(Upper left, moving clockwise) Kannon & Our Mother Mary; Papa Joseph, Mama Mary & Baby Jesus; Mother God & Daughter Christ; Birth of Tara

cytoplast

A way to go yet, of course, but it feels good to be  painting.

Shibori Dyed Silk prior to Pressing

Shibori Dyed Silk prior to Pressing

Shibori Dyed Silk prior to Pressing

Shibori Dyed Silk prior to Pressing

Shibori Dyed Silk prior to Pressing

Angel of Charity (Work in Progress) Oil

Angel of Charity (Work in Progress) Oil

So, my camera sucks, no more so, however, than my photographic skills – the result is two pictures of one work in progress entitled “Angel of Charity,” to be paired with a mirror-image-like painting entitled “Angel of Systemic Change.” Ha, I crack myself up (if no one else)

I have begun painting the mirror-image painting as well, but am only on my first layer of paint, so it’s not much to look at just yet. Charity, here, is the result of two layers of paint, and will receive at least a third layer before she is completed.

In one picture (the one with flash) you can see the textures of her dress and the colors are more true to life, however, b/c of all the hot spots the hair and wing are pretty much lost in a glow. In the other picture (one taken without flash) you can see some of the layers of color in her hair and wing, but the highlights in her dress are lost in shadow. The fun part about this picture on the right btw is that it does replicate something about how these colors seem to hum or glow in the light of my studio at night.

After taking these pictures last night, I took a moment to consider why these late night/ post painting photos are generally of such poor to mediocre quality. Maybe there would be a different outcome to these photos if I retook the pics in daylight . Or maybe if I had waited until the piece is finally dry the hot spots would not be as prominent (however, I find that some acrylic and oil paintings, even after dry can still be shiny and have hot spots in photos). Maybe the only quality outcome will come when I finally admit to myself that of all the visual arts, consistently good photography seems to be my least aquirable skill, and hire a professional to take the photographs for me!

As usual I can’t help thinking of this painting or these photographs as a metaphor of who I am, where I am. The cue I take from these photographs is that like this unfinished work, like these crappy pictures, I am also a work in progress. I mean, good God, who/what isn’t, right? But I am trying to be intentional this year, more so than usual,  in not only recognizing the areas where I have let things slide “professionally”, but making a realistic plan for continued development. Here, I mean development beyond developing talent or conceptual ability. Rather, I intend to focus on the development of the things that too often you are not taught in school – those mundane things about how to market your work, and open up opportunities for the work and where it can take you. That means a lot of research, meetings, consultations, financial planning, networking – and making sure photographs of my work are beautiful. Frankly, I’d rather paint and talk to this computer, like I am doing now. Or go out to dinner, a movie, a play, … bowling, camping – really just about anything else! But the time has come to stop hiding behind my obstinate streak of introversion, tendency toward marketing/investment-cheap-skate-edness, and my aversion to the mundane over seeking out fun.

All of this career planning – something that of course makes good sense to do – brings me back to this subject of the mundane. You know, when I am creating something it feels exciting, new, anything but mundane, but when I am trying to do the things that need to be done in order to sell or market that creation, there is very little joy for me in that process, it is mundane and tedious.

Unfortunately the mundane things in life make everything else work. I am well aware that behind every ebullient adventure is a bunch of mundane crap.  I would make a lousy ascetic. Even still, perhaps I need to find a way to have the joy of the ascetic. That joy of little things, small steps, and the routine.

I suppose this is really a matter of discipline. As one who does not like to be or feel controlled, discipline is a hard concept to embrace, and yet in creating there is also a discipline, and I excel in embracing it. Is this a change of perception? – to see the daily routine as also a creation, as surely every day is a creation in itself and part of the whole creation of a lifetime. So then, paying bills, and washing dishes, and balancing the checkbook, are in fact acts of creation simply because they are a part of living. Oh, I don’t know, such a boring (mundane) post!

