Elijah (30″x40″ mixed media on linen) was one of many paintings exhibited at The Highland Galerie in Columbus, Georgia this spring. Immersing in creating this painting was a very mystical experience for me (please see the Judaica page here on this website to read about it).
This recent painting explores the notion that while alive on earth, everything and everyone is infused with light and an essence of love. Earthbound, yet of pure love (heaven). Actually, this not just a concept or a notion, but rather something we can sense and generate, expand upon. To choose to see love more than to see angst, for example, and to celebrate the glow of light in everyone and in ourselves is to be as if in a garden of bliss that we tend to ourselves. Recently this painting was at The Highland Galerie in Columbus, Georgia and one viewer said the area of red clay (mid right side) reminded her of the moment just before God created Adam out of clay (humans being of the earth with all its conditions but created in a divine image of the Creator).
Between Heaven and Earth 36″x40″ mixed media on linen
Last night I taught stream drawing to a large group of young adults at Covenant House. I was so moved by not just their creative expressiveness, but the depth and insightful reflections they had based on their stream drawings. I was able to hear them explain profound and meaningful associations and emotions they had based on their imagery. I can’t say enough how wonderful this experience was, and how important it is for us to draw freely with open hearts and minds, and embrace one another while supporting the creative genius within ourselves and others.
When I lived in rural Connecticut, I dreamed one night of Sojourner Truth and a magical garden that, in the dream, she was cultivating with people of all races coming together to grow miraculously abundant food. I painted in honor of that dream, and the painting recently sold to Chaz Ebert, who is in the process of creating a major project to honor Sojourner’s life and legacy. I painted a second portrait of Sojourner (she gave the other as a gift) especially for Chaz and her Sojourner project. And now, as if Sojourner herself (and Chaz’s husband Roger Ebert, from his place in heaven?) the project is “gaining a life of its own” as Chaz so well put it. Now Chaz has commissioned me to paint 3 more, two for direct descendants of Sojourner Truth (!) and a third for another iconic trailblazer, Gloria Steinem. The spiritual momentum has me giddy with joy.
(My portrait of Sojourner for Chaz Ebert/ 2019).
Detail of a work in progress
Transitional times often are full of resistance due to negative emotions such as guilt. Guilt can be the first step in acknowledging responsibility for mistakes once made, yet guilt is also the ego’s successful way of entrapping us (ego does not like to let go of pain because it is one of the ways that it knows itself–the ego wants identifiers and pain and guilt do feed the ego-self which needs blame in order to hold others and self hostage–it is a control thing).
Often people will “guilt you” for not doing as they’d like you to do, or by reminding others where they/we fell short. And we often do that to those around us. Since none of us are perfect, the most kind people of all may be rendered excessively hurt by someone laying guilt upon them, and the one receiving the accusations may then disallow harmony as a way of self punishing. Forgiveness purifies all of this: we forgive ourselves, we forgive the accusers and we forgive our ego for trying to hold on to negative emotion. What if everyone said,”I’m sorry, I love you. You and I made and make mistakes, but we are only human”–wouldn’t that be great? Sometimes there is no way to resolve an issue except from within, which is to embrace forgiveness on our own terms, whether the people around us are able to do so or not. And they may have not even asked us for forgiveness. Do it anyway to set yourself free. And set yourself free again by not allowing others to guilt you into paralysis or self misery.
Don’t hold on to guilt, but grab forgiveness and see if you feel so wonderful you alight your path in the blink of an eye with tremendous love and joy.
Detail of a recent painting in progress/2018
“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” Viktor Frankl
Viktor Frankl survived the brutality of the Holocaust by remaining present within his own mind and heart, by not giving away his attitude. “One’s attitude in any given set of circumstances,” can be that one element that allows a human being, even in the most dire of situations, to survive on his/her own terms.
Most of us don’t know what a bad day really, really is, but Frankl and millions more endured the unthinkable. Frankl’s living example demonstrates the power of choice; we do not have to think of ourselves as surrendering, but more so empowering ourselves to inwardly, fiercely keep our strength, to “choose our own way.”
This is a recent Spirit Painting I was commissioned to create. These are very different from my other work (abstract and other figurative work) because I meditate while creating it for the person who commissioned it (or for their loved one). I paint what comes. It is a very surprising process for me as the painter but for the recipient, too. These are done for a mitzvah (read that as a “good deed”) and I charge next to nothing for them, but I feel strongly that I should make them available for anyone who might want one, which means the commission fee is very low. Check out others here on my site, under the Spirit Painting heading at the banner. And of course contact me via this site if you’d like one!
