Comments on: Who You Gonna Call?

By: Macha

Macha — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 11:49:23 +0000

Love these altars! What a great kind of street art! What a great way to use to those oh-so-many tchotchkes we seem to accumulate!

By: Sia

Sia — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 21:50:16 +0000

Ah…now you know why we moved here :-)

Now that the sun is back, I shall take what pictures I can.

It will soon be berry picking time. Come visit.

Sia

By: Anne

Anne — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 03:16:43 +0000

Thanks for the update, Miles—now that you are no longer cloaked by my careful anonymity. How odd that the Buddha was replaced by another. Maybe someone wanted to upgrade their altar at home? Once again, those wacky Portlandites!

Donald, I very much look forward to seeing the pictures of your river altars. And thanks for reminding me to link to your blog!

By: Donald Engstrom-Reese

Donald Engstrom-Reese — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 21:11:49 +0000

Anne, thanks so much for sending out these photos. What sweet altars. Delightful.

They remind me of the altars I make on the banks of the Mississippi River as part of my regular river devotions. When the river is down and the banks are snowless, I build miniature temples wherever I find a promising site. I gather river stones of various sizes and build, play, pray and work magic quietly and usually by myself. . I often have a specific intent to the work. But, I also simply sit down in the sand and build miniature stone hedges simply for the delight and beauty that fills me. Sometimes I work with others. Sometimes we have a shared intention. Sometimes we each make our own individual temples. It is all great fun. By the way, I have noticed that even after just a week, the temples have almost always disappeared. I will take a few photos when I next make my way down to the River after the snow thaws.

By: Miles

Miles — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 19:16:14 +0000

Well…(un?)fortunately, the Buddha altar has been disturbed, or transmogrified since the photo you see here. The Buddha in the attitude of Vishnu, with the cape of rearing cobras has been replaced by a Chinese-style Buddha who, for some reason, is missing his head. It’s interesting–the Buddha and Ganesha altars went up at the same time. The Buddha altar actually had some interactive space to either side of the statue, which quickly filled with plastic trinkets (including an elephant riding a bicycle) and spare change. The Ganesha altar has no interactive space, and has not been messed with. Birch says the headless Buddha reminds him of the pillaging British, who would remove the head of a gigantic piece of temple art because that was all they could carry.