ART ATTACK

I’m headed out to Wichita today to scope out a new hobby. One of my New Year’s Resolutions was to take a class in something artsy, so I have decided to try to learn how to work with stained glass. Note the emphasis on try. There’s supposedly a one-day workshop set for April 25th at this glassworks store, so I think I’m going to live dangerously and sign up. I don’t have any unrealistic, cockeyed aspirations to be able to create cathedral windows; making a little sun catcher would be nice, though.

Now, I am not exactly what you’d call an artistic person. I struggled through two years of junior high art classes, one of the lowlights of my educational career. A close examination of my 7th grade report cards show semester A’s in everything except art, where I squeaked out a C-. About all I recall making were a pencil drawing of a penny loafer, which was not bad--at least the teacher could tell it somewhat resembled a shoe--and two of the absolute ugliest ceramic pieces you’ve ever seen in your life. One was a parallelogram-shaped, spotted banana peel-colored thing, for lack of a better word. The other was a blue pot made of coil strips. It was supposed to be smooth and symmetrical, but mine was lumpy and off kilter (sort of like me!). I tried to improve its appearance by cutting out cool words and phrases from magazines and Scotch taping them to the big blue lump. Stuff like: “Wow!” “Far Out!” “In a funk?” “I love The Beatles.” Profound. I wish I knew what happened to these masterpieces. I suspect Mama Bore put them out of their misery as soon as I ran off to college.

Anyway, I’m going to see if I can cut it working with stained glass, although I fear the only cutting is going to be to my hands. Perhaps I’ll create a new art form? Blood-stained glass.