It has been 4 months now since I posted. Time seems to slip away. We were busy creating a new site for windhorseOne Studios with many new services including creativity coaching with horses and also equine identity and branding services. Horses are our passion and we can't imagine life without them.
To see our awesome new site please visit www.windhorseone.com. Our Blog will be built in so we are saying good by to this Blog
We also have a new online shop that features my equine art work as well as equine art of other artists including fabulous jewelry! Check it out at www.windhorseone.com/shop.
Happy New Year and all my best to you for a prosperous and healthy 2011! This beautiful white Arabian, Shazi, from my ancient wisdom series is blazing full speed ahead embracing his bright future. He represents "Illumination of Awareness".
I returned to visit my family back east and was delayed from returning home due to poor weather and flight delays. It provided me with an opportunity to reflect and have gratitude for 2010 and all the amazing people I have met and where I am planning on taking my journey of creation with horses.
There is a creative life force within each and every one of us and the more we can access our inner selves and face and know this self, the more we can gain access to this authentic creative self...... illumination of awareness......
Horses connect me to nature and unity and have been my not so gentle at times guide on my journey! It has been a mysterious and fascinating pilgrimage of sorts and has lead me to develop "The Art of Unity; A Journey of Creation With Horses". I learned last year how to combine equine facilitated learning with expressive arts and creative play through horses. When I realized how therapeutic my art creations were for people I wanted a way to share how they could learn creative expression through horses.
I am really excited about this work and will be sharing more with you soon! I am also having a new web site developed so stay tuned!
May Peace be your gift at Christmas and your blessing all year through! ~Author Unknown
It is time to look back at the year and reflect and honor our journey. It is also time to look forward with excitement to the new year and see where our journey takes us for "The soul rides on the feathers of the wind" `MeisterEckhart
Horses, for me, represent a bridge to nature and all creation. They are nature in all her glory here on earth while they also invite us to journey and connect with our intuitive higher selves.
Is there any where in your life that you may feel stuck? Like the windhorse, horses have the ability to lend us the wings we need to soar and take flight with the wind while allowing us to overcome the obstacles we may be facing.
May joy and well being be yours this holiday season.
In a world older and more complete than ours they moved finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the earth.
Summer has been busy with the Denver Fine Art festival and a weekend workshop I co-facilitated called Journey to Spirit Through Horses with Anna Twinney, from Reach Out to Horses and Melisa Pearce, from Touched By A Horse. Lots of "Spirit of the Horse" love here in beautiful Colorado!
This weekend I will be in Aspen for their 8th annual fine art festival with some new work and I hope to see some of you out there!
Meet Syche's Sweet Serenade aka Seri. She is a new addition to my herd and is such a doll baby! She has already seen a bit of the world for her young age and these pics were taken at her Oldenburg inspection a couple of weeks ago. I just love the little braids!
I was looking at a 1/2 sister to Zephyr who was down in Texas. She was also a sweet little thing but a bit far awawy. Little Seri lived only a few miles down the road from me and she had the pinto thing going that I just love.
She has two heart shaped patches - one near her girth and the other on her neck. One for Kairos and one for Zephyr, although I have to tell you that they were not to pleased when we brought her home. Worse yet was little Scooter who just seemed to glare at her when he wasn't trying to bite her through the fence.
Just wait Scooter, she is almost as big as you already!
I was busy dropping off my new artcards, Horse as Teacher book, small prints and also large editioned mounted prints today while getting my new account set up in the boutique section of our local tack and feed shop. Sometimes I have to wonder why it takes such a fire under me to get these things going!
The cards have been extremely successful at all the fine art festivals this year. What I realized on the way home was that I never created the opportunity for you to buy some beautiful cards here on my blog. They will not be available on my web site. I had to sit down and do a bunch of graphic work this evening so why not continue on and create PayPal buttons.....fun stuff for a Sat. evening. I bet you want to party with me! LOL!
There are three different sets of cards; each box contains 6 cards, 2 each of three different prints. They are 5 x 7 so they pop easily into little frames and make a great gift for the horse lover in your life! Additionally they are printed on the highest quality of paper.
To purchase your set please go to the right hand side of my blog. I hope you enjoy them!
This morning was spent photographing three former champion reiners who now have new jobs in life. And yes I do take normal photographs! I once handed a client her proofs and she just stared quietly at them, finally looking up and saying softly..."These don't look anything like your work". LOL!
But back to these amazing guys, who are not old and retired but average aged that have experienced career changes in life that they embrace and love. Career changes are not just for people!
Scooter
Each one of these handsome boys have become a therapeutic healer. Melisa is a psychotherapist who uses horses extensively in her work. These are her personal show horses who no longer perform at World championships but work their magic on her clients and other folks who show up from all over the country to participate in one of many equine experiential learning workshops she offers at her Lil Bit North Ranch in Longmont CO.
