by Anne Jaeger
GARDEN
The Garden Gal
Magical Mosaics
c The trickiest part of building a good mosaic is
finding the right stones. most people are too
lazy to really do a good job.
c I also sort through piles of pebbles in stone
yards, a rather joyless and tedious task that
requires a meditative will, as it usually takes
3 or 4 hours to sort a couple of 5 gallon
buckets worth.
c The pebbles can’t be laid flat like pancakes so
that you get more coverage, as they will pop
out over time. They have to be set on edge,
or if they are large, have enough thickness to
stay imbedded in the mortar.
wANT To mAKe youR
owN PeBBle moSAIC?
visit Jeffreygardens.blogspot.com for
Building a Pebble mosaic Stepping Stone,
August 3, 2011.
For more info:
jeffreygardens.com
Anne Jaeger, writes The Garden Gal for Just out. Anne
was a hard news reporter and anchor at KGw and
KoIN before turning to gardening full time. After that
her award winning garden shows appeared on both
stations. you can now look for Anne's garden videos
on the oregonian newspaper web site: oregonlive.
com/hg , catch her on Twitter: Anne Jaeger@Gar-
denGalTv or send her a suggestion on her web site:
GardenGal.Tv .
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Justout.com
Anne Jaeger: Mosaic is an ancient art, but I
don’t remember seeing it in Oregon until you
built them here years ago, causing a sensation
in the garden community. What do you get out
of mosaics?
Jeffrey Bale: They’re intricate. Seeing them,
changes the way you’re feeling. It’s a low cost
material that I can put together to create some-
thing extremely luxurious and meaningful be-
cause every stone has been collected for its in-
dividual beauty, then amassed together. So you
have all of these little components, each one is
magical unto itself and then together it creates a
much bigger artistic vision.
AJ: you must have a tremendous memory for
rock.
JB: I pick very carefully from nature and leave
a minimal impact. I remember the day on the
beach when I found THAT rock (a huge single
stone) and what a beautiful spot that was. you
have to carry it. you’re putting in a penance,
carrying it up the slope from the river into the
truck. ‘Oh my God that hurt.’ you’re not going
to forget it because it hurt. For instance, I’m
looking for certain architectural shapes for the
wall over there (a horizontal rock alter spanning
one entire side of his garden) and it might take
me years. Or the snake, (a slithering stonework
side path) I worked on it seven years, but not
continually. The rocks come from Sauvie Island.
There’s only one little section of beach where
they come up through the sand, a half mile from
where I can park. When I go, the river needs to
be low, later in the fall, when no one is there. The
geese are coming in. It’s a magical, epic place to
be. I like to rock when I’m alone.”
AJ: And the stone tapestry’s you built for the
television actor in ‘Monk?’ Going through 400
pounds of pebbles to find two dozen that fit?
(See The New york Times, December 23, 2009)
JB: Tony Shalhoub…. I built the entire mosaic
in sand and then took it all apart. It is so exact.
It’s very precise and rebuilt in wet mortar — a
Moroccan carpet design; I needed to know
where every pebble was going to go. Again, it’s
a fine art piece.
AJ: What will your work say about you 200 years
from now?
JB: I’m crazy (gives throaty laugh). And again,
there’s a story behind everything. I really think
the mosaics speak about my grandparents. I
honor my ancestors; they were geologists with a
true love of stone. A lot of the stone in this wall
(surrounding his backyard garden) are from
their collection I inherited. It says a lot about my
life as a world traveler — a quarter of the year
I’m a vagabond and the rest I’m anchored here
and creating. I want to trigger consciousness:
of memory, of beauty…..like these temple bells
(hanging overhead) from Thailand. When they
ring I see it all again. The bells tell you the wind
spirits are passing through the garden, ringing
the bells to make you aware, conscious of na-
ture. I honor nature. g
September 2012
PHoTo By HoRACe loNG
BAle oN moSAICS
Jeffrey Bale's title — landscape architect — tells
us Bale knows a heck of a lot more about plants,
structures, design and the earth sciences than
most of us. What the moniker doesn’t convey
is — the man weaves magic in pebbles. Rather
than merely arranging so many “rocks” in mor-
tar, Bales builds hypnotic mosaics mimicking
tapestry rugs. His work is heavy, back break-
ing and tedious to the extreme. The result un-
derfoot is a story; a pictograph steeped in his-
tory and mystical forces. Bale travels the world
constantly trying to quell his hunger for people,
plants, art and mosaics. And I could have sworn
I saw Jeffrey’s aquamarine eyes become a plasma
screen for his transfixing stories. yes, Bale casts
a spell and his mosaics are not only a feast for
the eyes…but a pleasure for the soul.