3.5″x2.5″ mixed media
I painted acrylic over a piece of Iowa map paper and adhered it to a piece of 2-ply rag matboard (ATC size). Instead of hand-lettering my poem Iowa hills over the paint as I usually do, I decided to tediously search for the words in two old law books from 1881 and 1907 (given to me by artist Margaret Whiting, who has done some really cool artworks using old law books!). Some of the words I had to construct from letters in other words; for some reason the word “beautiful” (and a few others) didn’t make it into any easily findable printed opinion in these two books! Once I had all of the words, I adhered them onto the piece, then brushed some transparent acrylic paint over the words. I took the photo before I went over everything with gloss medium.
The poem is a golden oldie—I wrote it in 1978 and it was my first published poem. I’ve put it in several artworks more recently, but I don’t think any of them have been quite this small!