shards

let mind run away from a shard,
turning it into an angel fish
and you'll have what mind wants:
something interesting.

stay with the shards
and let them fall
let them fall
let them fall,

and you'll have nothing,
which is everything.


i could feel where the shards came from, they issued out of intuition, through the painting.
Mind wanted to name them, make them knowable.
It feared the shard.
The angel fish clearly came from my imagination.
I'm watchful not to get caught in the meaning of the shards, either.
Letting them come and go.

yellow completion

those red pulsing threads

returning to the thread of a painting requires trust
and willingness to hang out in i don't know
or any judgement that jumps in to keep company with
"i don't know"

the red pulse magnified by brown lines
grew more and more bold
and still
we found a way in further,
there was still a doorway to open

how?
was it as simple (yes) as to invite another color?
i could feel the answer was yellow

the yellow began to bubble
and then

the brush found its way
rounding out the circles of yellow
bubbling here and there and there

it was like breathing
like the painting was breathing now,
whereas before it was just pulsing, beautifully.

astonished
i painted yellow circles
until i knew the satisfaction
and quiet thrill of completion.

one gesture

a new kind of beginning
one mark at a time
one stroke
one gesture.

the twins

I'm a bit stunned by where this piece took me.
at the beginning of our class, one of the women shared that the definition of God is surprise.
indeed.


freed of the image
the brush knows
and dances,
surprise!

Processing Life in Paint - who's processing who?

After I titled this blog Processing Life in Paint, I began to ponder  -  of course.

I am not saying that I am processing life, surely it is processing me.
In fact, in a very real way, it is processing me right out of the room,
leaving me as a quiet pulse of human being,
with or without a paint brush in her hand!

I've made a few attempts to see if I could change the title.
Glad to let it go, to let it be, not to get it right.

It doesn't matter what I call this blog.
I'm glad to have it to express and share what happens to me as I enter this conversation with myself, with the unknowable, with my true self.

What is true in me doesn't look like the painting.
The painting is given its freedom to be itself in the process,
and this is also the gift of the process to me.
There is a simplicity in this.
True self is beyond ideas of great or grand.
It is just real.

There is no mistake in whatever we are called to do, in love.
It will undo us,
drawing us closer and closer and closer to the truth  of ourselves,
in and as each unfolding moment.

a simple red mark

I was convinced that I had followed the “right” path. I was reentering the painting, warming up by making small red marks in the red layers of the womb wall, then smaller strokes of blue in the waters around one of the children’s heads.

 I “got the idea” to bring more attention to those small marks, to not just let them brush on as they came off the brush, but to make the mark a MARK, really, in hindsight, like “a better mark, a more care-filled mark.” I felt connected while I was doing this but I was indeed doing it.

Then what? The question arose what to do next, where to take these marks….(now I know that is a caution flag of its own- where else would this question be answered but from my idea filled mind).
I looked up and saw the daisies growing against the blue sky, and thought of small white marks in the blue sky. But when I got there, I made clouds! I began carefully painting, la dee dah, sure that I was not fixing the loosely applied paint from days ago that made the daisies and sky blue……


Just about that time, Barbara came around for her second visit of the day…..

I am chuckling now, I really couldn’t hear her!  She said, right away…..as I told her about what I was doing, how I was “developing what was there” - gosh, even that is a caution signal for me, thinking I know and have something to tell - (now, I might venture to say that the truth is either I don’t know or I am painting)….. but I digress……

So she said, “I’d be suspicious.”

What I love about Barbara is that she doesn’t say, she is suspicious, she guides me to become suspicious. She is not being the devil’s advocate, she is an advocate for the truth. It’s her job.

the sails of my boat

My teacher speaks of process painting as a conversation.
Experience has lead me to understand that to have a conversation one has to feel one’s ground and be the openness of listening.
To be willing to trust in what is unknown and beyond my control, sets the stage for a good conversation.

Intuitively, I have spent my life developing, discovering, uncovering trust in the ground of my own being.
Painting and meditation came together to meet me as I began my path of higher education.
They are the sails of my boat.
Life tests me to develop skillful means to see clearly and to feel fully.
Drenched in intuition and obeying my depth, I am following the direction of true north.

Who am I?

Oil and cold wax on panel

8x8 inches

little green joy

The word process alerts me again and again
To the flow of life
To my place in relation to life
And to the joy that comes in letting go to its course,
to its wisdom course.

No room here for blame
Let it go.
Process is kind and loving and fierce.
Like reality.

During one of my first process paintings
I was letting the color flow.
Letting images take form,
I had no plan.
It felt like pure response.
I was feeling something new: joy.
I could feel the snake wanting to appear,
and there was a familiar mistrust.
I hesitated,
fearful that a snake would bring something into being
that I did not ask for and was not wanting to feel or face.
The evil dark….the threat of evil, the past.

But curiosity had its way with me and I chose a color for the snake
My brush touched the paper,
Gliding,
a snake took form.

A past memory was touched,
of the green garter snake
in my father’s hand.

The neighborhood boys had been chasing me with a snake
and I was scared.
I ran to my father who was kneeling in the garden,
And as luck would have it
there, too, was a snake,
a thin, green, garter snake.
He showed it to me, wanting to allay my fears of the snake.
Maybe it helped.
Being with him helped.
By the age of seven I was already well challenged by the dance of boys in the natural world.
Whether I was ready to fully trust it or not,
I received what my father could give to me.
The teaching settled into my body through the love I felt for and from my father.

So, bringing my attention back to the painting,
this green snake appeared with such a surprising quality
Joyfully slender.
Playful.
Emerald green.
And more snakes took form.
They wrapped themselves up along the stems of the wild flowers that bloomed in this new garden before my eyes.
I was filled from the inside with a new found joy for life,

space had been made for this joy to be felt.

the power and gift of process

Process
That is my key word
That is the word that alerts me to life
Not what I want life to be
But what it is.
Kind of like, a lot like, Reality.

The heart of the matter is change
held in something that never changes.
Process is development, life and death
and the surprise of the phoenix.

Process painting is undoing in the guise of doing.
Life is slippery for the mind to grasp,
That is its power and gift.

self portrait in process

I'm in process.
and loving it.
and hating it!

like this:
I began to paint myself about three weeks ago.
I needed to add another sheet of paper to give myself room to be a full standing figure.
Imagine that, life needs more space to show up!
22x40 just isn't enough, right now.


So, I began another.
and try as I might, to fit the painting onto a full sheet,
I needed more space, again.

I hate to have to keep adding paper to my paintings to give them the room they need!
I don't like folding them up to lay on the growing pile of finished paintings.
I'd rather have this all neat and tidy.

so, that's process painting.
and that's life.
I'm not in control.
I may not always like it, that's no longer the point.

In fact, I am beginning to develop an awareness that holds the whole, as the painting holds the whole; the doubt, the discomfort, the pleasure, the interest, the fascination, the judgement all have room to come, be felt and pass..


And did I mention I am learning kindness through this process?


process painting (which is not about producing a product) has put me in touch with all the ways I have created unhappiness for myself as a painter who paints paintings that need to be seen, appreciated and valued by others.
I did not begin painting 40 years ago with product in mind, but it was there, lingering in the art school hallways.

process painting is helping me see what is still lingering in the hallways of my conditioned self.
process painting is helping me realize what is whole and mine to express and give freedom to.