Strange reversals...

Clockwise: Grade school card, this week’s block print tests, blocks created decades apart and a William Rice image from his book.

Delighted to find this 1941 gem of my father’s, “Block Prints How To Make Them.” If you look up William S. Rice, his images are timeless and beautiful. A page was marked by dad’s 1950 driver’s license obtained as he was leaving Pennsylvania for Alaska. 

Might be the time of year, I’m careening madly down memory lane with no brakes…

I was the weird kid who broke down in first grade during Duck and Cover drills. I promised Einstein in second grade I’d use all of my brain. In third grade, I expounded on the vastness of the Cosmos to my beloved teacher who sat gobsmacked. I was marginalized, as so many gifted and talented children are simply because They can’t force us to fit where They are comfortable. They accused me of having my parents do homework and art projects. The devastating humiliation repeated every year when we moved. Inevitably, I learned how to do most of what I do from books like this one. Even in college, classmates pulled an intervention (for their benefit) and told me to slow down, I was making them look bad. I kept going and never looked back.

In the olden days, B.A. (Before Apple) children were actually trusted with sharp objects and I still have the hunting knife I carried running the woods ~ when I wasn’t forced to sit in school. Of course, we of the era can all point to scars and relate an Unfortunate Incident as a rite of passage.

Vividly remember the grade school art project when we made block print cards. The knives were no big deal and I was incredibly happy carving away. Breathing deep of the fresh Lino smell (complete with asbestos) and fascinated to trace the curls falling away. Imagine my consternation when the image printed as a mirror to the carefully prepared block. Who knew of the strange reversal? 

The second big printing aha came this week while having a blast working this duck I’ve wanted to print for years. There’s the obvious reversal of the image and this time I nailed it. In addition, we need to comprehend which mark will print and what won’t proving we can always learn. Doncha love it! The next step is experimenting with line thickness and techniques like hatching. So exciting!

The educational system has been stripped of the arts and music in an effort to turn out conformists who will behave themselves. Prove yourself deliciously unmanageable and make wonderful art, exquisite music, powerful poetry or innovative houses. Don’t look back.

If you have questions or want to share your story, the comments finally function thanks to Sarah Moon & Co. If you’d like coaching or want to shift old programs getting in your way, connect through the contact page.

Artists and children....

Children of all ages enjoy chalk drawings…

One of my best studio tools is a simple dollar store chalk. For marking changes, enlarging, possible composition shifts or additions, school chalk is the best. Safe for oil or acrylic and wipes off with water. The caveat is the surface, oil or acrylic, Must. Be. Dry. before drawing.

They Are Us...

Douglas Earl Colyer. Born in the fall of 1913, was categorized as vulnerable during the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918. During the Spanish Flu, a third of the world population died. He’s about three here, with the classic short hair, straight fringe and dress children of the era wore until the males were “breached” or allowed to wear pants. Wearing pants began the separation from his mother and his journey into manhood. Wondering how my grandparents coped with the Spanish Flu as young parents prompted this post. 

Photo copyrighted.

The sperm and egg that unite to become us imprint in the bodies of our ancestors generations before we’re conceived. Biological markers provide the evidence. For twenty years, I’ve worked with clients on the principle we carry our ancestor’s experience and memory along in our cells. When trauma affects a population, the results lodge in our body and pass from generation to generation. 

Patterns of response establish in a family line as a result. Our progenitors had the same tools for flu as we do - social distance, masks, hand washing. They had the same anxiety we feel. Family experiences occurring generations ago overlay our local, real-time experience. Science caught up and validates this through research in neuroscience, cell biology, epigenetics, neuroplasticity and more. 

What does this mean to us when anxiety and depression show up for us in this time of virus? Once we understand what belongs to us and separate out the portion we own, we are more effective in the here and now. We’re more able to cope with our own stuff without lugging along the baggage of a few hundred years of progenitor’s trauma. 

Options to explore for ancestral trauma… 

It Didn’t Start With You by Mark Wolynn offers a way to work through generational issues to understand behaviors we haven’t been able to explain. I’ve attended conferences where he’s presented and his work is amazing. 

Becoming Supernatural or anything by Joe Dispenza. Once you get through the bells and whistles of promotion, the science is fascinating. This interview will give you an overview: Joe Dispenza and Lewis Howes, https://youtu.be/D8C3HZpWKAM Make sure you get Dispenza’s authentic audios and not a you tube wannabe dubbing over music and drumming. Not the same result. 

We’re all experiencing trauma and anxiety at some level. We’re holding our collective breath. Here’s a simple and effective exercise to employ…

Anxiety ramps when we forget to breathe. The muscles in our neck, back and chest tighten so breath constricts even more. The brain panics when the air supply is reduced, starts a mayday and emotions ramp up. Breathe deeply through the clog in your upper body into your diaphragm. Lying on your back while doing this helps release the diaphragm. This gets enough oxygen to the brain so the brain knows we are living and can relax vigilance. Once the brain is oxygenated, our body relaxes and we are able to think clearly and intuit logical next steps. 

When we understand we’re no longer at the mercy of a rogue body and run away emotions, we may recall resonant family events to provide insight and greater understanding of our own actions and reactions. 

