The reality of the artist life

“dream journal” is 8x10, made from book pages, newsprint, junk mail, vintage Japanese letters, washi papers, acrylic paint, glue, charcoal and white ink on cradled wood. It is also available as a card reading, “happy birthday to an extraordinary being.”

When you picture the life of a working artist, do you imagine days filled with sketching ideas or brushing canvasses in a paint-splattered studio? Maybe mixing buckets of paint and experimenting with colors and textures? That was certainly my impression before I became a full-time artist myself!

That picture may be true for some artists, but for me the reality is that actually creating art is just a small part of my work. You might say it's just one arm of the octopus. To give you some idea, here are a few things I’ve been doing these past few days.

• preparing a Zoom presentation and workshop on creating haiga (art with haiku) for a haiku group this Saturday afternoon (and you’re invited! Details in the Makino Studios News section);

• co-editing a conference anthology for the Seabeck Haiku Getaway I attended in October;

• updating my CV and submitting materials for a proposed show of local Asian American artists;

• shipping Makino Studios orders (especially 2024 calendars) and restocking stores (especially cards); and

• working on year-end accounting and tax prep for my business.

Oh, and I wrote several haiku. (As per usual, they are mostly bad, though I think there are a couple with potential.) I also went on several long walks at the beach, woods and marsh, which ultimately inspires most of my art and haiku.

While I sometimes feel frustrated that I don’t have more time in my studio, the reality is that most of these other activities are enjoyable too. For instance, I’m learning a lot about the editorial process by co-editing a publication for the first time. But I definitely do not enjoy bookkeeping!

year-end accounting
I try to reconcile
the past

The truth is that while most of my other commitments are ongoing throughout the year, I tend to create art in concentrated bursts, especially during my summer retreats on the river. My collage papers are just gathering dust right now, but the time will come when I dive back in to art making, tearing paper and splattering paint with gusto!

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I did dip into art-making when my two sisters visited recently. We had fun creating plant prints using leaves and grasses on a gel press, which I will use in future collages. (Photo: Yoshi Makino)

Makino Studios News

Haiga presentation/workshop: In this Zoom event for Komo Kulshan Haiku, a group based in the Pacific Northwest, I will present a selection of my haiga (art with haiku), talk about how to create haiga, and then lead a workshop on pairing haiku with images. You are invited to join this free meeting, which takes place this Saturday, January 20, 1-3 p.m. Pacific. Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89424637034

2024 mini-calendars: I still have some of these calendars of art and haiku for sale, which feature 12 colorful Asian-inspired collages with original haiku.

Valentine’s day cards: February 14 will be here before you know it! I have several cards suitable for Valentine’s Day, such as this collage design reading, “you are my heart’s delight.”

Free shipping: Use promo code FREESHIP35 for free shipping on any order of $35 or more.

From the archives: For more about the challenges of being an artist—and my 23 failed attempts to paint a simple frog—see my 2013 blog post, “The truth about being an artist.”

Thanks: I always appreciate your comments, especially the kind responses to the feature article, “Annette Makino’s life in collage” that ran in the North Coast Journal last month.

A few gel press prints made with plants, which I’ll use for collages.

News story on my art journey

I’m excited to share that this week’s North Coast Journal includes an in-depth article about my creative path! My thanks to Louisa Rogers for the lively and well-researched column—it’s a great holiday gift to be featured. Happy solstice and season’s greetings to all!

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Makino’s “Garden rosebush,” a collage of book pages, a letter and envelope from the artist’s grandmother, handmade and Japanese washi papers, painted, torn and glued onto birch wood panel.

ART BEAT

Annette Makino’s Life in Collage

LOUISA ROGERS, NORTH COAST JOURNAL, EUREKA, CA, DECEMBER 21, 2023

Annette Makino has been an artist all her life but it wasn't until 2010 that she became interested in incorporating haiku into her artwork. For her birthday that year, her Arcata friend and fellow artist Amy Uyeki gave her a book of senryu, a poetic form structurally similar to haiku but with more humor and a focus on human nature. The poems were written by Uyeki’s Japanese grandmother and accompanied by Uyeki’s art.

