Chat about the day.  Bring her up to date on what is going on in the community, with the newspaper and often within the petty world of politics within the Catholic church.  That connection was a metaphysical compass bearing which gave meaning and direction to the deeper regions of my life.  ++ II.  She went to Saint Anne’s Academy, graduating in 1940, so her roots were in the region, although she travelled away with my father’s military postings until 1977 when they could return upon retirement to help care for her mother who lived on the Island from 1920, coming from Northern England at Darlington, a Quaker town.  ++  My father, after sixty-five years of married life together, it must be said, misses her the most acutely.  Although some of her children are close behind.  She was one of those people with a sort of personality that insinuates itself deeply and permanently into your psyche.  She was not to be denied.  In a good sense, as they say.  ++  My father, I would say, has had a very hard time filling in the gap.  He still lives in their condominium apartment but finds it haunted.  Wanting to move out of its confines but realizing it is much too soon.  Their apartment represents physically what we have left of her in a way.  A sort of permanent shrine, none of her children wish to see it sold yet.  ++  Christmas was interesting that way.  The feelings from the years when she constructed and reconstructed the traditions that had grown up through the years.  Because we were a rootless military family sort of group; Vancouver, Edmonton,  Whitehorse, Ottawa and Oromocto, New Brunswick as well as Chilliwack, Winnipeg and finally Victoria all added their dimensions.  It always seemed like it would go on forever with her mystically at the helm.  ++  My father has kept up his refugee work but with an obvious lessening of intensity at age 86.  But of course he realizes that it is all largely a distraction from this gaping maw at the centre of our collective life created by her passing.  His challenge, and ours, is to symbolically let her go again and again over these next few years.  ++  Just before my mother passed, a great grandson, Jamie, was born who she was able to hold two months before her death.  Now within the year of her passing a great granddaughter, Poppy, is born in Winnipeg and my father looks forward to meeting her soon.  ++  My sister, Rita, who lives in Winnipeg has drawn the connection already in her visiting with the baby and feels it helps in some small if concrete way.  The tangible experience of healing through mourning.  ++  … IV.  My mother’s creativity was how she created a whole phenomenal universe for her family.  Physically and emotionally.  It was a power she took for granted yet tempered with an alluring charm and graciousness.  She  rarely had to threaten.  He method of discipline was largely that of charm.  One never wished to disappoint her or go against her best values.  It lent itself to great difficulty when it was time to leave the emotional security of the family nest.  ++  She could be fiercely aggressive and highly articulate in defending and explaining her values, particularly in the earlier years when it was key to our earliest and permanent formation.  ++  This whole way of life she wove, converged at a central point in the values and spiritual principles that guided us out through its cone at the end and into weaving similar patterns in our own lives, ones that we had all but unconsciously learned.  ++  As my sister wrote in her eulogy, such a richly symbolic figure when she dies leave a huge gap.  The temptation is to try to fill that gap with another person, frenzied activity or some other false substitution.  ++  But as Dietrich Bonhoeffer says: “Nothing can make up for the absence of someone we love, and it would be wrong to try to find a kind of substitute: we must simply hold out and see it through.  This sounds very hard at first, but at the same time it is a great consolation, for the gap, as long as it remains unfilled, preserves the bonds between us.  It is nonsense to say that God fills the gap: he doesn’t fill it, but on the contrary He keeps it empty and so helps us keep alive our communion with each other.”  +++ 

SISTER MARY ANGELICA, LOFTUS, GERTRUDE MARY, SSA, June 24, 1908 – January 10, 2008, R. I. P.

