Five Artists Celebrate the Season in CDPL's Art Gallery!

Watching softly falling snowflakes wafting down from the heavens to cover brown leaves and dirty sidewalks left over from fall, is one of the more delicious delights of every delicious December. The twinkling beauty of nature's winter coat, couched in frigid air and crispy underfoot crunch, can easily entice you to build a silent, silly snowman complete with carrot nose for deer to feast on. When your tootsies freeze and the twirling wind nips at your nose, may we take this opportunity to warmly welcome you to the exquisite beauty of nature's indoor wonders pirouetting on the Walls and in the Display Cases of the Library's Mary Bishop Art Gallery for the month of December.

NATURE'S BOUNTY: SCULPTURES & LIFE CASTINGS by Jo Funk-Lauctes
The Display Cases are filled to the brim with original sculptures and castings created by Crawfordsville's own nature artist, Jo Funk-Lautes. Exercising her artistic versatility as a child, Jo found herself drawing pictures and carving wood any time she was free of other responsibilities. As an adult she engulfed herself in a career that created beauty in the dental lab, which she owned, and at home where she was a practicing artist.

Feeling stifled by previous jobs with no creativity, Jo flourished as a dental technician. She honed her artistic talent by working meticulously on her creativity both at home and at work. After 25 years of owning and working in her dental lab, Jo began selling her sculptures and castings and was delighted with the positive public response.

Eight years after carving her first piece, which ignited a desire to further this art medium, Jo constructed creative works for pleasure and commercial markets.

In 1999, she was commissioned to help create the Hunter Dan Large Game Series; a toy line that found it's way onto the shelves of Cabella's and other outdoor retailers. She carved and created multiple game accessories including replicas of the largest record holding buck and deer in the nation. With this, Jo's talents began to spread far beyond the wildlife realm and into a diversity of creative efforts.

Skilled in a range of mediums, Jo creates carvings, paintings, life castings, intricate jewelry, sculptures and wood burnings. Her collection shows a range of diversity that is limited only by her imagination. From incredibly small, detailed pieces, like jewelry, to a life-size statue, her abilities prove no piece is too small or large for her talents and passion. All of her pieces illustrate the things that Jo values most in her life.

Currently working on a new line of sculptures, Jo will work on every aspect of the pieces from creation in clay, to mold making, pouring the final piece into the mold and masterfully painting it. These pieces will be debuted and available online in 2008.

STRIKINGLY BEAUTIFUL HAND-MADE VIOLINS by Alan Frodge
What a delight to learn that cozy, comfy Crawfordsville can claim one of its citizens as a real-life Hand Made Violin Maker. WOW! Alan Frodge started making violins in 2004 and so far has made eight. He gave the first three to his nieces in Florida whose children play bluegrass. Alan himself began to play after making his first violin and is still learning.

His interest in creating violins was peaked by his Crawfordsville friend Archie Krout and a Stone Bluff friend Jerry Kelly.

It takes Alan about a month to make a violin. Though he has never kept track of the hours, he suspects it takes him over 100 hours to make one. His violins are all hand carved, including the scroll. The only parts purchased are the pegs, tailpiece, bridge, fingerboard and chin rest. The fingerboard and bridge are purchased rough and are hand-shaped to their final dimension. The purfling (the thin line of trim on the top and back) on all his violins is cut in, not painted on.

You will find two of Alan's Violins encased in the Display Case closest to the elevator on the Library's first floor. His #5 violin is unusual in that the neck, sides and back are made from sycamore rather than the usual maple. In his continuing search for knowledge on violin construction, he read that the wood of the sycamore has sometimes been used to make violins. So, he tried it! And liked the results! The sycamore, which gives a more mellow tone than maple, is highly figured and was purchased from Pennsylvania. The top is made from standard European spruce. This violin is priced at $800.00.

Alan's second violin, #6, includes all the things he wanted to try in one violin. First, the neck, sides and back are made from walnut grown on his farm. Alan says walnut is not normally used for violins, but he found the sound to be good and it looks nice. The next thing you will want to notice is the carved Lion's
Head on the top where there is usually a scroll. This carving took a lot longer to carve than a scroll because it is more intricate and Alan had never carved one before. The next thing you will notice is that there are no points at the c-bouts (center of the violin). Jerry Kelly told Alan that Antonio Stradivari once made a violin with no points, so Alan decided to try it. And the last thing you will notice is the light color of the edge on the top. That was achieved by wiping off the colored varnish in this area. This violin is priced at $900.00.