“This lovely book set me on my current path,” says Makino, whose father is also Japanese. She started combining her haiku with simple brush paintings, which evolved to Asian-inspired watercolors and then collages. A year later, after leaving her 20-year career as senior vice president for communications at the Arcata-based nonprofit Internews, she launched Makino Studios, offering collages, watercolors, prints, cards and calendars.

Annette Makino. Photo by Maya Makino

Currently she works mostly with collage using hand-painted and torn Japanese washi papers, which are typically made from the fibers of the mulberry plant. She also uses other papers from different parts of her life—letters, her young nephew’s scribbles, book pages, musical scores and maps. To make sure the pieces don’t fade over time, she uses acrylic paints to color the white paper, then tears it into the shapes she wants and glues it onto paper or wood, a process that typically takes two to three days. According to Makino, a common misconception is that collage doesn't require much skill. “It’s very labor intensive and can involve as much skill as painting,” she says.

Makino’s most productive periods of artwork happen twice every summer, when she and her husband, Paul, a retired Cal Poly Humboldt geography professor, rent a cabin on the Klamath River in Orleans, a place they've visited for 27 years. In that placid location, free from distractions, she can get a lot of work done.

Makino usually writes the haiku first, before the artwork. “The words aren’t meant to illustrate the art,” she says. “You want a bit of distance, so the reader has a new way to think about the theme.” She often starts crafting the poem while hiking in Ma-le'l Dunes or in Trinidad, where she and Paul walk a couple of times a week.

Makino considers herself equal parts artist and writer. Her book Water and Stone: Ten Years of Art and Haiku was awarded Honorable Mention in the Haiku Society of America's Merit Book Awards and her poetry regularly appears in English-language haiku journals, including Modern Haiku, Frogpond and The Heron’s Nest. She has also won awards for her poetry from the Haiku Foundation and the Haiku Society of America.

Annette Makino’s “All that I am” incorporates book pages, a fern print, a vintage Japanese letter and washi paper, as well as asemic, or made-up, writing by her nephew.

Many of Makino’s haiku have to do with transitions. A few years ago, for example, when her two young adult children started the process of leaving home, she wrote about the empty nest, while the loss of her 16-year-old dog inspired many poems last summer. Her 95-year-old mother Erika, a former Humboldt resident and also a writer and artist, lives three hours away in Mendocino County. Makino visits her about once a month and is keenly aware of her mom’s gradual decline. That, and the earthquake last winter which caused a lot of damage to her home, have inspired her poetry and art. “Whatever life brings me,” she says. 

Makino was one of five local artists granted the 2022 Victor Thomas Jacoby award for “artistic vision and creativity,” provided annually by the Humboldt Area Foundation and Wild Rivers Community Foundation. Winners each received $10,000 to support their work. The award freed her from some of the commercial pressures of running a business and creating mostly marketable art that appeals to the public. Instead, she experimented with mixed media, using materials like charcoal, crayon, ink and pencil in her collages, and exploring oils and cold wax.

North Coast Journal, December 21, 2023

Recently, she’s been incorporating more personally meaningful elements into her collages. Because Paul loves maps, she created a collage for him that included a detailed map of Tibet. Another collage she created with whales incorporated a scrap from her daughter’s high school copy of Moby Dick. For “Garden rosebush,” she says, “I included a letter from my Swiss grandmother when I got married.”

Makino’s Japanese-Swiss ancestry has shaped her creativity. The haiku and Japanese paper may be more apparent to viewers but, “The Swiss, too, are surprisingly very playful in their art and writing,” she says, noting she likes to bring that spirit of play into her work.