+++  LOFTUS, Gertrude Mary (Sr. Mary Anglelica), born June 24, 1908, in Greenwood, B. C., of Irish/Scottish ancestry, died at Saint Anne’s Residence in Victoria, B. C., on January 10, 2008, at 99 years of age.  ++   Having made contact with the Sisters in Kitsilano, she entered the Sisters of Saint Anne on January 10, 1925, and pronounced her vows at Saint Anne’s Academy, Victoria, B. C., on February 2, 1927.  Last February she celebrated her 80th anniversary as a Sister of Saint Anne.  ++  Despite twice being stricken with TB, Sister Mary Anglelica’s years of ministry were many and varied, and brought her to several missions in British Columbia.  Her ministry encompassed cooking, housekeeping, laundry, gardening, assisting the nurses on night duty, serving meals to patients, and stamp collecting, as well as teaching crafts to patients and the handicapped.  ++  She ministered in Campbell River Hospital, St. Augustine’s in Vancouver, Smithers Hospital, St. Joseph’s Hospital, and for 24 years at Mount St. Mary Hospital in Victoria, at the sisters’ residences on Johnson Street, Mount Saint Angela, and Begbie Street.  It was while stationed at Mount Saint Mary that, in addition to her other responsibilities, Sister Mary Angelica began making pottery and teaching basket weaving.  She served in volunteer capacity at the Saint Vincent de Paul Store and at Arbutus Crafts, teaching basket weaving for 22 years.  She retired to Saint Ann’s Residence in 1989.  ++  Predeceased by her parents Mary Kennedy and John Patrick Loftus, sister Mrs. Irene Proctor (Leo), and cousin Joe (Marie) Loftus, she is survived by nieces Maureen (Norm) Okerstrom and Sheila (Duncan) Ross; several cousins: Gail Jones, Ann Cole, Bill Loftus, Pat Loftus, Terry Loftus, Joan Uede, Susan Hepburn, Betty Wallace, Mike Loftus, and David Loftus; and her religious community, the Sisters of Saint Anne. ++  Prayers were offered January 14 at Saint Anne’s Residence, 2474 Arbutus Road, Victoria, B. C.; where Mass of the Resurrection was offered on January 15.  Interment Hatley Memorial Gardens.  +++  This article was originally published by the B. C. Catholic weekly newspaper, on January 21, 2008 in the OBITUARIES section of the CLASSIFIEDS, on page 14, with a black and white photo.  +++  A link to the Saint Anne’s Residence at Queenswood is found on the blogroll under the heading ‘QUEENSWOOD,’ in the tags, or at this address: http://www.queenswoodcentre.com/newsletter.html +++  B. C. CATHOLIC newspaper website is provided in the CCC WE BLOG blogroll to the right under the heading ‘Catholic, B.C.’  +++   

SISTER EILEEN CURTEIS’ ‘Wind Daughter,’ GLOBAL ARTISTE DES ARTS, says Goyo de la Rosa

+++  Sister Eileen Curteis is my choice for Victoria’s NUMERO UNO GLOBAL ARTISTE DES ARTS for her work in many healing arts ministries, through her prayers and gentle being as a Sister of Saint Anne, and through her many published books, including  poetry.  Among her books is this one recently given a brief review at our CCC LibraryThing account:  http://www.librarything.com/work/4650674.  It is listed under ‘SISTER EILEEN CURTEIS’ on our blogroll.  There is also another link under her name on the blogroll to a site showing other books of hers for sale.  +++

New colour art by GREGORY HARTNELL (alias: ‘Goyo de la Rosa’), ICN Island Catholic News, January 2008, Volume 21 No 12

