blog history

I started this blog in Jan of ‘08 to have a place to organize and post words and images – works in progress. We were newly arrived in northern New Mexico and I was feeling the isolation and the need to push myself to produce. I quickly connected with other writers and before long I was regularly posting original work as a weekly image prompt for writers. This took over the blog until I made a separate page – the storybook collaborative – for the dozens of writers and hundreds of poems, fairy tales, myths and stories that arrived over the next year.

Now, far from feeling isolated, writers, poets and artists from the other side of the world have become collaborators and friends. I am still working on connecting with the local artistic community. Through returning to work in the film industry I am connecting with the many smart, creative, funny misfits always to be found employed there. The NM film community in particular seems to attract very talented and accomplished visual artists, fiber artists and sculptors. Not to mention hunting and fishing guides, white-water rafters and expedition leaders. What an amazing bunch of people. If the hours weren’t so grueling I would always want to keep my hand in.

Ten months into the blog and the growing body of collaborative efforts, of Ekphrasis, we had a baby, a beautiful baby girl, Ada Corinna Meridian Swinton. Then she came down with whooping cough (pertussis) and was sick for months and we were frightened to death for her. (Welcome to one of the poorest counties in the country, and a State Board of Health stretched too thin to help its people with avoidable public health emergencies. But Ada is fine now.)

Then my interrupted career in film in tv kicked back in and I found myself working 12 hours a day, six days a week, and living out of motel rooms and suitcases. However, the blog friends remained friends, and continue to this day to be sources of challenge, pleasure and joy. I just wasn’t able to get into the studio on a consistent basis, nor was I able to keep up the prompts and the work required to keep track of and post submissions.

Which is too bad, because it was a outstanding  experience for me. I am something of a community organizer at heart, and love to see people shine, and they were they shining. Browse through the storybook collaborative and you will get a sense of their work and their talent, Check out the “notable” page to see some outstanding examples of the kinds of work that people submitted, using the images they found here as starting points for their personal expressions.

Now I have finished my work on a year-long series of films. The family is healthy and we are adjusting to life in an incredibly beautiful place, living in faculty housing on the campus of the United World College , in Montezuma, New Mexico. I hope to be back in the studio soon, which is in the unfinished top floor of Montezuma Castle, a real, awesome, three hundred room castle here on campus, nestled into the foothills of Sangre de Christo Mountains. The Rio Gallenas  runs through the campus, where there are free, public hot springs; healing waters which have been used by humans as meeting place and neutral ground for thousands of years. Our kids can run for miles through the mountains, along the river, through the woods, and the only things we have to worry about are mountain lions (a real concern), falls and spills, and of course, human predation. But we all know how to take care of ourselves, and if your hearts are true you are welcome to visit.

Being between movies I will be reorganizing here, posting writing, images and works in progress. One day I hope to get back to posting image prompts for writers on a regular basis, and one day, I would like to collect them into a book and publish them.

Until then, as always, you are free to use the images in your own work, useing them as prompts or for other non-commercial purposes.

So freely appropriate the images in the paintings, but please do leave a note in the comments at the bottom of the post directing attention to links to the pieces you produce. This way everyone can enjoy and comment. If you do not have a blog or a way to post online, send me an email and I will create a space for you on a blog I have set up for that purpose.

contact:  rickmobbs@gmail.com

This has been a rich experience and I want to thank all of you for your kind attention and continuing support.