The Blooming of Mary Delany's Ingenious Mind 

May 2019
 

In 1717, at age 17, Mary Granville Delany was married off to a rich ogre who died and left her destitute seven years later. (Beauty and the Beast without the happily-ever-after.⁣)
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At 43, she found true love and completely reinvented herself. But Mary's great creative blooming came in her 70s when she embarked on her life’s work—creating 985 life-size botanical depictions now held by the British Museum.⁣
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Some consider her the Mother of Mixed Media Collage because she employed paint, tissue paper, and actual flower parts. Nothing like it had been seen before!⁣
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Mary lived to age 88 under the patronage of King George III (the guy who lost those thirteen colonies), creating to the very end.⁣
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Click here to read about the astonishing twists and turns of Mary's life.

May Celebrations

One Man's Trash is This Woman's Treasure

Over on Instagram, I recently mused about the silliness of measuring our lives by standardized achievements. Why not just chase creativity, like a caterpillar in constant metamorphosis? 

Debra Rapoport, age 73, is a technicolor incarnation of this notion. She's a visual artist and fashion designer who works with recycled materials, even garbage, to create something unique, wearable, and always surprising. 
 
She sells her trademark paper towel hats for $250 to $400. Her work has been exhibited at the Smithsonian and the Met. She even teaches a workshop called "Anything Is A Hat!"
   
Follow this link to view a fun three-minute video about Debra from Jezebel magazine. 

Here's a bit of her wisdom: "Anything is possible at any age as long as you are open to it!"