I think a person’s identity is never quite as static as it seems. Certainly, we are shaped by the labels that are given to us and more often placed upon us.  But we are also shaped by our experiences, old and new and present stimuli. We are shaped by love and hatred, beauty and pain, care and betrayal. Ironically, sometimes these things come to shape us at the same moment. Recently I read an essay by James Baldwin, in which he was speaking about the African American experience, entitled The Fire Next Time. In his essay Baldwin speaks to race relations between whites and blacks in 1963, before the assassinations of Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy, before the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. Many of his comments are still applicable today, particularly regarding the fear that resides behind bigotry. In referencing the revolutionary times – protests, communism, desegregation – and the fear people have in regard to seemingly sudden change, he says:

“We are capable of bearing a great burden, once we discover that the burden is reality and arrive where reality is.  … Behind what we think of as the Russian menace lies what we do not wish to face, and what white Americans do not face when they regard a Negro: reality – the fact that life is tragic. Life is tragic simply because the earth turns and the sun inexorably rises and sets, and one day, for each of us, the sun will go down for the last, last time. Perhaps the whole root of our trouble, the human trouble, is that we will sacrifice all the beauty of our lives, will imprison ourselves in totems, taboos, crosses, blood sacrifices, steeples, mosques, races, armies, flags, nations, in order to deny the fact of death, which is the only fact we have. It seems to me that one ought to rejoice in the fact of death – ought to decide, indeed, to earn one’s death by confronting with passion the conundrum of life.”

I think ultimately one’s identity and imprint in the world comes from these things Baldwin speaks of: how we embrace (or don’t) the beauty of our lives, how we earn (or don’t) our inevitable deaths, how we “confront with passion the conundrum of life. ”  These are the questions to ponder and answer when you run into discovering yourself again, and again, and again – as we all do, if we’re only paying attention.

An apropro poem:

When Death Comes

Mary Oliver

From New and Selected Poems by Mary Oliver (Beacon Press, 25 Beacon St, Boston, MA 02108-2892, ISBN 0 870 6819 5).

Lent/Wind - the pencil sketch of the piece I'm getting ready to paint

Today was all about preparing to paint. I am working on a silk painting that switches out with one of the paintings  that is part of the installation at HAUMC. I was transferring the image and preparing the canvas to accept the silk dyes. Although it doesn’t take any great artistic genius to do this, the preparation part always seems to take me twice as long as it should, probably because it is my least favorite part – and the least fun part – of creating a work. I don’t know, today was a boring day as far as creative stimuli goes. I just had to be disciplined, and do the work to move on to the next step. Discipline is not the easiest thing for me! Below is a picture (again) from Aztec dancers who performed at the Poor People’s March back in August. I thought this woman was breathtaking. I am thinking of starting a series of angel/deity icons that draw inspiration from indigenous dress from tribes around the world, you know, just something beautiful, not so heavy-handed as some of my recent stuff. Sometimes the completion of a piece drains rather than energizes me – some of the pieces I created during the Fall were like this … although the painting from yesterday was very enlivening. When I start feeling that drain that’s when I know I’m needing to create something beautiful, just for the sake of creating something beautiful.

dancer

"Face of God" - oil, 16 in X 20 in

It’s been snowing all afternoon and evening, but the day is soft, no wind. I stretched a new silk canvas and painted the painting above, while hanging out with Matt and listening to Bon Iver’s beautiful moody album. In short, a perfect Saturday.

original sketch/idea in oil pastels

Silk painting Installation at HAUMC

The riot gear makes people forget they're human too

God Among Us: Icons of an Incarnational God (the installation is up!)

protection for the non-violent march?

Gallery Show at UTS

This boat was detained by coast guard just for the sign

Wounds of Hate (from the gallery show)

Dancers at the Poor Peoples March

part b of Wounds of Indifference (from gallery show)

Hello! It’s been awhile!

Okay, one of my top New Year’s Resolutions  is to recommit to my intended practice of (almost) daily journaling on this blog – about my creative process and the things that inspire my creative process.