Shadow
I have been very fortunate to share and sell my art at her workshops. People leave the ranch wanting to bring home a "horse" to solidify their experience so Melisa and I felt it would be more powerful and meaningful if they were able to bring home a representation of her horses whom they worked with. This is a fun and exciting project! I also photographed Kathy Pike's horses (Coaching With Horses) a couple of weeks ago for the same purpose. This is a very worthwhile project that may continue to help people with their healing process when they leave the magic of the ranch and return to their mainstream life.
I will continue to share more about this artwork as it develops.
Enriching the life of humans and horses one day at a time......
It is already well into the month of August and I can't believe how quickly this year has moved along! I haven't had much time or energy to any art work lately. I am surrounded by work that needs to ship to New Hampshire, Texas, Minnesota and locally from the shows I have been at but I took a little time to do some much needed work (for me!). This piece turned out to be a challenge and it took a bit of perseverance to get it to where I wanted it.
This is a portrait of August, a Canadian mare. I had never heard of the breed before I met Ingrid - the caretaker of my two boys. The Canadian Horse is a little known national treasure of Canada. This hardy breed descended from horses originally sent to the “New World” by King Louis XIV of France in the late 1600’s. These Norman and Breton horses were felt to be of Arab, Andalusian and Barb ancestry – traits of which can still be recognized in the Canadian Horse today.
There is quite an unusual lot at Ingrid's with this Canadian and her colt Echo plus the Peruvian Pasos and then my Friesian/colt crosses.
August is the alpha of the group and has quite a mind of her own! She is often standing near the gate gazing towards the house door or towards the forest. She is a horse who demands and commands respect.
I am glad to be home now for a while with no shows until mid-September! I have become enamored with a buckskin Friesian/paint filly in San Antonio. She is half sister to one of my boys and I can't seem to get her out of my mind..........Perhaps more on that later!
Meet Foose. I can never remember if he is a border collie or Australian sheep dog mix. Any way I am not too sure it is important. He is absolutely gorgeous! All I know is that with horses there must also be dogs. At least there have been wherever my horses have been. Dogs have come and gone in my life and right now I am sad to admit I am dogless. With a busy art show schedule it is easy when your horses are boarded but it is not as easy to board your dog. Yes it easy in the sense that you can drop them off at a kennel but I have never really had the heart for that.
But on the bright side I get to see Foose and his girl Scout. Scout has had some leg problems lately and I do not have any photos of her but she is equally as spectacular! What I love about Foose is his wonderful vigor for life. When I arrive at the farm (I am from the east where we say farm but now I am in Colorado so I guess I should say ranch!) he comes flying down helter skelter to greet me. He loves to jump up to say hello but if it is muddy he is a gentleman when I tell him down. Foose found his forever home after a former guardian decided it was too much effort to continue to feed him. I guess I can't imagine somebody coming to decide something like that.
If there is one thing I have to say about Foose, it is that besides being an amazing companion, he takes his herding responsibilities quite seriously! And while he is very much the serious fella about this, sometime the horses think he is a pest and will chase him! He is quite the tenacious guy though and often his patience wins out. I have to admit that I love photographing dogs as much as I love photographing horses. Really, the two are inseparable!
These are my two young colts horsing around in the field a few weeks before I brought them to the mountains. Recently I was notified by Equine Wellness magazine that this picture was awarded 6th place and will be published in their March/April issue! Woo hoo, what an honor! The contest called for photos of people's horses. I know I am partial but I have to admit that they are way too cute. :)
They look like brothers but they are not related. The standing colt is called Kairos and the lad on top is Zephyr. They are both named after Greek gods. Zephyr is the god of the gentle west winds and Kairos is the god of time (Cronos is also a god of time and that is where chronological comes from). Kairos is symbolic for instances with small windows of time where there is an opening and one must act with gusto or lose the opportunity.
This was actually a pivotal point in these boys lives. Normally Kairos would be pestering Zephyr, who is so sweet and gentle. But Zephyr has decided he has had enough! And if you knew the two then you couldn't really blame him. They absolutely adore one another and are inseparable!
Once again it is late in the evening when I find the time to work on one of my photographs. It was just last year when I was exhibiting my work at the Art at the Classic at the Draft Horse Classic in Grass Valley, Ca. that I fell in love with the Friesian horse. As exhibitors, we were given a free ticket to an evening show. My breath was taken away when a team of six Friesians entered the ring. That was all it took and I was immediately hooked. Somehow I was immediately transported back in time to the medieval ages. It was an amazing site to see all six horses moving in sync!
We were busy at the show but I did manage to sneak out for about an hour and go back to the barns to take some photographs. I have read somewhere that the black horse is a metaphor for a messenger of esoteric knowledge. You have to wonder what this fine animal is thinking. There is such wisdom in its eye. The Friesian breed certainly is the horse of kings (and of course queens!).
This past summer I had the good fortune to watch this Andalusian stallion strutting his stuff during an evening performance at a draft horse event we were exhibiting at. I took a break from the booth and to my delight he was at liberty in an outdoor arena getting some exercise and playing with his handler. I had never seen anything like it before.