+++  Island Catholic News’ February number is in production now, according to my good friend Patrick Jamieson, founding editor, and former Concerned Citizens’ Coalition candidate, and should be hot off the press in a few days.  I aimed to attend an ICN board meeting recently but missed getting into Pat’s controlled entrance apartment building by coming late, so don’t know what they have planned for February, aside from an article I wrote about the first printing press used by Bishop Demers and Catholic editor Paul de Garro to produce ‘Le Courrier de la Nouvelle Caledonie’ and the ‘Colonist’, some of Victoria’s earliest publications.  +++   The current print number of Island Catholic News (ICN website: http://www.islandnet.com/~icn/) which is very likely still available in a box in the atrium outside the downtown library and perhaps still may be found at Sorensens’s Books on Cook Street near Fort, contains full colour art work by ‘Goyo de la Rosa,’ as I sometimes call myself.  +++   Page one opens with a large (24.3 cm. x 29.3 cm. or 9 5/8 in. x 11 9/16 in.) full colour reproduction of a digital photo taken by Wordworks’ Louise Beinhaur of my painting ‘Our Lady of the Light of Vietnam,’ which is one that I started in the late nineties and only finished just before Christmas.  The caption below the painting says that it is ‘by Gregory Hartnell, acrylic gesso polymer on stretched canvas, 1999-2007.  Based on an old Catalan Romanesque fresco, it glorifies the Prince of Peace and recalls the damage done to the Vietnamese Church by imperial wars.  Let us pray for world peace.’  +++   On page three another one of my paintings is reproduced in black and white in the centre of the top of the page where it cannot be missed.  Below, it carries the caption: ‘Sacred Quatrefoil of Imperfect Hearts, by Gregory Hartnell, acrylic gesso polymer on stretched canvas, 1999-2007.  A Christian psychedelic mandala, with four different sized free-form hearts centering  on a mirror-like host, for meditation on the Real Presence of the Cosmic Christ with us now.’   +++   In the upper right hand corner of page 5, ICN has placed another of my paintings, reproduced in black and white, and used here as a decorative element or space filler as had been done with the previous mandala, with no illustrative connection between them and adjacent elements.  The caption below the vertical rectangle says: ‘Holy Green Cross of Palma (Homage to Gaudi and Jack Wise), by Gregory Hartnell, acrylic gesso polymer on stretched canvas, 1999-2007.  Another Christian psychedelic mandala honouring the great Catalan mystic maestro of Modernismo and the late Pacifican Buddhist mandala master.’   +++   A centre spread in full colour has artwork by a number of artists who were involved in the Development and Peace Art Show at Saint Patrick’s Church recently, including Hamish Tucker, Cathy Thompson, John Hillian and myself.   +++   My two pieces, arranged in the lower half of page 7, are both vertical rectangles, one of which actually was not shown in the D & P show, but which is part of the mandala series.  It carried the caption: ‘Above: Holy Martyrs’ Heartblood of Marrakech (Meditation Franciscaine), Gregory Hartnell, acrylic gesso polymer on stretched canvas, 1999-2007.  The blood red centre of this Christian mandala recalls Christ’s salvific sacrifice and honours 13th century Franciscan martyrs in Maroc.’  +++   To the right of the mandala is a vertical rectangular photo of a detail from a square painting of Saint Francis of Assisi.  This painting was prominently displayed at the show and the caption says: ‘Right: St. Francis stigmata, Gregory Hartnell, acrylic.  This painting was purchased by the Franciscan Friary, Joan Crescent.’  +++  Another piece from this show, one entitled ‘Cherub’ by Char Bell, is a monochrome orange acrylic painting of a cherub which was not so successfully reproduced on the smaller of the tabloid’s one-page covers. Three charming watercolours of pears by Laurie Ladmore, wife of painter David Ladmore, are also reproduced in this number of ICN, to advertise an artwork show they held at their studio apartment just before Christmas.  +++  It should be noted that ICN is a very good outlet for artists to have their artwork reproduced at no charge for black and white and for reasonable prices for full colour.  Other artists that have had their work reproduced in colour or black and white over the years include David Ladmore, Anna Mah, Imre Szekeley, Linda Darby, and many others.  We have a link to the ICN website (http://www.icn@islandnet.com/~icn/)  listed here in the tags at our CCC Weblog and in the blogroll to the right under the title: ‘Island Catholic News.’  +++

One hundred and fifty lines – an odyssey by DAVID JURE, poem for Robbie Burns’ Day, James Bay Books

