Gifts of Wabi Sabi

And my friends bring me presents. Often left on my studio door knob, sometimes slid under the door. Friends go to Venice, Italy and bring me back rusted wire and brick. They go to Port Elizabeth, South Africa and bring back a nail rusted by the moisture off the Indian Ocean. They go to London and dig in the dirt and bring back a curved bit of rusty metal--a broken vase? They tape pennies and keys to the train tracks and offer me one of the many treasures smashed there. They go to Artist's Point on the Mount Baker Glacier and bring back part (a very small part, thank you) of a car hood that apparently fell from the sky and rusted into the scree. Add to that broken bits of dresser knob embellishment and various finds from sheds and metal detected expanses. I am a lucky, lucky girl to be blessed with such finds. Thank you, my friends, these treasures will become parts of my art.

This time I really mean it: Finished Gestating

Still Point: Gestating 36"x36"

It was quite the process, and it took some time once Peggy Zehring pointed out to me that I need to turn the orientation, but I love it now. I just had to darken down below the circles and raise the burn a little into the white. But I love how this is working now. As always, I bow to my teacher/mentor and give thanks for having recognized her when I saw her.

Woman, The Snake, and Man: Before, During, and After

each painting is 24" x 48"

This series pulls together many symbols and concepts for me. I chose the size because I wanted the paintings to look like columns. The idea of the snake came when I found this very versatile brass hose at Z Recycling. It reminded me of a snake. I didn't mind that it was flat in places, that it was torn and unraveling in places. That seemed right with the idea of a snake shedding its skin. Experimenting proved that the surface could hold paint, which could prove necessary.

Once I thought of the hose as a snake, a couple of concepts came to me: one is the myth that the snake and woman (Eve) brought knowledge to humankind (what was the man's role in that? he had to go along for it to work, right?); the other is that the kundalini is represented by a snake. The idea of the kundalini made me think of tantric sex and the life force moving up the spine during orgasm. It goes something like that. In the paintings, the female aspect is symbolically represented by the oval shape with the dark at the back and the light on top, the male aspect by the upward pointing triangle with the light at the back and the dark on top. With these two opposites above/below one another, the question became where is the light where they come together (hmm...did I intend that pun)? The answer for me was a continuous push/pull between dark and light. It took a lot of time and paint, putting it on, leaving just the right amount, painting over, push/pull, push/pull until it was complete.

This series was quite the challenge for me and sat unfinished for months. Once I started figuring them out, though, they happened fast...well...relatively fast for me. These paintings were great teachers for me. They move me closer toward the marriage of the divine feminine and masculine, a spiritual achievement I aspire to for cronedom. I loved working on them, the whole process. I think that they have to always hang together.

Finally. This is it. Re-working finished

Still Point: Gestating 36"x36"

I think I have finally resolved all of the places in this painting that were nagging at me: "not quite right." I've sat in my rocking chair countless moments, pouring over the painting inch by inch. Right now, it makes me smile. Of course, there is always more time to sit and rock and study, but I think that I'm taking it to Ladyfest this week to get it to an audience--if there is enough room on the gallery walls. 

So in this painting, "Gestating," is the idea that circles represent the female and squares, the male. This is my consciousness moving toward acceptance of the divine feminine and masculine, toward the idea that we gestate both dimensions within ourselves, that we accept that, as we move toward the integration and "the crowning of age" as Marion Woodman calls the spiral toward becoming a crone.

Still Reworking--Still Point:Gestating

So here it is again, after gold-gessoing out the bottom right and upper left and putting in the colors of oil slicks and peacock feathers. Still not finished, though. But my balance problem of leaning to the right is mostly resolved. I hear that the lower left quadrant is not quite working, and frankly, it was troubling me, so I'm relieved that's confirmed. I think I need red there. And I have yet to be successful in completing the top of the gold that runs over the two circles in the middle space. I've painted and repainted that area. The painting is still trying to tell me what goes there. 

Reworked Version Still Point: Gestating

I'm still reworking this painting but feel pretty close to finished. I resolved the split personality that happened when I added green after I'd been working the copper/violet. I think I need to come in with a little more gold in the space above the three circles. But after the red was added, I could feel myself smiling--a smile that started in my toes. That's often how I know a painting is finished or very nearly so. 

Now I just need to learn how to use my new/first digital camera along with the cropping tool. There's always some new technology nipping at my heals. It provides such a challenge.

Abstract Composition Upside Right

I thought it went like this:

But Peggy showed me how and why it was a better composition when rotated 180 degrees. The way I was seeing, the viewer could not get down to the lower half of the painting. The attention was drawn to the gold circle in the top half. I still need and value her instruction. I've gotten so many more positive comments on this piece now that it hangs this way.

Still Point: Trichotomizing 36"x36"