From the Scrapbook - Invitation

This was the invitation to the celebration honoring Marxhausen last year.

Here is what the text says:

a celebration of MARXHAUSEN

Reinhold Marxhausen, Concordia artist and Seward resident since 1951, will be celebrated at Seward's Rivoli Theater on Main Street Sunday, May 24, from 3:00-5:00 p.m.

Showing Marxhausen films, "Findings," "Timelines," and "A Time to See," produced by Banker's Life and Nebraska NET. These films showcase Marx's artwork and his legacy in Nebraska.

Sponsored by: Seward Chamber of Commerce in cooperation with Concordia University.

This invitation was kept as a souvenir by a local fan of Marxhausen's work.

Click on this thumbnail to view a close-up of the photo by Marxhausen used in this invitation.

- Duncan

From the Scrapbook - Civic Center Expo

All of these are photos from a scrapbook owned by a fan of Marxhausen's work. They were in an exposition at the Civic Center in 2002.

Bust of his wife Doris.

"Old Farmer" was written on the back of the photo and may be the title.

This photo is a bit fuzzy, but you can sort of make out these words:

Top: WINTER, SPRING, SUMMER, FALL

Side bar: SKY, GROWING FIELDS, CROSS SECTION OF EARTH

SKY is written on the right side as well.

Center: SUN, SEED, CENTER (the second word is difficult to read, but I can make out the letters NOT and something else), COIN

Bottom: SEEDS, GROWING, HARVEST, FALL, PLANTING (?)

Anyone recognize this image?

A self-portrait clay bust.
This piece was created with a lightning rod and glass ball insulator.

Human Face as a Landscape

This a portrait of an old man by Marxhausen drawn on scratchboard. Using a scratchboard is like drawing in reverse; the artist starts with a simple black board, and uses a tool to cut white lines. Creating an image on scratchboard is tricky because you can't erase, and any fingerprints you leave are nearly impossible to remove.

When Marxhausen gave a talk to members of nursing homes, he explained that aesthetics is more than looking pretty or cute. An old face can be incredible aesthetic.

Your face can be understood to be like a landscape. We walk and enjoy the sunsets, the trees, and the driftwood and the barns and the houses. Maybe we could look at our faces, the cavities and the grooves, as a kind of landscape

Just like nature, which is constantly changing, the human face is gradually changing as well. Because of that, seeing a human face and finding aesthetic beauty is much like trying to find aesthetic beauty in nature, which is constantly changing. One must make a deliberate effort to see.

I think we all have preconceived ideas of what we look like. And actually, as we go through life, we mark moments when we’d like to remember. Our confirmation picture is taken in a very official way. And so there are times when we go to the photographer and he sets up the proper lighting, and we take our picture. Probably the most true pictures of what we look like are our passport pictures and our driving license picture, which are taken spontaneously and without too much makeup. But most people don’t like their passport pictures. It’s not the way they really are. So while we’re changing and going on, we think we look like that picture in the wallet, we look like our wedding picture. Actually, we’re changing.

Visiting Ridgewood

This past Saturday, the writer's group on campus here visited Ridgewood retirement center and delivered handmade Valentine's cards to all of the residents with a bible verse written on the inside about Jesus' love.

I didn't even have to look for Marxy! He was right there. He nodded that I could take his picture. I showed him what it looked like after I had taken it (oh the marvels of digital cameras), he looked right at me and nodded his approval :)

Marxy has Alzheimer's.

Being there with my camera, it made me think of the video Marx had made when he found out he had this disease. He did different workshops with residents at nursing homes and the one in the video he took photographs of the people and then also did a drawing of the photographs and hung them all up on a wall, like a gallery. The exercise was to help raise their self-esteem again and show them their beauty--many of the elderly had a negative opinion of themselves. I'll see what I can do to get that up here...

Although I did not go there with that same intent (we were delivering Valentine's! And it was fun!), I did take a few pictures.

They were so delighted to have us college students go and visit!

Here, they were creating rain-sticks out of toilet paper rolls and tin foil:

The woman standing is Jan, an assistant, and she's so good with them!

Giving Valentine Cards:

This lovely lady loved to sing. We told her she had a pretty voice, and this was the surprised look she gave us:

Austin, explaining the verse about Jesus:

This little lady was sweet--she asked for a copy of her picture.

-Amber Dawn