Makino’s cards, prints and calendars are available at the Made in Humboldt Fair at Pierson Garden Shop through Dec. 24, and in shops around the county year-round. You can see more of her work at makinostudios.com.

Louisa Rogers (she/her) is a writer, painter and paddleboarder who lives in Eureka and Guanajuato, Mexico.

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Makino Studios News

Made in Humboldt fair: With 300 local vendors, the “Made in Humboldt” event at Pierson Garden Shop in Eureka, CA runs through this Sunday, Dec. 24. There you will find my calendars, books, small prints and boxed notecards.

2024 mini-calendars: I am still shipping out orders through the holidays, especially my calendars of art and haiku! They feature 12 colorful Asian-inspired collages with my original haiku. $12 each.

Free shipping: Earn free shipping on orders for $35 or more; just enter promo code FREESHIP35 at checkout.

Waiting for whales

Sometime last winter, on a coastal trail in Trinidad, CA, my husband and I sat on a bench and watched for migrating whales. We didn’t spot any, but there was a spectacular view of the ocean far below. I joked, “We’ll just have to settle for the Pacific.” Later that experience prompted a haiku.

A few months later, while at the riverside cabin we rent every summer, I had the urge to make a collage of a whale. Though I prefer to use my own photos, in this case I had to turn to Google. I found several appealing images of gray whales to use for reference and quickly sketched the idea.

Next I flipped through the collection of papers that I have painted blue. Sometimes I have to paint the papers I need for a particular piece; other times I’m lucky enough to find what I want already prepared.

Eureka! There was a piece of rice paper that I had quickly painted with turquoise blue liquid acrylics, deliberately leaving white streaks. (These are known as “flying whites” in Japanese calligraphy.) Turned on the diagonal, that sheet of paper perfectly conveyed the quality of beams of sunlight filtering underwater.

I also found some washi papers from Asia that I had painted dark blue using a brayer and a gel press, with bits of rice straw and wood shavings showing through. It was time to start tearing my papers into the desired shapes.

But the single whale in my draft looked lonely. The piece called out for a second whale.

Months earlier, I had painted some pages of my daughter’s high school copy of Moby-Dick. Perfect for the second whale’s fins! I glued everything down on a cradled wood panel. Now the two whales looked like they could be playing with each other, a much more interesting dynamic.

At home later, I added some finishing touches: charcoal to create shadows, a white pencil for highlights, and specks of white ink to make the eyes come alive. I glued on an imprint of my red name seal. I had the piece professionally scanned, then added the haiku digitally using a personalized font made from letters I had brush-painted.

waiting for whales
we settle for
the ocean

The finished haiga is my favorite piece of the year. It is the January art for my 2024 calendar of art and haiku, and I also made a card version that reads, “so glad you’re part of my pod.” (That has emerged as the best-seller among the eight new card designs I released this fall.)

“waiting for whales” is 8x10, made of rice paper, Japanese washi paper, book pages, acrylic paint, glue, charcoal, white ink and white pencil on cradled birch panel. © Annette Makino 2023

Another recent poem about whale-watching, a one-line haiku:

nowhere I’d rather be migrating whales

We didn’t find any whales on that hike, but I found plenty of inspiration. And with gray whale migration season starting again, we’ll keep our eyes peeled!

P.S. If you’re curious about the haiga art form, the Haiku Society of America has just published an essay I wrote titled, “Pleasures and pitfalls in creating haiga.”

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“waiting for whales” appeared in the Haiga Gallery of Contemporary Haibun Online, December 2023.

“nowhere I’d rather be” appeared in The Heron’s Nest, September 2023

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Makino Studios News

2024 calendar sale: These calendars of art and haiku are 10% off through this Sunday, Dec. 10! They feature 12 colorful Asian-inspired collages with my original haiku. Normally $12 each, currently $10.80.

