Susan Spencer:MOUNTAIN RETREAT
This is the same location as ICE COLD, but this is what the weather really looked like that day. I am in a continual struggle with myself to keep my work as simple as possible and I felt I had a degree of success toward that goal with this painting. I love getting out in a canoe and seeing hidden treasures like this scene that you would never see from the road.

John Leben: When the Propellor Stops
Acrylic on Canvas - 36 x 48 inches - 1996 - $ 2450. (framed)
Note: This is the prologue of a lengthy narrative which follows an artist and the choices he makes in his search for artistic inspiration.
The narrative was originally published in serial form with a new chapter appearing every two weeks on my web site at www.lebenart.com. Eventually, literary agents and publishers became interested in the piece suggesting that I cease publication on the internet if I hope to publish the narrative as a conventional novel. Being the capitalist that I am, I took their advice and stopped publishing on the internet after chapter 7. The novel is almost finished now, but 7 chapters are still available to anyone who wants to read them on my web site.
Alien ArtifactA Novel of Technological Trauma and Artistic InspirationBy John LebenStarted 11/11/97
Prologue
Westerly winds blowing off Lake Michigan constantly form, erode and rebuild massive dunes made of sand over the ghost town... a town once known as Singapore. A small artifact... square, metallic, a quarter-inch thick wafer with bolt-like nubs on its weathered surface... slowly emerges from under the blowing sand.
There it sits, for weeks... maybe months, uncovered at last. Over and over, the wind covers it gently (again) with a new blanket of sand, then carefully brushes it away to allow the artifact to sparkle in the sun, gather strength. The artifact attracts a hiker (an artist) awed by the mystery of the place. It reflects a flash of sunlight into the artist's eye drawing him to the sand dune where the artifact hides. It waits as the artist scans the dunes, searching for the source of the flash of light. The silver-colored wafer flashes again, drawing the hiker near.
The wind picks up, teasing the hiker with needles of blowing sand, spraying more sand over the artifact. The wafer vibrates briefly, coming alive. It pulls more sand over itself as if shy, trying to hide from his curious eyes (not yet). Hooked, the artist approaches, brushes sand off a badly eroded grid-like structure imbedded in the dune and finds the artifact planted precisely in the middle of one square cell, partially covered, gleaming in the sun.
Smiling, the artist reaches for the metal square, hesitates... simultaneously repelled and attracted by the object. Then he picks it up, turns it over in his hand and abruptly pockets the odd object for a more careful examination later.Back in his rented room, the artist secretly hides the artifact in his briefcase, away from the thoughtful eyes of his wife and partner. He never touches it again, but its now tenuous grip on the artist's mind would grow more firm with time... symbiosis begun. The artifact, awakened, grows stronger in the artist's briefcase. Blueprints, proposals, storyboards, video scripts... papers hinting at the artist's vocation make their periodic visits to the home of the wafer-like icon, giving the artifact purpose.

TEXT ABRIDGED

John Pangia:Eagle Lake

Digital repaint of a vacation photo in Alaska, overlayed with the face
of a co-operative eagle from the Philadelphia zoo.

John Pangia
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Altered Images
http://www.jersey.net/~usns/