I spent the past weekend at Quartz Mountain Lodge, sitting as a portrait model for classes presented by Juliette Aristides, a Seattle painter.
Ms. Aristides was the guest of Oklahoma Arts Institute and this weekend was the fall session attended by teachers from across the state.

Ms. Aristides was ably assisted by Cameron College’s Katherine Liontas-Warren, Faculty Hall of Famer and wonderful painter.
The institute was four days — Thursday through Sunday — and I was treated as a prince by Emily Clinton, director of programs, and her cohorts. It was a completely wonderful experience.
The artists kept telling me my face is “sculptural”. I was hoping they meant that I have chiseled features, but I have a sneaking hunch they meant “deeply lined with wrinkles, you old fart.”
There were more than a dozen artists who did tonal portraits with only black, white and gray as well as follow up formal portraits in colored oils. Not many matched and all were (as one might expect) individual interpretations of my face — some brooding and some hopeful and others bored. In some I have a square chin, others show me with narrowed eyes, and, depending on their vantage point as I sat, full face to full profile.
These were teachers from Stillwater, Tulsa, small towns and, of course, the Oklahoma City metro area. I met and interacted with a lot of interesting people.
There were also classes in folk dancing, creative writing, digital photography and printmaking and those participants mixed freely with me and the painters.
I will say that every evening I looked forward to an hour or so in the hot tub to soothe my aching back.
On one evening drive through the park, just as the sun was setting, I saw six deer in the space of a mile. There were armadillo and skunk on the grounds, fully unawed by the presence of humans — it was your job to get out of their way.
The lake was way down, but still lovely, and it is always a surprise to come through flat western Oklahoma and arrive at a place of towering granite outcroppings and pin oaks. The lodge is about 9 miles south from Lone Wolf or, if you prefer, about halfway between Hobart and Altus. For those of you out of state, about an hour’s drive south to the Red River and about an hour’s drive west to the Texas Panhandle in far southwest Oklahoma. I’m thinking Greer County, but on the border of Kiowa County.