Free shipping: Earn free shipping on everything in the shop through Sunday, Dec. 10, 2023. Enter promo code HOLIDAY23 at checkout. No minimum order. Applies to first-class shipping in the US.

Holiday Craft Market: The only in-person fair I am doing this season takes place this 10-5 this Saturday, Dec. 9 and 10-5 on Sunday, Dec. 10, at the Arcata Community Center in Arcata, CA. $1 admission. Catering by Mother’s Cooking Experience. Hope to see you there!

Made in Humboldt fair: The “Made in Humboldt” event at Pierson Garden Shop in Eureka, CA runs through Sunday, Dec. 24; there you will find my calendars, books, small prints and boxed notecards. There are 250 participating vendors, all local.

Water and Stone: My award-winning book of art and haiku includes 50 watercolor paintings with my original poems. Cost is $25. You can find it online here, on Amazon and in select local Humboldt stores. 

Cards: Holiday, birthday, sympathy or everyday… right now there are 70 Makino Studios card designs to choose from, including eight new designs. I also have several notecard sets, including holiday designs.

Holiday order deadline: To make sure your package arrives by December 25, please order by Friday, December 15. Makino Studios ships via USPS Ground Advantage and first-class mail. The elves are standing by!

Thanks: I always appreciate your comments, including all the emailed responses to my last post, “It’s complicated: Celebrating a holiday with a dark past.”

It's complicated: Celebrating a holiday with a dark past

“to everything a season” is 8x10, made of washi papers, acrylic paint, and glue on cradled wood panel. This is one of the pages of the 2024 calendar of art and haiku, and is available a holiday card or notecard set reading, “Wishing you joyful holidays”. © Annette Makino 2023.

Thanksgiving 1968. My kindergarten classmates and I dress up in pilgrim hats and Indian headbands for a “feast” of snacks at the classroom’s long formica tables. My hat, made from a paper plate and crumpled tissue paper flowers, is awkwardly tied under my chin with yarn.

It was the first of many whitewashed lessons about this holiday, touting peace and harmony between white European settlers and Native Americans. As a child, I was dubious about the fashion but never thought to question the story. Yet despite the version most of us learned in school, Thanksgiving has complex and dark beginnings.

When visiting my son at Whitman College last month, I got to see Larissa Fasthorse’s “The Thanksgiving Play." This is a very entertaining, satiric look at the efforts of four well-meaning white characters to produce a politically correct Thanksgiving play for an elementary school. Given the lack of Indigenous actors or writers, the characters reach the comically logical conclusion that the most respectful way to honor the Native American side of the story is to leave them out of the play altogether.

That is clearly an absurd solution. But how can we best celebrate a day with such a checkered history?

My kindergarten portrait, without the Pilgrim hat.

I focus on the Indigenous tradition of giving thanks for nature’s abundance, and to the practice of modern-day people, Indigenous and not, to focus on the gift of family. I’m also educating myself on the history behind Thanksgiving—the National Museum of the American Indian offers great resources.

The Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving Address, which expresses gratitude for all life, begins: “Today we have gathered and we see that the cycles of life continue. We have been given the duty to live in balance and harmony with each other and all living things. So now, we bring our minds together as one as we give greetings and thanks to each other as people. Now our minds are one.”

In that spirit, here’s wishing you a happy and abundant Thanksgiving.

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Makino Studios News

Everything in the shop is 15% off with promo code THANKS23 through Sunday, Nov. 26!

Thanksgiving sale: Use promo code THANKS23 at checkout for 15% off everything in the Makino Studios shop except original art. No order minimum. Good for first-class shipping within the U.S. Only one promo code per order. Sale ends at midnight this Sunday, Nov. 26.

Made in Humboldt fair: The “Made in Humboldt” event at Pierson Garden Shop in Eureka, CA runs through Sunday, Dec. 24; there you will find my calendars, books, small prints and boxed notecards. There are 250 participating vendors, all local.

