Sunday, March 6, 2011

A Celebration of Life for Mari Le Glatin Keis

Yesterday, I drove to Corvallis to celebrate the life of a special person, Mari Le Glatin Keis. Mari died January 9th at the age of 60. It was wonderful to share her artwork, sketchbooks, memories and stories with family and friends. She inspired me and many others to sketch and draw with eyes and heart while traveling and at home. She had six simple ideas for sketching and living- pack light and simple, relax, play, stay small, collage and sketch with words. Her book, The Art of Travel with a Sketchbook, is one of my favorites.
In the summer of 2008, I was fortunate to travel with her to Brittany, France for ten days. She shared her love of France- the people, culture, language and beautiful landscape. As a memento, I bought one of her published Brittany sketchbooks.
This map is a page from my journal of the places we visited. Her spirit and passion for life will always be with me. Merci Mari!

5 comments:

lilylovekin said...

What a loss, I'm very sad. I'm so glad you had the chance to work with her.

Jo Reimer said...

I'm sorry this world has lost an interesting artist and I'm sorry that you've lost a friend, Paula. How fortunate that you were able to travel and study with her.

Carolyn Blocher said...

Paula, I was at her celebration also . . I found her through your web site after Sunset wrote about you. This past August I attended her workshop in Anacortes, WA after a friendship via email for a year and a half. She has influenced my artistic ability, an ability I never knew I had until I met her through you and her book. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Carolyn

Dreamcicle Journeys said...

Carolyn, I'm glad that you got to be with Mari in Anacortes and at her celebration. I wish we would have met each other on Saturday. Keep nurturing your artistic self. It's a wonderful experience.

cynthia said...

Oh, that is sad news to hear about Mari, but I know she lived life to the fullest and spread her artistic influence to many, many people through her workshops. Thanks for that lovely tribute.