Lettie Jane’s Intuitive Drawing is a weekly newsletter about making art. This year I am trying to publish 52 newsletters that are each an art lesson of sorts. They are an invitation to draw, if you feel inclined, but also a description of why I do. These aren’t Netherland Dwarfs, you don’t need to pick them all up and cuddle them. I encourage you to take what you need and leave the rest.
Today is Easter and I could write an email about how this holiday is a metaphor for the artistic process, or I could show you photos of the paintings I worked on this week and will put up for my art show next week, but what I really want to do is talk about bunnies.
Two years ago for Easter, I brought home 3 real rabbits. I had finally succumbed to Nicky’s love for bunnies (inspired or bolstered by his collection of Jellycat stuffies).
There is absolutely nothing as cute as a baby bunny, try to come up with one thing and then look at the picture again, it’s not possible.
This time of year the online world of bunny owners* post many things about not buying bunnies for Easter. I suppose many pets come to families as tiny babies only for the families to realize they can’t actually care for the animals properly.
We are Easter bunny owners who have become devout bunny lovers and changed our lives forever.
*My Instagram feed is about half art content, half bunny content.
This has not been without our bunny casualties and heartbreaks. We have had 7 rabbits and 4 have died in the past two years. The first lesson of having rabbits is that they are fragile, they do not bounce back easily from stomach sickness and they have to go to exotic animal vets, which are terribly expensive.
Having a fragile pet means you must be careful, I am a tornado person who would rather do 10 things at once than be careful doing one.
Lesson One: BE CARE FULL.
Vets do not recommend you keep your rabbits outside, they are more prone to catching illness or eating things they shouldn’t. A predator can also take them. Everything likes to eat a bunny, which is why they reproduce like, well, rabbits. That is one of their biological defense mechanisms, they make enough babies to survive, despite everything and everyone wanting to eat them.
Losing Sandy and Margot to a predator was traumatic and abrupt, and we are all still upset about it. We’re still upset about all of them, but I feel the heat in my shoulders and tears behind my eyes as I type about these two little puff balls. I feel some need to defend why the kids, Matt, and I were so attached to them. Like I need to explain pets to people who don’t have pets, but if you love animals, you know. Sandy and Margot’s death brought another lesson: how to grieve as a family. We talk about it, we talk about it again, we look at pictures, we talk about it again.
Lesson Two: GREIVE AS A FAMILY
Velvet Trouble was our rebound bunny after Sandy and Margot, we got him the next day. There are so many lessons this incredibly naughty rabbit has taught us: how to put up baby gates everywhere, not to leave plants on the table, and always shut the bedroom door, to name a few. Ultimately his naughtiness has boiled down to one lesson: you can make mistakes and still be loved, it helps if you are covered in velvet.
Lesson Three: YOU CAN MAKE MISTAKES AND STILL BE LOVED.
Let’s talk about Jiji. This is a refrain often heard in our household, rarely does an hour go by when we do not talk about Jiji. She is the Queen Of Our Hearts, she is the heartbeat of the household. Why? I believe the first reason is her deadly cuteness, but one can be cute and not hold the attention of the masses. It is also her attitude: she is aloof, you must work for her affection. She is dignified, and dignified bunnies don’t just come running. I could take a lesson from the way she sets boundaries or isn’t trying to please, but the real lesson I have learned from her is that I must give her respect and patience.
Lesson Four: RESPECT AND PATIENCE
Our most recent addition to the bun fam is Stede Bunnyet. He is a quiet rabbit with one white paw, named after a gentleman and embodying gentleness completely. He will lick your ankles if you lay on the floor, he is like the middle child between the other two big personalities, Trouble and Jiji. The lesson I learned from Stede is one that all bunnies teach, but that he embodies: be quiet. You must be gentle and quiet and calm to pet bunnies (except for Trouble, but he’s a different story), but Stede also teaches that being quiet leaves space, space for other bunnies, people or ideas.
Lesson Five: BE QUIET.
Having animals in our life adds humor, love and meaning. The work of cleaning up after them, feeding them and entertaining them comes back to us tenfold. In the oxytocin hit we get petting them, the lessons they teach us and the conversations we have with and about them.
I hope you have enjoyed this Easter message about rabbits, back to art lessons next week.
Until next week.
Much love,
Lettie Jane
And Then Some Tidbits
Come see my art show! Sunday, April 7th 4-6pm. Albina Press on Hawthorne. It’ll be up for 2 months if you don’t make the opening.
This past week was Spring Break and I tore through multiple books, know that I love to listen to audiobooks and usually paint while I do, I am not a particularly fast reader, but can consume audiobooks all day long.
I finally finished the physical copy of How We Show Up: Reclaiming Family, Friendship, and Community by Mia Birdsong. I have been reading this book very slowly all year, a few pages here and few there. It’s filled with short notes on lives lived outside of the nuclear family, queer family, communal family, friend family. Although a lot of the lessons from this book are things I have been working on, it’s a reminder that to be interdependent we actually have to receive help from others, we can’t just be the givers.
I listened to Pachinko by Min Jin Lee. It’s a sprawling epic about a Korean family moving to Japan, and the racism and hardship they face as immigrants in a stoic society. It was interesting to read this after having visited Japan. I loved the calm and dependable culture I encountered, but realize the downside is there isn’t as much space for being different.
I listened to When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill. I had been looking forward to this book for a while, dragons and feminism? Sign me up. I may have been a little fatigued after reading Pachinko, this is another epic book set in a time when women were recognized for working hard and keeping their house clean and had very few prospects outside of that. This book felt a little slow, I thought it could have ended about 2 hours before it did. I found the concept highly engaging: women in the 1950s turn into dragons when they are just too frustrated or filled with joy. It reminded me of The Power, the book where women gain a new physical power and overturn the patriarchy, but done much more gently, instead of destroying everything the dragons begin to set up a matriarchy of communal queer living, baking bread and knitting sweaters.
Did you listen to Beyonce’s new album? As a kid raised on country music who has a passing respect for Queen B but doesn’t belong the holy church of Beyonce, I have to say it is epic.
Pisces season ended and there is a mix.
Take A Class with me. Ya’ll I am so jazzed on Deeper Drawing. Take this class with me if you need some time and space to make art.
Deeper Drawing (Saturday Afternoon) Apr/May 2024
$275.00 - $300.00
Dates: Saturdays, April 6th - May 18th
Time: 1:30pm-4:30pmFriday Night Figure Drawing (Apr 19)
$50.00
Date: Friday, April 19th
Time: 5:30-8:30Intuitive Drawing (Saturday AM) Apr/May
$300.00
Dates: Saturdays, April 13 - May 18
Time: 10:00am - 1:00pm
Take a class with me AND YOUR KID at Mudland.
Ages 6-teen + adult
$24
APR 7 & APR 21
2 hours 30 minutes
Take a class with me at Sitka Center for Art and Ecology
$230
September 21, 2024 - September 22, 2024
Listen to LINE TIME, a monthly podcast and art lesson I helped create.
Bun Updates
This week’s letter was all bun update, so I thought I’d post a link to Rabbit Advocates, this is an organization in Oregon that fosters and rehomes rabbits, it’s a great place to find your first bunny! We think Chickadee is Trouble’s brother, if you are ready for some velvet in your life.
Bunnies and beyonce are the hits of this easter