+++  DAVID JURE  is the nom de plume of my good friend DAVID BURKE, or as he is sometimes known, John David Burke, poet, actor, cineaste, mental health patients’ advocate and a former Concerned Citizens’ Coalition candidate.  David is the author of a number of poetry chapbooks, including ‘Various Means of Escape,’ ‘Merlin’s Millenium’ and ‘Dazed and Confused,’ most of which are produced with the able computer handiwork of Louise Beinhaur of Wordworks.    He has a new big book of poetry in the making with Louise.  +++   Here is a new poem on blue-lined writing paper, neatly typed up on an old typewriter, as is the wont of David Jure, with the occasional typo fixed in blue ink, and the following scribbled at the top: ‘Jan 23rd. David Jure 220-2354.’  David intended to read this poem to those attending the Robbie Burns thing at the James Bay Book store last night, but we decided to take our tea instead here at our Hartnell-Keough Rockland aerie as his back was killing him.   After giving him a cup of tea and a couple of painkillers, he seemed to relax and he read it aloud to me.  Impressed and privileged, I gathered my courage before driving him home, to ask if I could borrow it to post here.  I suspected that this was his only copy.  Graciously, he gave me the envelope, inside of which was this poem on three sheets of lined paper, about fifty lines per page…I will have to add my own eliptical dots to the ends of his lines, as I fear that the Weirdpress computer blogging programme that we use here does not seem to allow for paragraph indentation, or spacing, or the peculiar word arrangement that DAVID JURE uses in his original typewritten copy.   I have also taken some liberties with David Jure’s punctuation and spelling where the errors seem unintentional, but where the orthography is merely weird and idiosyncratic, I leave it as is.  - CCC WE BLOG Editor, Goyo de la Rosa  +++  One hundred and fifty lines – an odyssey …  shakespeare in his thieving murderous way … stealing lines from Marlowe and everyone in sight ….  you would think that a man that wealthy would …  have more scruples … and was that word in evidence … he had a vocab of 24,000 words … which was prodigious … liked to love gorgeous bankside babes … had a fondness for tobacco … and was a good father … but after that we know absolutely nothing. … perhaps this mystery is a cachet….? …  how can I foster this mystery … Viktoria’s finest … seer in search of…… comfortable shoes … lover of hookers and booze … descended from robert the bruise … capable of knocking out a play in 24 hours … and once clocked at twenty eight miles an hour … beside the Uplands bus … breathing heavy on the flowers … as the quest for fame sours… … I retreat … I backpeddle … I lie on the bed waiting … for the magic phone to ring … but Trevor Nunntheless the words flow … and I prove inimicable in my incensed way … no nearer royalty than a beggar … but prodded by excellence … and proud of my rings and voices and trappings… … back to the theatre or forward into canlit … the big tit … charles tidler lorna crozier and roy green …  I yam in excellent company … however the pain … mounts … shoulders and neck not worth writing … hame aboot and ernie hemmingways letters on sale … at Sorensens for five dollars. … I demurred and drank my rum. … David Jones … welsh wonderkind… … my potent friends … its overwhelming to the new girl on the block … a brief pause… … gregory hartnell … parapundit … master blogger … labours long without this week getting his … pikture in the paper …. calls the mayors office to task on everything … and beetles around town in little blue car… …  The Viktoria police have been called again … and again on their brutal and rude behaviour … has stephen harper been notified … that five police cars show up to check out a stolen bicycle … Willow Kinlock handcuffered and tethered to a cell door … for five hours …what kind of a world are we living in … kindly Paul Battershill on suspension … perhaps he didn’t get the message across to his merry men.. … I have been in handcuffs a dozen times… … The secret is to relax and let the imperative observant mind … takeover … drink it all it in and don’t get upset … life is a grand adventure … a grand for thy avenger …. sold a book today to John Dobbs … son of legend Kildare dobbs … at the james bay coffee company.. … Shakespeare left a million words behind … with the redoutable smith corona I can do better … waiting for a redhead in a tight sweater … it’s no secret Im the biggest womanizer in the city … without a gal on the go I feel veritably shitty … a fan of beauty bright and the showcase sexy bits … culturally and rock and roll viktoria is the pits… …  the author spends too much money on cabs and lives the high life … still a big fan of the wind in the willows … and casual sex … wrote to beckett (sam) and got a reply … one grey day in the summer of seventy three … reading all of proust and feeling vaguely … depressed and compressed… … harold pinter … alone on the planet … having a pinter … david jure hovelist still gets calls from collection … agencies … gives them their pound of grief …. william shakspere poet and playwrite … had his financial griefs … all of london a giant dungheap smelt to the high heavens … with what the horses left in the street ….  plaintive wiccatoria … sweet smelling … but pushes its dung into the straight … in spite of the waging raging grannies…. …  Barak Obama smoker controversy man …  running for president … God speed. …  sam beckett …  warrior and saint … stabbed by a pimp in a paris suburb …was so kind as to visit the man in … jail … and see if he was alright… …  the coffee stained manuscripts of a seasoned mature author… veteran of a thousand treasons … that ass…. I wont speak to him ….  the pains taken and the insults given … on the street by the market on yeats some street person … called me a fat bastard and threatened physical violence. … I quoted ts eliot and zoomed away to private school …  golden threads and the intimations of childhood … molten pity and a new ditty … . if I could escape; gwen stephanie ….  funny how the radio grows and grows on one … as one gets older and milder and internally wilder …  soon to be in a wheelchair on the creaky … careworn streets of okey dokey bay …  I set the bed on fire with candles … at 3am one morning … and slept on … the chard remains … and now when coming … up in the elevator … sniff for burning pots in the hallways … and in respect … of the coldness and the brutal snobbery … I have experienced in the building … I am inclined to think … let her burn ….  oh for soho in the sixties … toronto in the seventies … and san francisco in the eighties ….   the world is too much with us …  al quaeda cells training in afghanistan … and paksitan … smoke that hashish … and are told that when they die they … go to heaven … and are promised seven virgins … I could use one now … how difficult it is to meet a tall beautiful … woman in insensate cromwellian wiccatoria …  i despair …..  and it turns into a bitterness about Hollywood north … car chases and explosions … cliff hangers.. …  meanwhile amazing poet Paul Burnside sleeps outside … with racoons … writes about irish goblins and heathrow accidents … never asks for help … found in Mcdonalds eating a meagre muffin and coffee … I ask you … what is wrong with the just society….  +++     

