Aditi Series

Aditi~Fertility

(No longer in inventory)

Aditi~Consciousness

Aditi~Future

Aditi~Past

Aditi~Space

Each of the five paintings is 33"x33" acrylic on canvas

This series began with inspiration that came from looking at NASA's Picture a Day website. Nebula fascinate me. Who knew there could be such inspiration in colored gas?

  

I began all five of these paintings with a white and black dynamic. And then I didn't know what to do next. So they sat for five years. Then finally, one day, I had some blue acrylic paint with blue interference left over from another painting I had been working on. Not enough to put in a container, too much to wash down the drain. So I grabbed the painting that became Aditi~Space and put the remaining paint on it. That broke the barrier that was keeping me from moving forward with these paintings. Once I found my way into the process, it took (oddly enough) five weeks to finish the series. 

As I was finishing the last painting in the series, I came across information about the goddess Aditi, a Vedic goddess of the infinite or the void. Having five aspects, I knew she was a part of the narrative in these paintings. Why did I name the unconscious aspect "Consciousness," though?

 

Aditi~Space (and another lesson in letting go even if you love it and it holds a certain beauty)

I had nearly finished this painting, but it had a problem. The flame from orange to white to blue in the bottom left quadrant threatened to propel the image off of the painting. I loved that part of the painting, but it was distracting, overpowering, and actually belonged to a different image. One I hadn't painted yet. Definitely not here, not now. I had protected this portion of the painting through all of the edge work. Now it was time to let it go. That's often the way it is. The places you fall in love with have to essentially provide the foundation to more color, different shapes. And actually, letting go leads to freedom and other places to love.

Aditi: Space 33"x33"

The bottom left and center, now, for me, hold the image and the space. There is still movement, but it's circular. And stronger. And I will always know what lies underneath that strength.

Lightcatcher of the Whatcom Museum

The Lightcatcher is a fabulous addition to the Whatcom Museum. This building is for exhibiting fine arts, and it houses what is known as "FIG," or the children's museum. the current exhibition at the Lightcatcher, "Out of Bounds," is the art collection of two wonderful people, Driek and Michael Zirinsky.

I know Driek and Michael from my years at Boise State University. Michael was one of my teachers in the "History of Eastern Civilization" class (his area of expertise--History of the Middle East), and Driek was my mentor as I went through the English Secondary Education program. I certainly could not have made it through as gracefully without her guidance. And now, our paths cross again, in Bellingham, in the art world.

Driek and Michael have collected art from around the world and some mighty stunning pieces are displayed at the Lightcatcher:

Jeppe Hein "Fire Drawings" are mandalas created from the scorchings of a torch.

Chris Gilmore's "Lambretta" is the incredibly detailed motorcycle constructed of cardboard.

Lead Pencil Studio's Annie Han and Daniel Mihalyo created "Inversion" to pay with solid and void and can also be viewed from above.

Cheryl Sturtleff's home-structions tell a compelling story of structure and emotion.

Susie J. Lee in "Fugue State" projects shadows of hands portraying varying stages of human relationship through handcast resin.

Long-Bin Chen sculpts faux stone heads from recycled books in "China Can Say No Again" and "Damoh" (from telephone books).

Ala Ebtekar has reverently painted "Ascension Buraq" with Tanka clouds and missiles on pages of an Islamic prayer book.

And then there is Enrique Chagoya's "Codex" an incredible book, a copy of which can be purchased at the gift store, "Endurance" footage of Shackleton's adventure in the Antarctic with penguins and pick axes projected on a tooth. Look for a painting with Medusa seeing her reflection as a smiley face. Definitely the gamut of emotions as one travels from the profound to the whimsical. The breath stopper, though, is Hung Liu's "September" a painting in process in 2001 with a Chinese woman in elaborate headdress and a peace crane juxtaposed. I wished for a bench to sit on to ponder this painting further.

The Zirinskys also own a couple of pieces created by John Grade, who has an installation in the Lightcatcher called "Bloom: The Elephant Bed." This cannot be explained. There's ink. There's paper. There are counterbalanced weights. There's binding that's corn-based to dissolve in Bellingham Bay waters. There's white. There's black.

So I bought a membership. It had to be done. Been there three times. Will be there again February 7 when John Grade comes to the Lightcatcher to speak about his work. There are a lot of people to thank for the existence of this fine art museum. I thank them all. And I thank Driek and Michael for sharing their art adventures with us 'hamsters.

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 (was the pun intended?)

Still Point: Gestating 36"x36" (no longer in inventory)

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.