Frontal Image
13" x 9" x 9"

Rachel's Dream

"The mirror reflects more than my hands can feel.
Lines, edges, shadings, a weariness under the eyes, an awkward stance.
Yet, not reflected is a certain vibrancy --
a compassion and wisdom and wonder so many people rely on.
Only you, my beaded art doll,
capture the fullness of me as I age in place .
You embody changes I want to make, so I aptly name you…"

Rachel's Dream

I close my eyes and am transported to a dream world. My fingers tingle with a sound permeating the forest as my ears hear the sharp crackling of the pin leaves I step upon. My nose is being teased with a plethora smells dancing and embracing with a promise of more if I would follow deeper into the woods. The Sun is filtered through a curtain of aromatic pine trees throwing down their boughs in a welcoming embrace. Sound that at first was a slight humming becomes louder as my feet carry me closer to the source. My heart beats faster, but I am not afraid. I know this is a safe and nurturing place. I step out from between towering pines into a small opening. There on the ground is crouched a small woman peeking between fantastical flower shurbs. Each petal beckons me to see what is beyond. I stand close to the woman without her sensing me, and then I realize that I too can see beyond the shrubs to a sight that catches my breath.

This is the source of the sounds I've been listening to. In the hidden glade a curious creature lasy flat on her stomach with a paintbrush in one hand. With each stroke of the brush, she looks up at her audience to see if they approve of the colors she is spreading on the petals of a groove of flowers.

The Blue Jay warbles sweet agreement, the insects click with pleasure, the fish slaps the water, and the lizard just sleeps.

The creature nods and pushes her eyeglasses back up onto the bridge of her moss green nose. She squints through the glasses and makes another stroke with her brush. I gasp and the Creature turns her head but seems unaware of our existence. She is attired in colors of the forest with sparkling hints of hidden dew glimmering off her sides. She kicks her feet back and forth as she keeps up her soothing humming tune.

I am mesmerized with this colorful display. I wish to take my fingers and brush them over the textured landscape, but am distracted when the crouching woman moves and brushes her arm against my leg. She stiffens, and slowly moves her head and looks up toward me. Her eyes crinkle with delight at seeing me, and she whispers, "Isn't SHE wonderful? With the world for her to watch over, Mother Earth takes time to heal one small flower. I'm always enthralled at her Love for the small things, and for US too." She looks back at me and asks "How did you find me here?" I touched my fingers to my eyes and told her, "I found you through your book." The woman then smiles and leaning over, kisses my forehead.

Then I am awake lying in my own bed with the whirling of the fan. I touch the place where the dream woman had kissed me, and can still feel the moisture from her breath. I know this woman. I've seen her before. Then I realized where I'd seen her. Quietly, I got out of bed and walked to my desk where I'd been doing research for an art project. There was the woman's picture on the back of the book I'd just read. The woman was Rachel Carson the author of Silent Spring, and I had followed her into her dream.

Rachel Carson's contribution has impacted the world that we now journey upon. After World War II working as a Naturalist, Rachel noticed the damager herbicides and pesticides were causing to the environment. In her book Silent Spring (1962), she predicted a bleak landscape where there were no wild flowers dotting the fields, no insects clicking away, no fish meandering in clean pools of water, no birds soaring in wind drafts, nor small animals scurrying among the forest floor. She warned of a sterile world unless measures were taken immediately to stop the pollution of the air, land, and waters. She explained that creatures not immediately killed by the indiscriminate sprayings of the chemicals were in danger, and made a hypothesis that these same cancer causing agents were working their way up the food chain possibly causing harm to humans.

Government authorities ignored her warnings. Then excerpts of Silent Spring were published in The New Yorker. This caused ordinary citizens to become aware of the pollutants poisoning the water they drank, the food they ate, and the air they breathed. President Kennedy called for an investigation. People began to demand changes, legislation followed suite, and the beginnings of the Environnmental Protection Agency were formed. Unfortunately, Rachel was unaware of how her book changed the world we lived in as she herself died from breast cancer in 1965.

I remember reading the first chapter of Silent Spring in 1966 and then learning about ecology at school. I grew up in Los Angeles during the late 50's and early 60's and was a witness to the world before people were aware of the hazards of pollution. The skies were so polluted in Southern California that I had never seen the stars at night. My parents moved to a small Ohio River city in 1967 hoping to find a place with cleaner air for my mother who suffered from asthma. But there too, the pollutants and chemical spraying contaminated land, water, and air. A natural spring everyone enjoyed was polluted with run-off from herbicides used in the cornfields surrounding our town. A chemical plant upriver would dump hazard materials in the Ohio River polluting human drinking water, and killing animal, plant and fish for miles down river. The sulfurous smelling red tinted air we breathed was belched out from stacks of the steel mill near town. I witnessed more and more of my relatives diagnosed with all sorts of cancers, suffering, and then dying. My world was on the brink of destruction not from the destructive machines of the Cold War, but from tiny chemical time bombs devastating the natural world and waiting silently in my own body threatening to kill me.