When we begin to address our personal ancestral pain we begin to heal the planet.

Thanks for stopping by and I appreciate your visit.

Questions and answers...

The Lines Are Down. Acrylic. 22.5 x 30.5

The internet connection in Alaska was cumbersome and I didn’t keep up with the blog so here’s a piece from sabbatical year. This painting was the result of a flippant question and I was stunned the answer so immediately and effectively presented. Art and life move along side by side. This past year has been a huge question for most of us and why questions get us absolutely nowhere. Why questions feed guilt, regret, sorrow and second-guessing ourselves. Why did they do that? Why did that happen? and on to undermine our confidence. Why questions waste energy and precious time we could be processing and moving forward. More effective questions begin with what. What’s the next step? What would happen if I…? As I posed in the question preceding this painting ~ what would it look like?

Artmaking, however inadequate we feel to the task, is willing to work for us and have our back as we resolve our questions. Here’s the story from the original post in Instagram

I’m pragmatic about art making. Begin at point A and proceed to the zed of signature with a death grip on realism. A few days ago, I positioned a primed watercolor sheet for a go at the series I’m working on. A bit flippant (and out of nowhere) I mused, “If a ‘good girl’ painted rage, what would it look like?” I came back to awareness stunned to realize this is an allegory for the 1964 Alaska earthquake and Tsunami. 9.2 Richter. I clearly remember the quake. The aftermath was a blank. A few years ago, I recalled huddling under blankets in the dark with no heat, on the sofa hugging a flashlight. The world had ended, the aftershocks kept coming and even now my chest constricts and hands shake as I write.

My father was the manager of the phone company with the only mobile phone in the area. Mother worked in the office. They left me alone for days to care for my younger sister while they went about restoring telephone communication with the outside world and doing whatever good they could along the way. When I asked her why they left us behind, she said, “When something like that happens, you do what you have to.” I went on to experience enough disasters across the country in the next 20 years the Red Cross wanted to hire me. The earthquake was my first presentiment of Mother Earth’s growing dissatisfaction with what the human race is doing to itself and the planet. If that’s not rage, I don’t know what is.

I'm back...

Work in Progress. Copper RIver Flats. Oil. 4 x 6’. Some of you have asked about the white lines and if there is more than one canvas. The white lines are chalk guides to edit while I work.

I’ve been on a self-imposed retreat for a year. Sorting things out. I was gloriously happy for eight months at my home in Alaska. Deep diving art and silence. Blissfully unaware, I flew out for business in time to sequester at the Portland studio and experience the global Dark Night of the Soul.

You’ve come to the place where I share ideas of possible interest to artists, healers, mystics, outliers and introverts. Muggles welcome. In fact, everyone is welcome. This blog is about concepts, art and technique, healing, spiritual possibilities and what makes life on this planet interesting.

I have an extraordinary capacity to ignore the artistic elephant in the studio. Walked by this painting with eyes averted while exploring other avenues of expression for months. Thought if I posted as a WIP I'd commit to make progress. Keep me honest. The volatility of the U.S. at this time affects even me. I want to be home again where the only thing that changes is the course of the river over time.

Copper River. Oil, 4 x 6'

Guppies and Goldfish

Fireweed. Acrylic 36x12”

During the cleaning frenzy of March, I excavated several unfinished paintings 15 to 40 years old in several mediums. They survived the moves and mayhem and all have several thousand miles on them. The images still resonate.
There’s a popular bravado in art cliques today to throw away, hose off, burn or paint over what we self-determine to be a bad or outdated art work. Lack of sleep, impatience or life issues often influence our assessment when we feel a painting doesn’t respond. Good or bad are words steeped in childhood injunctions and only serve as a reason to make up excuses not to paint. Ineffective is a more descriptive term.

Time is a faithful friend and if we patiently wait, we override the cultural disposability of all things. Often our consistent life symbols and archetypes manifest through older work. We validate ourselves when we recognize and honor the knowledge moving within us. We free the work to new interpretation. Old paintings are like having a guppy for a pet. We don’t flush the guppy when it doesn’t grow up to be the goldfish we thought we were getting.

Our Muse is devoted, however pouts like a neglected lover if we repudiate the proffered gifts. Intuition may get miffed and require coaxing back. We need to respect our artist and the work. We have an obligation to help the art become the best guppy it can be.

When the Universe moves us to birth an impression, quantum physics assures us it’s already complete. Even though we feel inadequate at the moment to see the concept through, the idea lives. Conception is exciting. Completion euphoric. Showing up to the work in the middle is where good or bad generates unless we stuff a sock in our critical voice and keep pressing on.

Before you take a hose to the work, assess the potential strengths of the piece. Enjoy the challenge of figuring out how to use skills you’ve developed in the interim to resuscitate it. Consider what could make the painting more effective. Are there new materials or techniques available to try? What about a shift toward stronger composition? Would values benefit from adjustment? Would nudging proportions or exaggerating color excite the surface?

There is a stunning piece in a local museum that took over 60 year to complete. The Mona Lisa? Over a decade. While goldfish are great, I advocate for the guppy.