When you let go of control in process painting, anything or anyone can and will show up to join you.
The first time my mom came into the painting I discovered the gift of form. I was feeling a lot of mixed emotions after spending time with my family one summer vacation. My parents are both very elderly. And the fact of life, which is death, loomed large in my awareness.
I began the painting with a large black spiral. Around and around it went in the center of the paper, and so did my emotion, caught in the spiral jetty I had made. When BK came around to see where I was at, having told her I was going to paint my mom, she asked me why I hadn't painted my mother. Not like I was avoiding something.......eh?
As soon as I let my brush paint my mom's face, all the black swirling stopped inside me and I just felt the love I feel for her. From here, the painting continued to take form, keeping me in contact with what I was feeling in relation to my mom, and life and death.
Sometimes I begin a painting from a thread found at the completion of a previous painting. But for now I am glad to have myself to begin with. Any form will touch me. I might as well start close to home.
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