Holiday Craft Market: The only in-person fair I am doing this season takes place Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 9 and 10, at the Arcata Community Center in Arcata, CA. $1 admission. Catering by Mother’s Cooking Experience.

2024 mini-calendars: These calendars of art and haiku make great holiday gifts, as evidenced by the customers who buy 5, 10, even 20 at a time! They feature 12 colorful Asian-inspired collages with my original haiku. $12 each.

Water and Stone: My award-winning book of art and haiku includes 50 watercolor paintings with my original poems. Cost is $25. You can find it online here and in select local Humboldt stores. 

Cards: Holiday, birthday, sympathy or everyday… right now there are almost 70 Makino Studios card designs to choose from, including eight new designs. I also have several notecard sets, including holiday designs.

Art prints: Blake’s Books in McKinleyville carries a selection of my art prints, ready for gifting. They are among the local stores that carry my books, calendars, notecards and single cards.

Holiday order deadline: If you’d like your package to arrive by December 25, please order by Friday, December 15. Makino Studios ships via USPS Ground Advantage and First-class mail. The elves are standing by!

Hiking haiku for nature lovers

“morning hike” is 11x14, created from handwritten notes, book pages, and Japanese washi papers. These were painted, torn and glued on cradled wood panel. This is one of the pages of the 2024 Makino Studios calendar. The image is also available as a card reading, “the woods may be dark but I’ll walk beside you.”

I recently attended the annual Seabeck Haiku Getaway in beautiful Seabeck, Washington. Organized by Haiku Northwest, this is always a magical and fun gathering. As a featured reader there, I chose to share some poems I’ve written over the years inspired by the hikes my husband and I take several times a week. It seems fitting that during my reading at Scenic Beach State Park, a bald eagle’s cry punctuated my words.

As I explained at my reading, here on California’s redwood coast, we are blessed with amazing variety in the natural landscapes around us, including deserted beaches, old-growth redwood forests and tree-lined rivers. Here is a sampling of the haiku that I’ve found along the trail.

morning hike
my face undoing
the spider’s work

leaf light
tree by tree
the path unfolds

I highly recommend the Seabeck Haiku Getaway for haiku poets anywhere. For more details and photos of this year’s gathering, see @annettemakino on Instagram or Makino Studios on Facebook, links below.

our easy silence
every puddle
sky-deep

tree pose
the redwoods and I
wave our branches

untold stories
tufts of rabbit fur
line the trail

edge of the woods
some things I may not
want to know

chigger bites
my finger traces
the wilderness map

A trail on the grounds of the Seabeck Conference Center in Seabeck, WA in October 2023.

fallen shore pine
an egret’s long glide
over still water

solo hike
slowly catching up
to myself

mountain switchbacks
a turkey vulture
considers our odds

summer dusk
we cede the great outdoors
to a mosquito

egret wings
the evening sun
glides to earth

In these turbulent times, here’s wishing you the peace and healing of time spent in nature.

Publication and contest credits: Acorn; A Warm Welcome: 2013 Seabeck Haiku Getaway Anthology; The Sacred in Contemporary Haiku; Harold G. Henderson Memorial Awards Contest; Wales Haiku Journal; Modern Haiku; The Heron’s Nest; Dust Devils: The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku 2016; Presence; Something Out of Nothing: 75 Haiga.

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Makino Studios News

New card designs: I’ve created eight new cards for a range of occasions. Browse the whole collection.

New holiday notecard set: I also designed some new boxed notecards of persimmons, reading, “wishing you joyful holidays.” See all notecard sets.

2024 calendar: My mini-calendars of haiku and art make great gifts—and they are still just $12 each.

Haiga presentation: October was a busy month: I was also a featured reader for Haiku Poets of Northern California, where I showed a selection of my watercolor and collage haiga (art with haiku). The 15-minute Zoom presentation is on YouTube.