Alan has a website with additional information and illustrations if you would like to tap into it. The address is www.alanfrodge.com.

TIPPECANOE COUNTY ARTISTS TRI-BECCA: Rebecca Chapman
Rebecca (Becky) Chapman is a Lafayette artist specializing in oils, watercolors and colored pencil. Her compositions emphasize places she has traveled, floral themes and illustrations from literature.

Chapman enjoys creating art inspired by literature, poetry, songs, nature, travel and personal themes. Many of her images in this exhibit are pencil illustrations. Drawing has always been a natural way for her to express feelings or to create a certain mood. Even in her watercolors, she reaches for a pencil to create extra detail.

Her drawings usually tell a story from a song, literature or private thoughts and reflections. She has a set of drawings illustrating the song, "The Greatest Man I Never Knew", by Reba McIntire. The drawing of the figure emerging from a seed depicts a theme of personal growth from Henry David Thoreau's "Walden Pond". Other stories that have inspired her art are: "The Rabbits of Watership Down", "A Girl of the Limberlost" by Gene Stratton Porter, Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven", and "The Tell Tale Heart".

On travels with her husband throughout the year, Rebecca carries a sketchbook which allows her to create a special and personal souvenir of the trip and sketches that may someday become a painting.

Images of flowers and birds, most especially the intricate detail on the petal of a flower or the feather of a bird become both inspirational and a challenge to recreate for Becky. She enjoys capturing the beauty of birds remembered from growing up on a farm, the red-winged blackbird, the meadowlark, junco and a bluebird family. She is fascinated by their diversity, color and behavior.

Becky works within strict guidelines and tight deadlines as a graphic designer. Her personal drawing and painting allow her more freedom in the use of oils, watercolors, and colored pencils in Fine Art themes. The Fine Arts are her first love, though she does enjoy creating brochures or ads that communicate the essence of a business or organization. On occasion Becky has fun combining both graphic design and fine art in a single project.

TIPPECANOE COUNTY ARTISTS TRI-BECCA: Rebecca Longster
This Tippecanoe artist, Rebecca Longster is a writer, teacher and lover of words. That last comes in handy, as she teaches a variety of writing and literature classes in the Department of English at Purdue and for Purdue Statewide Technology. She is a recent graduate of the Stonecoast Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program through the University of Southern Maine, where she majored in Popular Fiction, and in late 2006, she started a local writers group for writers of genre or popular fiction in Indiana. This Rebecca finds it relaxing to express her creativity through visual art as well as through writing. She enjoys working in pencil, pastels, acrylics, and water colors, and is particularly interested in portraiture, unique places, and natural landscapes.

TIPPECANOE COUNTY ARTISTS TRI-BECCA: Rebecca Peters
This third Tippecanoe County Tri-Becca is a children's counselor and has been involved in art since she was old enough to hold a crayon. Her Dad still has a picture she drew when she was 5 years old. For the last few years she's been taking art classes from Betty Goodrich at the Morton Center in Lafayette. Rebecca has been a member of the Wabash Artist Alliance for the last three years. She enjoys all types of subject matter, working with pastels and more recently, acrylics. Rebecca finds her art a relaxing endeavor after her professional work as a child therapist for a local community mental health agency.

We hope you have warmed your body and soul with the beauty of nature's indoor wonders as interpreted by each of our FIVE ARTISTS CELEBRATING THE SEASON. Your tracks will be warmer now in the crispy, crunchy winter wonderland. Do come often and stay long!

Written by Diane Hammill

Genealogy Club: Social and Reorganization Meeting

Genealogy Club of Montgomery County, Ind Corp SOCIAL AND REORGANIZATION MEETING FINISH UP, Tuesday, 11 DECEMBER 2007, 6:30 p.m. for the executive committee, 7:00 p.m. for the regular meeting, in the Community Room-A of the Crawfordsville District Public Library. For More Information, contact: Ph: 765-362-2242 Weekdays: 9 am-5 pm Dian Moore, Local History Librarian (Ex 4) or Dellie Craig (Ex 118). E-mail: gen@cdpl.lib.in.us
BRING FINGER SNACKS TO SHARE. Visitors Welcome!

