A tripple-whammy beset this fine speaker: The P.A. system was DOA; Berkeley High alumni had a shouting match in the adjacent room (open to ours via a half-height wall); and the bookseller didn't show!

MAKE YOUR WRITING DREAMS COME TRUE
VISUAL ARTIST, CHRISTINE WALKER

What is it that sets us on our creative paths and keeps us pushing forward in spite of entanglements?  What must we do to fulfill the promise of our intentions?  How can we make our dreams come true?  These are questions that Walker continually strives to answer.  In A Painter's Garden, gardening metaphors illuminate the creative process, revealing it as a cycle.  Whether making paintings, writing books or growing a business, it is the evolving creative life that is being formed, not just the products of our hands and minds.  When we connect deeply to what gives our lives meaning, we gain confidence that what we are doing matters, not only to us, but to others. This trust translates into courage, which generates vitality, action and greater purpose.

Writing, like painting, is revelation.  Craft teaches us tricks, but then we're on our own.  What will we bring to each day?  Stories of winter digging and pruning?  A novel unearthed?  A fearless revision?  Tales of the muse with muddy boots and dirty fingernails?  Our February gathering will generate its own heat and light, and together, we will blossom.

Walker has a B.F.A. from the University of Kansas and a M.A. in Interdisciplinary Creative Arts from San Francisco State University. She is currently working on a novel set in a landscape of environmental activism and a collection of personal stories entitled A Woman's Journey. Her first novel, Before the Snake, (not yet published) is a love story about marriage, motherhood, and art. Walker paints and writes in Sonoma County, California.

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Christine Walker links:

Amazon.com
 
 

Her web page - Listen to a Real Audio excerpt of Chris describing how she gathers a pallette from the garden.

Read two excerpts from her book - at the Boomer Cafe
 Part One
 Part Two

Here's a bit about Chris and her book (from http://www.gardens.com) -
"A Painter's Garden, (Warner Books, NY $18.95) is a pretty gift hard cover decorated with the artworks of Christine Walker, who has painted and gardened on Potrero Hill -- at the same time being a mother and businesswoman. Now she turns writer, offering reflections on how gardening can help grow the lives of creative people. The prose is plain but will touch the hearts of many who renew and rest their souls in a garden, and offers topics to ponder during leisurely winter garden days."

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