Things changed, but slowly. Peoples' eyes were opened, and demands poured in and finally, FINALLY ...Rachel's words were heard and addressed. Our world has changed in these forty plus years. DDT spraying IS outlawed in the United States, the EPA is a watchdog for environmental issues, and former Vice President Gore was given the Nobel Prize for his work on Global Warming.

As I stated earlier, I had been working on a project addressing issues due to Global Warming. Our gorup corresponded about individual projects via e-mail, and I wrote that I was going to dedicate mine to Rachel Carson. No one knew who she was, then I stopped and thought did I really know who she was? I remember reading about her in eighth grade, but did I really know what Silent Spring was about? I bought a recent edition of Silent Spring and read the whole book in one weekend. Some of the stories and statistics were frightening and when I read how Rachel had died, I actually wept for this courageous woman. Most of the chemicals she wrote about are now illegal in the United States, but I talked to a former Peace Corp worker from Guatemala who told me that some of those same chemicals are bing used in soy bean and rice fields polluting the ground water of the surrounding villages and causing cancer rates to soar. Rachel's words still need to make their way out into the Global community to save the whole Earth. All people should have the right to breathe clean air, drink safe water, and walk among the vibrant landscape Mother Earth paints for us each and every day. It is a duty we all must make personal.

As I started this beaded doll, I'd read this quote of Rachel Carson's that gave me the idea of Mother Nature as a small creature like a fairy or forest sprite playing and working hard to heal the Earth. Rachel wrote: "If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children, I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life." So I made Mother Earh a creature from the imaginations of a fairy dream world. I wanted this piece to be full of wonder like the quote, so I decided to put my doll in a landscape full of other creatures of the Earth. She is a handmade one of a kind doll. I used a pattern of a troll called Mitze by Ute Vasnia. I made her middle age like myself. And I imagined her surrounded by all the things she creates just like my worktable surrounding me. I could actually hear her humming and singing as her feet swayed to and fro just like I do when I'm sitting on the floor playing with my Scotties thinking of patterns and colors for my beaded dolls. I gave her a happy face to show her joy of crating and healing, and her hair is a combination of the colors I've seen on the forest floor. Her playful mood is filled with joy and love just as I am while I'm in the middle of sewing and creating.

Rachel Carson also wrote, "It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know of wonder and humility". I feel that sometimes in our modern world, we lose the focus of this Earth. We are all too busy to see what we are missing as we drive ourselves faster and faster toward the future. We don't reach out to grab a handful of soil, smell the earthy scents, and just BE. If we take a moment to admire the beauty, we will be compelled to help heal the Earth. I used many embellishing techniques on Rachel's Dreams as I wanted the viewer to not only see the patterns and color of the beaded doll with their eyes, but to feel the textures and the dimensional world with their fingers.

We should all take the mirror we see ourselves in, wipe away the fog, and view our beautiful World with a childlike thrill. And with that thrill, we should all take a personal challenge to keep this world safe, and perfect for our own and for the next generations to come. It is my dream that I will link arms with Rachel Carson and someday find Mother Nature again. I'm making my own personal commitment to allow our Mother, our Earth to fill me with wonder, humility, and awe every single day and make sure I help Her, our Earthen Mother, for the future generations.

Side Image

Back Image

Detailed Image

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List of Materials
and Techniques Employed

Dimensions:
13 inches X 9 inches X 9 inches

Construction Techniques:
Hand made one of a kind soft sculptured doll altering Ute Vasnia's "Mitze" pattern. Doll is made with micro suede fabric, needle sculpted with crystal FireLine (6 pound), and filled with Airtex polyfill. Plastic eyeglasses for dolls. Doll is mounted on a recycled wooden cutting board treated with insulation, and various upholstery fabrics and wool felt.

Materials List:
All sizes of seed beads were used in the beading of the doll including Czech, Japanese, and Delica. Dichroic glass cabochons, pearls, crystals, pressed glass beads, Lucite flowers, recycled vintage jewelry pieces, and sequins both new and vintage. The blue jay is a recycled stuffed beanie baby from a McDonald's Happy Meal. The fish is hand felted using a small Styrofoam ball as the base. The insects are all made with Delica seed beads and artistic wire.

Techniques:
Machine stitched doll with needle-sculpted face. Bead embroidery, peyote, netting, square stitch

DOT LEWALLEN
from Westerville, Ohio


Doll named
Rachel's Dream
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