MILES LOWRY: GLOBAL ARTIST OF ARTS says GREGORY HARTNELL

+++  I’ve considered Miles Lowry to be the best male artistic painter in Victoria for many years, and put a black and white photo of one of his paintings, ‘Between the Worlds,’ on the cover of my prospectus number zero of LA ROSA in late 1988.  That same painting was reproduced in full colour when it was used in 1995 by Ekstasis Editions when they published Susan McCaslin’s book of poetry ‘Locutions.’  We also have in our CCC Library a number of Ekstasis Editions poetry books with covers illustrated by Miles Lowry, including ‘One Beautiful Day to Come,’ by Robert Lalonde, ‘A hand for the drowned,’ by Mike Schertzer, with a cover painting entitled “Fathoms,” and a very Fernand Khnopff-like painting entitled “Archangel” used for the cover of Richard Stevenson’s ‘From the Mouths of Angels.’ But I must say that of all these, I still prefer our LA ROSA NO. 0 cover choice and that of Susan McCaslin for her poetry book ‘Locutions.’  We both chose the very Leonardesque painting of a single young woman looking very mysterious and Italian, with shut eyes and downcast gaze, withdrawn, yet still attractive, somehow dreamy and yet dignified.  The attention to detail in the folds of the girl’s garment is worthy of Leonardo or Burne Jones.  The atmosphere that surrounds the subject is completely Symbolist or late Renaissance.  Miles produces beautiful work in a mystical Celtic tradition of his own completely unique imagination.  His posters for Suddenly Dance Theatre, Pacific Opera Victoria and others are exquisitely well designed and certainly collectable.  He is multi-talented, working in a wide range of media, including papier mache body casts.  We recently won a small enigmatic papier mache figure by Miles Lowry that looks vaguely Roman, certainly it has suggestions of the antique, when we successfully bid at a fund-raiser for an AIDs charity at Martin Batchelor Gallery.  I will load up pix of these things when I get the hang of it.  In the meantime, viewers can find Miles Lowry’s website listed in the Concerned Citizens’ Coalition Weblog Blogroll to the right under ‘Miles,’ or ‘Lowry.’  +++ http://www.mileslowry.ca/  +++

E. CATHERINE MORONEY: The Chief who Danced, a short note by Gregory Hartnell (‘Goyo’)

+++  Here is a thin curiosity of an illustrated chapbook about the Salish people of southwest British Columbia by a retired Sister of Saint Ann. I remember meeting Sister Catherine at Island Catholic News board meetings in the early 90s, and was always impressed with her keen attention to detail, humilty and wisdom.  The two colour (black and red) illustrations by Art Harrigan are unusual for the way they attempt to fuse traditional Salish native design motifs with Western style caricature.   I imported this item from our Librarything account over here to the Concerned Citizens’ Coalition Weblog @ WordPress, goyodelarosa.wordpress,com/ where it should now be found under ‘Chief…’ or ‘Moroney.’    It is a short review I wrote of it for our CCC Library catalogue @ LibraryThing:  http://www.librarything.com/work/4655700     +++