Mountain Water

Mountain Water Mountain Water is an artists' refuge and land restoration lab in Southern Colorado. Mixing the two practices is at the heart of Mountain Water.

THE MISSION

Mountain Water is the unique site of a dream - a dream that place holds power, which can be shared; a dream that what we make has the potential to benefit and awaken the world; a dream that simplicity and humor foster kindness. Artistic practice is fundamentally positive as an impulse, and meditation is a neutral way of looking at mind and phenemonena. THE LAND

Mountain Water Ranch i

s in Huerfano County, Colorado. Our 240 acres is mixed grassland and piñon-juniper forest, at an elevation of 7,400-8,000 feet above sea level. The land remains beautiful despite its past history of over-grazing and neglect. We are now amending that history through regenerative land management practices that restore soil health and stabilize the water table. In 2016 and 2017 we worked with local and regional USDA/NRCS staff and our neighbors to re-establish historic irrigation ditches; including two irrigation headgates - massive steel structures shared by three ranches - funded by a cost-share grant from the Upper Huerfano Conservation District. We also planted our first restoration test plots in mixed cover crops and even harvested a small crop of black einkorn, an ancient form of wheat. THE CURRICULUM

Retreats held here will include traditional practices such as drawing and painting, as well as studio exercises designed to reveal the delight of ordinary sense perceptions. Classes will be presented in a context of both group and solitary meditation practice that are guided through lectures and discussions. Participation is an across-artistic-discipline contemplative approach to benefit creative people – painters, musicians, performers, writers, dancers, environmentalists, etc. THE PRINCIPALS

Joan Anderson and Robert Spellman are the owners of Mountain Water Ranch. Both have been life-long students of painting and meditation, both have had long working careers as artists and teachers. The inspiration for Mountain Water came from their time spent managing a Buddhist center for solitary retreat – that time became the exemplar of painting and meditating – and from their years as faculty at Naropa University, a seat of Buddhist-inspired contemplative education. They feel intense gratitude to their Buddhist teachers, Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche foremost among them; to their art teachers, mentors, and students; and to their parents, friends, and families for a lifetime of support.

Greetings dear Friends,Thank you, thank you for your enthusiastic response to last month’s Mountain Water news and word ...
04/17/2019

Greetings dear Friends,

Thank you, thank you for your enthusiastic response to last month’s Mountain Water news and word of our neighbor’s generous gift of his land. Thank you to all who have made financial contributions to build Mountain Water.

Big news on that front! To get us to a finished building, one of our investors will match any contribution you make, between now and May 15th. Outrageous, right? Ten dollars becomes twenty, twenty becomes forty, one hundred becomes two hundred, and so on. All contributions large and small will double in size, now is your opportunity. If all goes well, we’ll be opening Mountain Water without debt. The rest will be gravy.

To donate, go here: https://www.mountainwater.space/get-involved

Mountain Water brings together the practice streams of meditation and art in a place surrounded by mountains and trees older than our own memories, a laboratory for you and future artists. We’re now planning a month-long housewarming for later in the summer; come and see Mountain Water, meditate, paint, draw, write, dance, eat, plant, rake, scythe…take it all for a test drive! Stay tuned for details.

Meanwhile, this coming week is all bustle: the drywall complete, interior painting begins; the exterior steel siding arrived from Wyoming on a BIG truck; and the wood stove is installed (we might even get to use it before winter abandons us for good this spring). It’s time to clean out irrigation ditches and get ready for spring land restoration planting. We look forward to seeing you here!

Best wishes,

Robert Spellman and Joan Anderson

Hay Forks • Joan Anderson •
01/17/2018

Hay Forks • Joan Anderson •

My grandfather owned a hardware store when I was growing up. Though I was no stranger to tools, it took Jim Dine’s drawings to open my aesthetic eye to hand tools...

For all the potters and ceramic artists out there, from Mountain Water Press author Meredith Ann Fuller. 🏺🏺
01/14/2018

For all the potters and ceramic artists out there, from Mountain Water Press author Meredith Ann Fuller. 🏺🏺

The Kindness of Dirt

At first there was no kindness in the universe.
Narcissism started with the Big Bang and just kept going. To this day stardust could care less about your broken heart.

And then there was dirt. For a long time, dirt was dirt and didn’t care about anybody. Then came the mud wasps and cliff swallows, who looked at dirt and saw a home. Then came the potters with their empty bellies and clever hands, priests of mud and fire.

Dirt became proud to carry water and pour wine. To cook and to serve food. To hold flowers and to hide jewels. To preserve scrolls and enshrine bones. Dirt became proud to be dirt. After all, it is dirt that makes potters! And outlives them.

It took a long time and many accidents for dirt to feel the sorrow of potters. That what is beautiful can break. And what is valuable can be thrown against a wall. And, worst of all, what is useful can be taken for granted. Who will remember the cup from which their beloved took her last sip of water?

Now, dirt has become the kindest thing of all. It knows that in this world where there are more cups than people, all are destined to be broken. Dirt’s oldest job no longer disgusts it. With tenderness it receives the bodies of the dead. And every time the body of a potter is lowered into the ground, dirt cries out, Oh, how I will miss your touch!

​​Meredith Ann Fuller
Curaumilla Chile
1.9.18
(Reading aloud in a candle-lit library to residents of Curaumilla)

Those of you in Boulder: come paint with Joan Anderson six Wednesday mornings in February and March. The best way to pai...
01/14/2018

Those of you in Boulder: come paint with Joan Anderson six Wednesday mornings in February and March. The best way to paint is to begin. 😜

I am beginning the year painting and invite you to come along. The theme and title of my 6-week class, XX. PAINT BEST, is inspired by a short list of New Year’s “rulins” borrowed from Woody Guthrie’s 1943 list: 18. Stay Glad 20. Dream Good 26. Dance Better. To this I add XX. Paint Best.

TGIF -- Joan's latest magazine dedicated to the art of the sketchbook is available to order online!
12/09/2017

TGIF -- Joan's latest magazine dedicated to the art of the sketchbook is available to order online!

An Ephemeron of our sketchbook drawings and notations seen in a handsome magazine format, with Guest Contributor, Chuck Ceraso.

Thank you to all who came out to support building last night! We had a blast and the clouds over Boulder did, too!
10/23/2017

Thank you to all who came out to support building last night! We had a blast and the clouds over Boulder did, too!

Excited for our party this afternoon!
10/22/2017

Excited for our party this afternoon!

co-founders Robert Spellman & Joan Anderson photographed by Cory Richards at ICON show by Art Movement Colorado.
10/14/2017

co-founders Robert Spellman & Joan Anderson photographed by Cory Richards at ICON show by Art Movement Colorado.

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Gardner, CO

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