My book, THE CREATIVE LANDSCAPE OF AGING, wins Award!

My book, THE CREATIVE LANDSCAPE OF AGING is a winner in the 24th annual National Mature Media Awards Program http://www.seniorawards.com/2015winners/. 

The program, presented by the Mature Market Resource Center, a national clearinghouse for the senior market, recognizes the nation’s finest marketing, communications, educational materials, and programs designed and produced for older adults. The entries were judged by a distinguished panel of mature market experts from across the United States for overall excellence of design, content, creativity and relevance to the senior market.

To Buy the book, click here.

THE CREATIVE LANDSCAPE OF AGING: My book WINS THE 2015 NATIONAL MATURE MEDIA AWARD

This beautiful full color book is filled with select essays and interviews from this blog PLUS photographs of artist works AND my Introduction. You can read about the book and see inside pages at: http://www.amazon.com/Creative-Landscape-Aging-Judith-Zausner/dp/0986339806/ref=pd_rhf_ee_p_img_7

To email and connect with me: www.thecreativelandscapeofaging.com

WHAT IS THE BOOK ABOUT?

The Creative Landscape of Aging presents compelling essays that explore the power and grace of creativity and aging from an intimate perspective. Includes a series of interviews with successful older artists such as Judith Leiber, Nelson Shanks, Isaiah Zagar (and many more) with accompanying full color gallery insert of artist works. Zausner's book is ideal for anyone who wants to explore the insightful world of aging and creativity and read about older adults at different stages in their lives and careers. 

WHAT ARE PEOPLE SAYING?

Zausner has taken an appealing subject, late life creativity, and suffused it with energy, insight, and most of all, compelling story-telling. Her writing is original, vivid and spot on. This book is one to curl up with, savor and then treasure. 

-Dick Goldberg, former National Director, Coming of Age

In The Creative Landscape of Aging, Judith Zausner helps us deal with the inevitable “third act” of life by offering wisdom stories from remarkable creative older adults. Having worked with everyday creativity and older adults, in this new book Zausner demonstrates and celebrates the power of creativity to heal.

-Ilene A. Serlin, Ph.D, BC-DMT, Union Street Health Associates, San Francisco, past-president San Francisco Psychological Association, author of Whole Person Healthcare: Arts and Health​

Judith Zausner is a gifted teacher, writer and commentator who illuminates the life

and work of artists who have changed the way the rest of us see the world.

Her insights and passions sweep away confusion and promote clarity.  Imagine

a wiser---and more sophisticated older sister whispering in your ear, as the two

of you embark on a great journey together.

-Dick Levinson

Central Senior Services, Free Library of Philadelphia

BUY THE BOOK!

INSPIRED TO DANCE

Just because she’s pushing 82, doesn’t mean that Pearl has to give up dancing. On the contrary, learning Salsa has been plenty of fun. So every Thursday evening, Pearl struts over to the dance studio to listen to the music and move to the groove. The group starts with practice steps and then learns to build them like puzzle pieces set to music. Body movement and partner interaction is part of the creative process that distinguishes individual style. A wink, a swing, a twist. Dance is the imaginative work of the mind and body in unison; a purposeful interpretation to music.

What happens when dancers meet life hurdles? How do they find creative solutions to continue their life passion?

Jodi Stolove was a dancer and teacher who had broken her ankle. Not willing to be immobile and abandon her students, she taught classes from her chair. And that became a successful business called Chair Dancing ® (http://www.chairdancing.com) which is non impact aerobics from a seated position. Jodi says, “These medically sound programs are a new fitness option for active people or those whose physical condition, restricted mobility or age limit their participation in conventional forms of exercise”. She sells home videos for instruction and you can always improvise.

The dancer, Kitty Lunn, had a very big hurdle to overcome. Her love of dance started at the age of eight. But while preparing for her first Broadway show in 1987, Kitty Lunn slipped on ice, fell down a flight of stairs and broke her back. Paraplegic and depressed, she could not imagine dancing again when she could not walk. But she also could not give up her love of dancing because ”the dancer inside me didn't know or care that I was using a wheelchair, she just wanted to keep dancing.” In the fall of 1995, Kitty founded Infinity Dance Theater, http://www.infinitydance.com , a non-traditional dance company featuring dancers with and without disabilities and performs all over the world. In addition to dance concerts, the Company is dedicated to educational programs by “teaching other dance educators to bring the joy and drama of motion and movement to a new level of inclusion by expanding the boundaries of dance and changing the world's perception of what a dancer is.” Kitty continues to take a “mainstream, professional ballet class every day and has developed wheelchair dance techniques strongly rooted in and growing out of classical ballet and modern dance.”

There are many challenges in life but few as great as finding creative solutions to build our lives with passion and dignity.


“Great dancers are not great because of their technique, they are great because of their passion.”
Martha Graham