BUNNY AND NON-BUNNYNESS

Six years ago, Ben Blanchard, a young man I’ve known since he was ten, illustrated a book-length poem I’d written entitled The Beast Beelzebufo, the story of a devil frog that was the largest frog ever to live on earth. At the time of the book’s publication, Ben was visiting his mother here in New Iberia but living in Sedona, Arizona and practicing as a raw foodist. He had graduated from the Raw Food Preparation and Organic Gardening School sponsored by the Tree of Life Rejuvenation Center and was working on art projects in his spare time, one of which was The Beast.

A few years later, Ben, now working in Austin, Texas, wrote and illustrated his own book-length poem, Willameena Moonbeam, a story about children wishing for the sun to stay out all day so they could play outdoors, and when their wish comes true are dismayed that the world has become unbalanced.

In Austin, Ben became affiliated with the School of Acting and began working in film, a field he had aspired to enter after graduating from high school. Yesterday evening, in a private showing, we were treated to Ben’s first short film, Bunny and Non-Bunnyness, a dark comedy that showcases his considerable artistic talents. Ben wrote and directed the film with Luftfield Studios in Austin, probing an existential ("egg-istential") crisis the Easter bunny undergoes when he realizes that no one believes in him anymore. He says “If no one believes in me anymore, what’s the point of making art?”

One of the many themes Ben presents concerns the Easter bunny’s egg painting, which symbolizes the controversy about whether pop art is really art. In the background of the setting, viewers see stacks of eggs waiting for the artistic bunny to recover from his angst and paint. There are deep levels in the short movie that reveal Ben’s knowledge of Buddhism and reincarnation and a concept pointed out by one of the Bunny’s fellow artists: before an artist can be reborn, he must die to the idea that he has to be recognized by others in order to succeed.  

Ben photo-shopped what he thought the film would look like before creating the video and spent a year working with producer Alexis Gabriel Ramirez of El Paso, Texas on production, then helped raise money to finance its completion.

A self-taught artist, Ben thinks that the best way for a person to learn an art form is to practice it and to surround himself with people who are dedicated to their art. He recognizes fellow artists like Meredith Johns, the woman who created the make up for the film and who has a formidable record in her field, having worked on movies such as True Grit. Ben's ambition is to enter Bunny and Non-Bunnyness in film festival competitions and to adapt the shorter film to a full-length narrative film.

“The way to succeed in Art is to marry and get the best experience from something that combines many forms of disciplines at one time,” Ben says. “Film combines music, costume, creative writing, architecture, and artistic set-making in one experience.” He might also say that a bit of philosophy, knowledge of world religions, and psychological perception enhance the mix.

A fifteen-minute performance brought forth “bravos” from this talented young man’s private audience, and we were home by 9:30, driving under a three-quarter moon (one of Ben’s favorite art subjects) from Broussard, Louisiana where Ben is enjoying a brief visit with his mother. We wish him the best in his “art making” and hope Bunny and Non-Bunnyness garners a 1^st place in film competitions this coming year.

  

VISTAS…

From steps of St. Mary's Convent,
Sewanee TN

Every morning when I wake, I open the French doors in the living room and look out at the woods bordering our front yard to get my shot of a vista for the day. Although I’m not a hiker or camper, my parents were inured to both activities, and I was taught to appreciate the outdoors. A copse of trees, as well as a great stretch of desert, are sacred sights to me. One vista often reminds me of another; e.g., the road leading to the valley in Cowan, Tennessee reminds me of the curvy Highway 1 leading to Big Sur, California, sans Pacific Ocean on one side of the road.

I’m always inviting people to view different vistas, and today my thoughts turn to Ben Blanchard, who will be married in Austin, Texas this afternoon. Ben once accompanied his mother, Janet, one of my best friends, on a trip we made to California. Ben was ten and a reluctant traveler, and he balked at every curve when we traveled the road to Big Sur and Point Lobos, often dozing or sulking in the back seat of the car as we passed through magnificent scenery – rugged cliffs, canyons, long meadows, and redwoods, stopping to explore narrow inlets where we could get a better view of the greenish blue waters of the Pacific. I’m not sure it was an entirely miserable experience for him because a few weeks ago, word came that he wanted to take his bride on a honeymoon to California – and guess where he wanted to go? Of course, he wanted to retrace his steps up Highway l to Big Sur!

You never know when you have effected a “travel take” with offspring, but if they’re exposed to vistas at an early age, they’re likely to develop wanderlust and appreciate the outdoors. I never fully appreciated the trip to Diddy Wah Diddy (California) that my father initiated back in the 40’s and earned the title of “luxury-loving girl” because I wasn’t too keen on the idea of campouts along the way. However, by the time I reached my twenties, I had a full-blown case of wanderlust. And, in my thirties when I went to Iran and lived there two years, people thought I had lost my mind because I enjoyed my sojourn in the southern desert of Khuzestan – so much so that I’ve written four books about the experience. In my forties, I began traveling to California every year and became enraptured with the deserts of southern California and Nevada.