Made in Humboldt Fair at Pierson’s: This event at the Pierson Garden Shop in Eureka features locally made gifts and food products by Humboldt artisans and craftspeople. You can find my calendars, notecard sets, signed prints and books there. Runs through Dec. 24.

Arcata Holiday Craft Market: This fair benefiting youth development scholarships takes place the weekend of December 9-10 at the Arcata Community Center. Look for my Makino Studios booth on the lefthand side of the main room. Mother’s Cooking Experience will cater.

Free shipping: I offer free US shipping on orders of $35 or more. Enter code FREESHIP35 at checkout.

Hot off the press!

I've been busy in the studio, and I'm happy to share that my 2024 mini-calendars of art and haiku are now available! There are also a couple of new vinyl dog and cat stickers. And I've brought back two beloved holiday notecard sets, plus there are eight more notecard designs to choose from. 

As ever, I also offer single cards for birthdays, holidays and more. You can view all current designs and other products in the Makino Studios shop. Shipping is free for orders of $35 and up; just enter promo code FREESHIP35 at checkout. Happy autumn! 

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P.S. The Made in Humboldt Fair at Pierson Garden Shop in Eureka, CA runs Nov. 7 through Dec. 24. I will have books, prints, stickers, calendars, and notecard sets there.

P.P.S. The Arcata Holiday Craft Market takes place Dec. 9-10 at the Arcata Community Center. Look for the Makino Studios booth on the lefthand side of the main room.

P.P.P.S. I'm excited to attend the Seabeck Haiku Getaway Oct. 26-29 in Seabeck, WA, where I will give a short haiku reading and have some haiku books and calendars for sale.

Sale

SALE! 2024 mini-calendar of art and haiku - Japanese-inspired collage

Sale Price: $6.00 Original Price: $12.00

• Please note this is the 2024 calendar, for those who just want to enjoy the art. The 2025 calendar is available here.

Featuring peaceful landscapes and animals, this wall calendar expresses Zen wisdom as well as quiet wonder and delight in the world.

The Japanese-inspired collages in this calendar include haiku by award-winning poet Annette Makino. She created each of these collages with washi papers from Asia as well as found papers that she hand-paints and tears.

This mini-calendar measures 5-1/2” wide by 7” tall closed (5-1/2” x 14” open), so it will easily fit in a small space. Major US holidays are listed. All twelve designs are shown on the back. The calendar includes an artist’s bio and some background on haiku and haiga (haiku art).

These are professionally printed in the USA on substantial paper and saddle-stitched. Each calendar is packaged in a self-sealing cellophane sleeve.

Many users of past Makino Studios calendars save and hang up each month’s painting after it has passed or give the image to a friend. The new calendar makes a great gift that may continue to bring pleasure well past 2024.

Add to cart

joy and peace fox holiday notecards - snowy pine landscape (807)

$20.00

joy and peace

A fluffy red fox takes in the stillness of the snow-covered woods in this holiday card, while the simple words go right to the heart of the season.

These eight cards are 4.25 x 5.5 inches, or A2 sized. They are blank inside for your message. The backs show the Makino Studios logo and contact information. 

Each set comes with eight envelopes and is packaged in a kraft paper box with a window.

Cards are professionally printed on an HP Indigo press that produces offset-quality reproductions. They are printed using fade-resistant ink on card stock.

Notecard sets are shipped in a sturdy cardboard box.

Add to cart

In memory of Misha

“the jingle” is 11x14, painted with Japanese watercolors and sumi ink and watercolor paper. © Annette Makino 2019

Our family had to say goodbye to our beloved rescue dog Misha a few weeks ago. He was at least sixteen and a half years old, and his little body just wore out.

Long ago, I became his person and he became my sidekick and muse, inspiring all sorts of art and haiku. He gave me the unconditional love that only a dog can provide, and losing him has been even harder than I expected.

