Here, Monotype of the Day #459

Day 93 of Year 2 (Actually Day 94)


Today, I needed to feel this orange, with its life affirming heat. From there, the image unfolded. It always starts like that, a flush of color or a fragment of image pops into my head like a key to unlocking a mystery. Then, the innate wisdom of the body takes over. My hands, even in their weakened state, know more about making art than my brain ever could. In this process, the brain has a more important task than thinking. It must empty and listen. The ink's voice, the images that pop in, the nudges, must be heard. All are messages from the universal source of all creativity, The Artist, shining through from behind the veil, a gift to the artist.

By Angelus Silesius, Trans. Stephen Mitchell
God, whose love and joy
are present everywhere,
Can't come to visit you
unless you aren't there.

From The Enlightened Heart https://amzn.to/2OKKWHD

the rod and blob, Monotype of the Day #376

376.jpg

Day 11 of Year 2

A rod and bob is the swinging pendulum on a fancy clock. This is a new symbol that has been popping up in my work lately. It will take time to unfold its meaning but I have been thinking a lot about time. In the studio there is almost an absence of time. No matter how long I'm in there working, it only feels like a few minutes. I'm regularly surprised at how late it is when I emerge. This is because the artist touches a timeless place while working, the deep well of universal creativity. This week I've been meditating a lot, trying to touch that timelessness and bring it out of the studio and more fully into my life. Making art is a kind of meditation and In the studio there is a spaciousness that allows the pressure of time to disappear. It would be an amazing thing to experience this is daily life. I'm not there yet as this print reflects, but meditation is helping.


Eternity is time
by Angelus Silesius, Trans. Paul Carus

Eternity is time
And time eternity,
Except when we ourselves.
Would make them different be.

Gathering of Birds, Monotype of the Day #318

I reworked yesterday's image and feel much happier. It was a good night to work. The studio was humming. Sometimes I get overheated under all the lights and need to step into the garden to cool off. Tonight I was overwhelmed by the smell of honeysuckle. I planted it 3 years ago and this is the first season it's had enough bloom for the scent to completely envelop me. It created a moment where everything dropped away and it was just me and the scent and then just the scent- my sense of self briefly, blissfully vanished. It's the same feeling I get when I'm making art. It's funny that to make something so personal, you, the ego, has to disappear otherwise there is no space for the creative flow. It reminds me of a poem by Angelus Silesius from 17th century Germany

by Angelus Silesius, trans. Stephen Mitchell

God, whose love and joy
are present everywhere,
can’t come to visit you
unless you aren’t there.

xoxo

Some via negativa poetry

I haven't posted in a couple days, I have a number of irons in the fire and been doing a lot of art which I will share soon. But I'm thinking of you and thought you might enjoy these via negativa poems:

God is pure no-thing,
concealed in now and here:
The less you reach for him,
the more he will appear
-Angelus Silesius

If in your heart you make
a manger for his birth,
then God will once again
become a child on earth.
-Angelus Silesius

Beloved, show me the way out of this prison.
Make me needless of both worlds.
Pray erase from this mind all
that is not you.
-Abu Saeed Abil Kheir

Thank the flame for its light,
but do not forget the lampholder
standing in the shade with constancy of patience.
-Tagore (Little Birds 64)

Where is the fountain
that throws up these flowers
in a ceaseless outbreak of ecstasy?
-Tagore (Little Birds 70)

Via Negativa in Poetry

Here are some poems I love on the via negativa, finding God in absence. For more posts on this look here:Rumi:

I have lived on the lip
Of insanity, wanting to know reasons,
Knocking on a door. It opens,
I’ve been knocking from the inside!
-Rumi (trans. Coleman Barks & John Moyne)

Silesius:

God, whose love and joy
Are present everywhere,
Can’t come to visit you
Unless you aren’t there.
-Angelus Silesius (trans. Stephan Mitchell)

Lao Tzu:

The Tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named
is not the eternal name.
The unnamable is the eternal real.
Naming is the origin
Of all particular things
.Free from desire, you realize the mystery.
Caught in desire, you see only the manifestations.
Yet mystery and manifestations
Arise from the same source.
This source is called darkness.
Darkness within darkness.
The gateway to all understanding.
-Lao-Tzu (trans. Stephan Mitchell)

A couple quotes from The Unveiling of Love by Sufi Sheikh Muzaffer Ozak Al-Jerrahi:

(On affection toward God) …it is possible by letting oneself fall like a drop into the ocean.
As for those who are annihilated in God, it is absolute certainty that they will exist forever.

The last quotes are borderline negative/affirmative way, but they are so beautiful...