Preview Shelf -- Holiday Reading Offers New Ideas

The Christmas story "Finding Noel" by Richard Evans about how people come into our lives for a reason is a love story about two young people from different worlds. It and other seasonal stories are new at the Crawfordsville District Public Library. Anne Perry's "A Christmas Secret" is her 4th novel of the season revealing deadly danger to a visiting vicar and his wife who'd hoped to have a lovely getaway among new parishioners. Thomas Kinkade and Katherine Spencer's "A Christmas to Remember" is the eighth Cape Light Novel; a curmudgeon confined to bed lets her thoughts drift back to the holiday season of 1955, when she met her dashing husband, and when she made some mistakes. M. C. Beaton's Agatha Raisin mystery "Kissing Christmas Goodbye" finds our detective looking forward to the upcoming festivities and hoping to rekindle the object of her affections, but she gets sidetracked to help a wealthy widow who fears for her life. In Joanne Fluke's "Candy Cane Murder" a bakery owner must solve the murder of Kris Kringle as the holiday gala is eminent. This season brings ideas for different foods. "The Latin American Kitchen" by Elisabeth Luard tells about essential ingredients with over 200 authentic recipes (with beautiful photos). "The Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen" displays Donna Klein's meat-free, dairy-free dishes from "the healthiest region under the sun". "The Pressure Cooker Cookbook" is designed to make cooking a pleasure offering 250 recipes for all types of slow cookers. James Halliday & Hugh Johnson's "The Art and Science of Wine" explains places, equipment, climate, and all the ingredients required for different products, along with the latest developments in the industry. If you give gifts, "Wrap It Up" has Sally Walton's 50 creative and stylish gift-wrap ideas and their processes. "The Billboard Illustrated Encyclopedia of Country Music" edited by Tony Byworth shows how this music has constantly grown and developed from the first tunes brought to the New World by British and European settlers. Architecture of the Air" means sound, light and interactive technology used for public works involving spectators, by Christopher Janney, who has won many awards; examples are the sounds of certain runways, the special steamboat monument from 2002 in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the Sonic Plaza 1997 at East Carolina University in Greenville, N. C. Three craft books are Kathryn Berenson's "Quilts of Provence" about French quiltmaking, "Afghans Tradional and Modern" by Bonita Bray, and "Two-Hour Scrap Crafts" by Anita Crane, all stunning visual and detailed artworks illustrated with their historical significance. "Through Deaf Eyes" is a photographic history of the American community from archives at Gallaudet University, using 200 photographs examining historical eras through a deaf lens. "Way of the Peaceful Warrior" is touted as a book that changes lives, now a major motion picture, written by Dan Millman. It features a champion athlete/college student looking for what's missing in his life; he meets Socrates, and begins a spiritual odyssey into challenging confrontations speaking to the peaceful warrior in each of us. "The Buried Book" by David Damrosch is a riveting story of the first great epic composed in Babylonia more than 3,000 years ago, telling of one hero's travels in search of immortality. Lost to the world for 2,500 years and rediscovered in the 19th century, the story features daring adventurers, fearless explorers, ancient kings, goddesses and gods.