I know, self-indulgent and somewhat meaningless, right?  I mean what does anyone else care about my creative process?! However, over and over again, in my personal struggle to become more mindful, more compassionate, and more life-giving in my artwork and life I keep coming back to the importance of the process rather than the finished product – the means rather than the end – and the importance of being aware of what is happening in that process. This process, this time of creating is where I most grow into and discover myself, my connection to other, to nature, and  that mysterious presence that I identify as God.   

Some days for me, the just being aware is the biggest challenge. Somedays the biggest challenge is being compassionate once I do become aware. Most recently, the biggest challenge for me is once I have become aware, once I have compassion, is how to not feel helpless with no ability to be “life-giving”. For me life-giving means participating in creating a better community, a better world; and creating a better world begins with “the least of these” people and ideals.  Certainly, as an artist, as one who explores ideas of beauty and culture, there is something uplifting there. However, I believe art is something more than just something pretty to look at – more than just art for art’s sake – more than the anthropological imprint of cultures old and new. I think art is for the sake of all who experience it, and can be life-giving.  If your vocation is that of a doctor and you want to create a better community perhaps you join doctors w/out borders or work in a community clinic for low income families, if your vocation is that of a teacher and you want to create a better community, perhaps you work in an inner city school, if one is an attorney perhaps you do pro-bono work for the underprivileged. But, how do I affect change as an artist? This is a question every artist asks and searches for the right answer to fit them. For the next year especially I will be exploring this question in a focused way, as well as a few other questions: What does activism/protest mean today (cause it’s different than it was in the 60′s folks!)? Can art truly be a work of activism? Is a negative means to a positive end ever justified in activism? How can my work be a continual process of life-giving activism? How can I make my activism work a work of beauty?

The pictures above represent work I completed over this last year, especially this last 6 mos. Also above, are a few of the hundreds of pictures we took from the RNC in August, which was a complex, scary, and exhilarating time in my own backyard (Matt and I live downtown near the convention site). During that time I saw many activists and a lot of civil disobedience. Some of it was inspiring and life-giving – some of it was not. During that time our streets were filled with police in riot gear (who were on both sides of the political divide). Some of them were patient and interacted with protesters in a  life-giving way, some of them did not. During that time our city looked like a demilitarized zone and pepper spray and tear gas hung heavy in the air and we had to close our windows, although there was very little coverage of any of this on national TV outlets. And I wondered, how can protest against war and poverty and  fundamentalism become – again and as never before – so meaningful  to onlookers, such an act of beauty, so life-giving – that the cause cannot be denied? That the media cannot NOT cover it? That even if someone wants to look away and deny those principles, they can’t, rather they become drawn into the process and move also toward a just peace?

Advent / Womb water - painting

21 feet long

The first spirit head is finished!

detail

last one, promise! This shows the neck musculature.

Today, my soul is tired. 

My body is tired too. For the last week or so I have engaged in strange body postures for hours on end to create this painting (above you will see pics of the first one which is now completed – only 6 more to go – whoo-hoo!). In addition to painting, stretching the silk (as I did today in preparation for the next painting) is taxing on the body- at least for pieces this large – and as I am working on a deadline  I am holding stress is my neck, hands, hips, back, and so on. So yes, my body is tired. Boo hoo, I know.  

But this is not why my soul is tired, in fact, this work is engaging and refreshing to my soul – even if, I must admit, I explode with an occasional outburst of obscenities after accidentally knocking over a cup of paint or pinching my finger in the handle of the staple gun! These works become me in the creating of them, full of paradoxes, of the moments of grace and connection to God as well as the moments of obscene words, frustration and broken connection. 