I just finished the piece recently in time for another event we were attending called Horsecapades. It was a benefit for the Cowboys Up organization which uses horses for equine assisted psychotherapy. The event had a great lineup of costumed riders and horses performing to music.
My favorite was an Andalusian stallion called Acierto who does amazing maneuvers around his person/owner while at liberty. I can't wait to go through the photographs to see what I got. I am hoping for a good shot of him rearing.
Welcome to the blogging journal of the Denver metro area equine fine art photographer Susan Williams and windhorseOne Studios. I decided recently to start journaling about my horse photography and adventures! I have been very busy getting work ready for last weekends show in Denver at the Phipps mansion. I also recently finished my new horse only web site: http://www.windhorseone.com/.
Today I took a bit of a break and drove down to Kiowa to see our two new colts. They will be coming home to the mountains after Thanksgiving. They are so much fun to photograph and it is amazing just to watch them! One is so sweet and gentle and the other is bold and a bit of a terror! Can you tell who is who?
Thank you to Deb and Dave Hart, of Hart Friesians, for selling us these amazing and beautiful boys. It is my wish and dream to document them as they grow up and create a children's book.
Call of The Horse; To Order your copy today click on the link below!
Free equine note card with each order!
This 3 CD audio book makes a great gift for a horse lover in your life! The retail price is $19.95. Place your order now to receive your copy and your beautiful free 5" x 7" note card of Excalibu ($5.00 value)!!
Horse as Teacher: The Path to Authenticity Through Horses. To reserve your copy click on the PayPal link below
Free equine note card included with each order!
I am pleased to announce my book Horse as Teacher: The Path to Authenticity Through Horses! I am a co-author along with nine other equine visionaries in a collection of poignant stories and photographs on how the horse has led us to lead an authentic life. My chapter is named "The Horses are Calling..."
Included authors are Stormy May (The Path of the Horse DVD), Kathy Pike (author and equine facilitated learning coach), Melisa Pearce (Touched By A Horse) and others! I have read the whole book and I am just amazed at the quality of the stories, the writing, and our kinship with horses.
Click on the image above or this link to go to my website (www.windhorseone.com) to learn more!
This book makes a great gift for a horse lover in your life! The retail price is $19.95. Place your order now to receive your signed copy and your beautiful free 5" x 7" note card of one of my prints ($5.00 value)!!
You may now purchase a boxed set of 6 beautiful high-quality 5" x 7" blank artcards of three of my popular prints for only $18.00! These cards are only $3 each and currently sell in stores for $4 to $6 each so the savings is substantial.
They come packaged in a clear box with a silver metallic ribbon.
Not only are these great for any event when you need a special card but they are suitable for framing!
"In the steady gaze of the horse shines a silent eloquence that speaks of love and loyalty, strength and courage. It is the window that reveals to us how willing is her spirit, how generous her heart" ~Author Unknown
Whispers from a Horse's Heart Inspirational Cards
Touched by a Horse: To order a set of these amazing cards click on the link below
Whispers from a Horse's Heart
You will be delighted reading the in-depth, prophetic messages of the horses from a beautiful herd. What is so different about these card decks, other than their beautiful artwork? The inspiration and guidance that is offered on the cards will encourage you to reflect upon your dreams, desires, and challenges. I just love them!
Every day, just pick one of the 52 cards that appeals to you in that moment and read its message.You will be amazed with just how appropriate the message is to what you are feeling or dealing with. They often provide you with comfort as well as reaffirm your actions and decisions.
Beautifully boxed, these cards are $29.95 and make a great gift!
To order your set click on the secure PayPal link below:
This is the BLOG spot of windhorseOne Studios and Susan Williams, a Denver area equine fine art photographer whose unique and distinctive imagery portrays the magical and powerful essence of the horse.
I am a photographer who primarily photographs horses and also dogs. I live in the mountains of Morrison Colorado. My mantra is "Portraying the powerful and magical essence of the horse."
My pencils and paintbrushes were given up for a camera many years ago however my photography is rendered in a very painterly style. I believe this yields the best of both worlds; a photograph and a painting at the same time. It also satisfies my need to add a personalized touch to the work
After The Gathering
After The Gathering: Number XXXX
After the Gathering is a series I have been working on about the wild mustangs after they have been rounded up and removed from the freedom of their home range by the BLM.
To see more from this series please visit my website: www.windhorseone.com. Or to learn more about America's wild horses and the danger they currently face visit some of my links listed below.
To become involved in the preservation and welfare of America's wild horses please visit some of the links below.
The horses are calling and need your help.
Save The Wild Horses
Become involved! Click to email Secretary of the Interior & the BLM
windhorseOne
windhorseOne Etsy Shop
Please visit my Etsy shop where you can easily purchase some of my beautiful prints. Just clink on the link above to be redirected to Etsy, which is set up to accept secure PayPal payments!
It has been 4 months now since I posted. Time seems to slip away. We were busy creating a new site for windhorseOne Studios with many new services including creativity coaching with horses and also equine identity and branding services. Horses are our passion and we can't imagine life without them.
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