Preview Shelf -- Ready for Thanksgiving; Remembering Halloween

About two weeks ago, 65 children gathered at the Crawfordsville District Public Library to celebrate Halloween. The Youth Services Department set up bowling for the costumed youngsters with cobs of corn in cups for pins and a pumpkin for the ball. While enjoying brew, "spider legs", and pumpkin morsels, they also heard stories, played "pin the nose on a jack o'lantern", and threw velcro'd balls at a worm in an apple. Squeals accompanied the fun. You can sign up for special events by calling 362-2242. The book "Savage Kingdom" appeals during Thanksgiving season because it is the "true" story of Jamestown, 1607, and the settlement of America. Benjamin Woolley draws on new discoveries, neglected sources, and manuscript collections to reveal the daring enterprise by outcasts of the Old World facing a new culture both ravishing and alien that they had hoped not to face here. This was 14 years before the Mayflower voyage. "For Liberty and Glory" is James Gaines' new book about Washington, Lafayette, and their revolutions. Inside the cover is "They began as courtiers in a hierarchy of privilege, but history remembers them as patriot-citizens in a commonwealth of equals." The book deals with the "sister revolutions" of France and America in a single narrative. "Markings" by Dag Hammarskhjold is a testament of personal devotion by the known peacemaker with his intense recorded inner life of efforts to live his creed, his belief that all men are equally the children of God requiring him to have a life of selfless service to others. "Chasing Life" by Sanjay Gupta offers new ideas from around the world, and sensible decisions for better days. "The Gaslight Effect" holds Robin Stern's instructions to stop letting other people manipulate your thinking and/or your life. Betty Rollin's "Here's the Bright Side" is about the "silver linings in clouds", a funny book about surprising upsides to challenging "low blows". Tony Campolo's "Letters to a Young Evangelical" argues against politically polarized and predominantly secular living. "Think" by Michael LeGault slows us down because he says crucial decisions can't be made in the blink of an eye. Bill Clinton's "Giving" shows how companies, organizations, and individuals are working to solve problems "down the street and around the world" told through the experiences of all kinds of people in different places. "Away" by Amy Bloom tells about a young innocent lady whose family is destroyed in a Russian pogrom, so she comes alone to America, and travels all around the country looking for a daughter who may still be alive. "Frank Lloyd Wright, a Gatefold Portfolio" contains 32 pull-out pages showing 16 of his special home designs like Falling Water, Wingspread, the Guggenheim Museum and the Beth Shalom synagogue, a full evening's entertainment. Leonard Susskind's "The Cosmic Landscape" explains his thoughts about string theory and the illusion of intelligent design. Thorsten Milse's photographs about "Little Polar Bears" from the Wapusk National Park west of Hudson Bay illustrate the protection of the animals while still allowing for controlled visits to the area. "Voyage of the Turtle" by Carl Safina is a pursuit of the earth's last dinosaur. "The Planets" by Dava Sobel divulges her impressive ability to make difficult scientific concepts into compelling explanations of our place in the universe (she wrote "Longitude" and "Galileo's Daughter").

Are You Ready to Enjoy Indiana Art at Its Best?

It is our great pleasure to warmly welcome the 83rd Annual Hoosier Salon Traveling Exhibition, Indiana Art at Its Best to the Library's Mary Bishop Memorial Art Gallery from Monday, November 5 until Friday, November 30, 2007.

The varied works chosen by this year's jurors, Ann Piper, Associate professor of Painting and Drawing at Emporia State University in Emporia, Kansas and Scott Wolniak, studio art teacher in various media at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the University of Chicago, brings an especially eclectic and diversified scope of art to our gallery.

Each year since 1925, artist members of the Hoosier Salon Patrons Association bring their newest and finest works to stand the test of expert jurors. In its 18th year at the Indiana State Museum, there were 586 entrys presented to the jury. Of these, 174 pieces by 142 artist members were juried into the show. Prizes of nearly $30,000 were awarded for excellence.

To belong to the Salon an artist must be a current Indiana resident and dues-paying member, or have lived in the state for at least one year. A member of the Salon may enter up to three pieces of art each year to be juried.

From September through January, 150 of these pieces are divided into five tour groupings that travel to 34 different venues throughout the state.

Each artist speaks clearly in his or her own unique voice. Artists chosen for our venue include: Mason Archie, Eleanor K. Brewer, John Charles Brooks, Tom Butters, Gayle Coyle, Dick Davis, Mark Dillman, Robert Eberle, Carol Fisher, Jennifer Hughes, Carol Moratti, John Oilar, J. Anna Roberts, Jerry Smith and Sharon Sommerville. What a delight to find three of "Montgomery County's Best" among Indiana's Best, included in our tour.

It is the Salon's hope that each of you find an artistic creation that brings you joy! Visitors may wish to purchase a piece that speaks to their heart to be included in their own private collections. Others may choose to incorporate the images into their mind's eye, to be played forward any time in the future. Whatever your choice, don't miss the opportunity to view INDIANA ART AT ITS BEST during the entire month of November. I promise you won't be sorry!

Are You Ready to Enjoy Indiana Art at Its Best?

It is our great pleasure to warmly welcome the 83rd Annual Hoosier Salon Traveling Exhibition, Indiana Art at Its Best to the Library's Mary Bishop Memorial Art Gallery from Monday, November 5 until Friday, November 30, 2007.

The varied works chosen by this year's jurors, Ann Piper, Associate professor of Painting and Drawing at Emporia State University in Emporia, Kansas and Scott Wolniak, studio art teacher in various media at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the University of Chicago, brings an especially eclectic and diversified scope of art to our gallery.

Each year since 1925, artist members of the Hoosier Salon Patrons Association bring their newest and finest works to stand the test of expert jurors. In its 18th year at the Indiana State Museum, there were 586 entrys presented to the jury. Of these, 174 pieces by 142 artist members were juried into the show. Prizes of nearly $30,000 were awarded for excellence.