But back to my first thought – soul-tired. My soul is tired because I feel that even though so many people are working to overcome bigotry and hatred in the world – to bring God’s beloved community to earth – some days it seems we will never get over that hill. Don’t get me wrong, I have hope, I have hope, and of late so many good hearts and busy hands and feet have inspired me. It’s just some days I feel like Sisyphus pushing my boulder of hope & reconciliation uphill day after day, week after week, seeing it almost cross over the threshold, just to see it roll back down to where I first started struggling with gravity in the first place. I know I am not alone. Oh, but how long? How long? Is that how God feels? Trying and trying to work through us, lead us to reconciliation and love, and justice – and what do we do? Usually someone ends up disposing of the messenger. Why is it that any time someone stands up to proclaim hope and change and reconciliation, there’s someone standing around to threaten, bully, lie, and kill? Someone always ready to say “It can’t be done!” “War/bigotry/racism/cruelty is woven into human nature.” “Don’t moralize to me and say we should change – you’re just as bad as me!”  We are so cynical about those who try to change the world for the better, in fact we expect and accept that someone or group will counteract the very people who try to extend the human imagination to see a better day. It’s the norm – but that doesn’t make it the ideal or even what the norm should be – so why don’t we demand more?

I apologize, I am in a weird place tonight but I must say it: 

I am tired of cynics and pessimists – and I have something to say to you.  If you are cynical and pessimistic  - than get going and try to change what it is you’re cynical/pessimistic about but don’t tell me, nothing can change.

I am tired of negativists, nay-sayers  and fear-mongers. I will not listen to you anymore. I reject your world-view. EVERYTHING good is possible and is truly the root of human nature – creation is good.

I am tired of bigoted ignorance and the claim that those who cling to their bigotry and fear are pro-American, pro-religion, pro-Jesus.  I have something to say to you too – I understand your fear, but it is misplaced and I will not join you in being afraid, and I encourage you to reach out to what you are afraid of with compassion. You might be surprised.

I am tired of mavericks who are not mavericks, of feminists who are not feminists and of Christians who are not following the way of Christ. I admit it, I am a lousy Christian, I know this, and it is precisely why I don’t want to shut ANYONE out.

I am tired of the demonization of things people don’t understand and of the demonization of the left by the right and the right by the left. I am tired from the struggle to not fall into this trap – because that is what it is – a trap.

I am soul-tired, tired because so much music gets drowned out by noise. But I hope, I hope – there is power in the hoping -

and I hope you hope too.

Shalom,

A.M. Hunter

This evening after my Older Testament class I started to put together a frame for a series of silk paintings I will be doing for HAUMC – which will also be the main art project I will be working on and posting in relation to over the next few months. I don’t know, perhaps it was all of the talking of women’s disadvantaged & complex social locations in the ancestral narratives of Sarah/Abraham/Hagar; but I wanted to come home and build something, by myself, out of wood and nails and nuts and bolts and little metal L shaped things that help fasten the wood pieces together. Perhaps it was just because all the supplies finally arrived and I’m itching to get started. Perhaps it was just to feel like I had made progress on this huge project.

In any case, after laying out the pieces of this seven foot frame which I will be rigging to 9 foot and 5 foot frames – this is quite a contraption I am building in our cozy loft! – I realized I had forgotten I used some of the pieces-parts (the L shaped things, nuts and bolts, etc.) in another project and would have to go to the hardware store tomorrow to get more if I wanted to put this thing together and have it stay together.

Ugh, the frustration of delaying the start of a project another day. The frustration of forgetting those nuts and bolts! I am always forgetting the nuts and bolts of a project, a task, a difficult relationship or … my spiritual practice. Those little nuts and bolts – that are so tiny, the smallest part of the project – and yet hold everything together. When I get busy and am away from these things for awhile (like that frame) I forget and have to recall the sticking points, the way things fit together, the facets that need extra support. This is true of relationship too. Lately, I have reencountered some relationships that I have been away from for awhile. Here there are lots of sticking points, water-logged edges that don’t connect to each other the way I wish they would. These places aren’t smooth or easy, and I wasn’t prepared for them. Why, you might ask? And here we come to the nuts and bolts of my spiritual practice, always a tough thing for me to observe in busy times when I need it most. I am not talking about my artwork which is a big part of that practice, that has been prolific, rather it is the things that hold me up in order to create art that i am forgetting – those things that give me a balance. Prayer, meditation, exercise, listening to music and dancing, cooking, journaling, resting, loving and building love. Hmmm, tomorrow I must go shopping for the nuts and bolts!