But after a month of grieving, the pain of Misha’s difficult last weeks and his passing is giving way to memories of his many good years. In processing the loss, I browsed through literally hundreds of photos of him. There he is trotting down a leafy trail, racing along the ocean, snuggling with my kids. After his traumatic puppyhood, we gave him a great life.

Misha, we miss you deeply, but we’re grateful we got fifteen years with you. May your spirit run free on the beach forever.

Following is a haibun about Misha from my 2021 book, Water and Stone. (Haibun are prose pieces with haiku.)

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Lost and Found

The dog is supposed to be for my eleven-year-old. Searching online for a hypoallergenic breed, she finds a small white poodle-bichon mix listed by an animal rescue group. One hot summer afternoon, we pick him up from his foster mom in the parking lot of a Sacramento gas station.

Scrawny and shaved almost to the skin, with huge brown eyes, Misha attaches himself to us right away. My daughter falls head over heels, saying, “I love him so much that sometimes I just have to laugh to let it out—I feel like I’ll burst if I don’t.”

Misha has had a hard run. It seems he was lost or abandoned somewhere near the Mojave Desert. When picked up and taken to the San Bernardino pound some weeks earlier, he was emaciated, filthy, matted, and suffering from giardia. He had dog bite marks on his head and shoulders and an infected cut almost completely encircling his neck. But it turns out his deepest wounds are emotional.

thrift store puzzle
the holes
you can never fill

Misha was happiest when the whole pack was together. RIP Misha Makino. Born est. 2006 or 2007. Died June 28, 2023.

In our first days and months together, we learn that Misha has severe separation anxiety. When left alone, he claws his way through screen doors, digs under gates and fences, chews through leashes, and scratches up doorframes and floorboards, all in desperate attempts to find us. He is determined he will never again be abandoned.

We watch dog-training videos, read dog books, and discuss the problem with Misha’s vet. But through tough love, Misha trains us to take him everywhere. And as anyone could have predicted, I end up taking over his care from my daughter.

home from errands—
a hero’s welcome
from the dog

Despite Misha’s issues and all his trauma, he turns out to be a very sweet fellow who brings a lot of comedy and laughter into our home. He is pushing fifteen now—105 in dog years—and going blind and deaf. But “His Dogship” still makes sure we get our daily walks at the beach, along the river, or through the woods. And for short bursts, he can zoom around like a puppy, barking at us to try and tag him.

Again and again, I tap his rump as he zooms past. Again and again, I claim him.

the jingle
of the dog’s tags
wild currant in bloom

(“Lost and Found” is from Water and Stone: Ten Years of Art and Haiku; Annette Makino; Makino Studios; 2021. The included haiku were previously published in Modern Haiku, tinywords, Four Hundred and Two Snails: Haiku Society of America Members' Anthology 2018 and The Heron’s Nest.)

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Makino Studios News

“bright eyes” is 11x14, painted with sumi ink on rice paper. © Annette Makino 2011

Playful dog sticker: To celebrate Misha’s life, I am planning to create a sticker from an early sumi ink painting of Misha in a playful stance. I’m away on a creative retreat this week without good wifi, but please let me know if you’re interested in ordering one and I’ll tell you know when they’re ready. Cost will be around $4-5.

Sunkist Festival: I’ll have a booth at this small and sweet fair on Sunday, August 6 from 11 to 5. Besides arts and crafts, the festival will feature wood-fired pizzas and other goodies plus live music. 135 Sunkist Lane, off Glendale in McKinleyville, CA, near the Blue Lake Murphy’s Market.

Obon Festival: Organized by Humboldt Asian Pacific Islanders in Solidarity (HAPI), the Obon Festival will take place on Sunday, August 13 at the Creamery District in Arcata, CA from 4 to 8 p.m. There will be taiko drumming, bon odori dancing, bento boxes, games for kids and vendors like me. (I’ve decided not to do the North Country Fair in September, so these two fairs are your best shot at catching my Makino Studios booth in the coming months.)