A few months ago, Pinyon Review published one of my poems that revealed my intense feelings about the desert entitled:

Carson City, Nevada:”

I could live here

under the rock outcroppings

away from the hot summer wind;

the sun would make me a cover

and I would become dry and brief;

my words sharp as the sage

skirting the Sierra foothills;

I could live like a mountain lizard,

scuttle with the ground squirrels

at the sound of footfalls,

suffering no invasion on the desert’s face;

I could live here

where my heart could dry out

from a lifetime of mistrust;

I would believe the night stars,

sleep in a grove of cottonwoods

rustling dryly,

feeling only kinship.

Landscapes affect me deeply, as they do most poets. When Robinson Jefferson moved to Big Sur, he became spellbound with the rugged coast near Carmel, writing that “the coast had displayed all its winter magic for us: drifts of silver rain through great gorges, clouds dragging on the summits, storm on the rock shore, sacred calm under the redwoods…” I was just as enchanted with my first glimpses of that rocky California coast, and the wild beauty of it had a lasting effect on me. Actually, if I had my druthers, I’d live in Carmel, California, but my senior’s purse won’t allow that luxury.

I’m happy that Ben will get to see all the natural beauty of the central coast of California when he makes a return trip to the scene that he scorned as a young child – this time with fresh eyes, and I expect the experience will be overwhelming for him and for his bride. Meanwhile, I will think about his trip vicariously and continue to record the beauty of the landscape here on the Cumberland Plateau, including a photograph of the Cumberland Valley as seen from the backyard of St. Mary’s Convent accompanying this blog. 

WILLAMEENA MOONBEAM…

"I was the night sky."

I once had a friend from Yugoslavia who had been through the strife of WWII and who often talked about the poverty she endured during her childhood. “I never had beautiful children’s books like the ones your mother bought you,” she said. “We were glad to get good bread and soup and have a warm stone at our feet when we went to bed.” At the time, I felt dismayed when she talked about her impoverished childhood, and I appreciated even more the books that my mother bought for us at Claitor’s Bookstore in Baton Rouge, Louisiana back in the 40’s. A passage in the introduction to my book entitled Their Adventurous Will: Profiles of Memorable Louisiana Women refers to Mother’s love of books and the trips to Claitor’s: “Every month for years, Mother would take one of the three children in our family to Claitor’s Bookstore to choose two books for our nightly reading session. She was the first family member to open the books, touching the pictures with credulous delight. My mother began to fly in the heavens long before Mary Poppins opened her first umbrella to make her wonderful flights…” I was privileged to grow up with beautiful books, and my appreciation for children’s books probably equals my mother’s enthusiasm for them. I’m sorry that every child doesn’t have the opportunity to grow up with access to good books.

Yesterday, I received two copies of a children’s book entitled Willameena Moonbeam, written and illustrated by Ben Blanchard, a young friend of mine who has done paintings for two of my books and who illustrated a long poem that became a small book for my grandson Joel. When I opened Willameena Moonbeam, I thought immediately of the words that I penned about my mother touching books “with credulous delight.” That’s how I felt when I touched the illustrations in Ben’s book.

Ben illustrated Willameena Moonbeam using collage and watercolor techniques and printed, by hand, the text of his long poem. The theme of the poem concerns Willameena and her young friends wishing for and actually lengthening a day to one of constant sunlight, a day when the sun “grew weary …weary of waiting for moon…” Children playing in the fields longed for more sun, danced and pretended that the day would lengthen…The day did lengthen, but the youngsters became hungry, and one of them cried out, “Surely we’ll grow thinner/if we keep on playing/without any dinner.” Unfortunately, the parents of Willameena and her friends decided they couldn’t call their offspring indoors while it was still light, and the children became aware that they had achieved more than they had bargained for.

One of the beautifully-illustrated scenes in Willameena Moonbeam shows the children trying to capture darkness by getting under umbrellas, but even then, the sun doesn’t vanish, and they’re forced to solicit the help of their grandparents to bring on the night. According to “The Elders,” the solution involves the use of a patchwork quilt dress that Willameena must wear and dance in so that she becomes part of the night sky. “I was twirled by my music and from afar/my long dress made a canopy of quilted stars,” Willameena explains. “Like a thousand pearls…all strewn/were actual stars in procession with moon…” Willameena dances the day into night, the moon finally rises, and all is well in the skies above. Ben brings his poem to a close as Willameena bows her head and finally accepts the fact that “it’s time for bed.”

Ben Blanchard is originally from Lafayette, Louisiana and currently lives in Austin, Texas. His multimedia projects include works in music, film, and collage. Willameena Moonbeam is the first book he has written and illustrated. Ben graduated from the Raw Food Preparation and Organic Gardening School sponsored by the Tree of Life Rejuvenation Center in Arizona and practiced as a raw foodist for a few years in Sedona, Arizona and Lafayette, Louisiana. One of his delicious raw food specialties that I’ve sampled is “Third Eyes Cream,” a dessert made with frozen bananas, raw chocolate, and Goji berries. Ben’s original drawings also appear in a book we published together entitled The Beast Beelzebufo. We share a mutual interest in the comic strip “Peanuts,” and have shared ideas in artistic sessions held at tables in Starbucks.

Willameena Moonbeam is an artistic achievement that will engage the interest of any child…as well as grown children like me and my fantasy-loving mother (deceased).

You can order Willameena Moonbeam from Ben Blanchard, 1200 Elm Street, #114, Austin, Texas 78703.