To belong to the Salon an artist must be a current Indiana resident and dues-paying member, or have lived in the state for at least one year. A member of the Salon may enter up to three pieces of art each year to be juried.

From September through January, 150 of these pieces are divided into five tour groupings that travel to 34 different venues throughout the state.

Each artist speaks clearly in his or her own unique voice. Artists chosen for our venue include: Mason Archie, Eleanor K. Brewer, John Charles Brooks, Tom Butters, Gayle Coyle, Dick Davis, Mark Dillman, Robert Eberle, Carol Fisher, Jennifer Hughes, Carol Moratti, John Oilar, J. Anna Roberts, Jerry Smith and Sharon Sommerville. What a delight to find three of "Montgomery County's Best" among Indiana's Best, included in our tour.

It is the Salon's hope that each of you find an artistic creation that brings you joy! Visitors may wish to purchase a piece that speaks to their heart to be included in their own private collections. Others may choose to incorporate the images into their mind's eye, to be played forward any time in the future. Whatever your choice, don't miss the opportunity to view INDIANA ART AT ITS BEST during the entire month of November. I promise you won't be sorry!

Preview Shelf -- Becoming Library Patrons

A recent episode attracts the question, "Why can we have the useful Crawfordsville District Public Library?" We can have our library because residents of Union Township pay library taxes, which afford them patron cards to use for all the services. Our county also has four outstanding outlying libraries in Darlington, Ladoga, Linden, and Waveland, affording their area taxpayers their services and, through CDPL cooperation, allowing them reciprocal cards to the Crawfordsville Library. This commitment by taxpayers is expensive and well worth the burdens of taxation. Thanks to our responsible taxpayers! Those who do not pay library taxes may buy annual cards. A yearly fee card for a family, covering all the Crawfordsville library services, amounts to $4.05 per month. Travel guides are fun to read even if we aren't contemplating a personal visit. New on the shelf are Rick Steves' "Great Britain 2007", "Europe Through the Back Door 2007" and "Best of Eastern Europe 2007" with good maps, information about museums, tours, transportation, and trip planning. Poetry comes from Anne Stevenson ("Poems 1955-2005") biographer of Sylvia Plath, winner of the Northern Rock Foundation Writer's Award 2002, and resident of Britain. John Betjeman's "Collected Poems" offer pleasure "as much to casual readers as to the literary establishment" (New York Times). Books about conflict appeal to writers as projects and to readers as history. "Kingfish' by Richard White, Jr. is about the "reign" of Louisiana Governor Huey Long whose story inspired the movie "All the King's Men". "Last Man Out" is Robert Charles' memoir of surviving the Burma-Thailand Death Railway (June 1942 to October 1943) through courage during unimaginable brutality while building the project immortalized in "Bridge Over the River Kwai". "Beyond Valor" is Patrick O'Donnell's story of World War II Rangers and Airborne veterans in the heart of combas told through 650 e-histories and interviews. (O'Donnell is the creator of The Drop Zone, the first online oral history project for WWII veterans.) "The Genome War" by James Shreave shows "the ups and downs of humanity's frantic quest for the Holy Grail of science" (Houston Chronicle). A new historical novel by Ken Follett called "World Without End" takes place in England in the 14th century, concerned with ambition, love, greed and revenge at the exquisite Gothic cathedral (built in "The Pillars of the Earth" by the same author). "Fellow Travelers" comes from Thomas Mallon about Washington, D.C. during the McCarthy era in the early 1950s. Robert Ludlum and Philip Shelby's "The Cassandra Compact" delves into the thinking of an under-cover Russian spy who is on the run, and the intricate plot expresses an attempt to steal Russia's store of smallpox virus. "The Septembers of Shiraz" by Dalia Sofer takes us to the aftermath of the Iranian revolution, when a rare-gem dealer is wrongly accused of being a spy and his wife goes to great lengths to help. Here comes Garrison Keillor with his newest novel of Lake Wobegon called "Pontoon"; his funny first episode is about the good lady who's prepared to die and wishes cremation and her ashes placed inside a bowling ball and dropped into the lake. It is a lake "as you've imagined it -- good loving people who drive each other slightly crazy". "Hartsburg, USA" by David Mizner offers an ideological turf war of opposites vying for a seat on the school board. "The Museum of Dr. Moxes" by Joyce Carol Oates contains ten stories about relations between women and men, children and parents, and strangers whose lives intersect.