gestation, Monotype of the Day #873

Day 141 of year 3

Sonnets to Orpheus, I, IV
By Rilke, Trans Macey & Barrows

You who let yourselves feel: enter the breathing
that is more than your own.
Let it brush your cheeks
as it divides and rejoins beside you.
Blessed ones, whole ones,
you where the heart begins:
You are the bow that shoots the arrows
and you are the target.
Fear not the pain. Let its weight fall back
into the earth;
for heavy are the mountains, heavy the seas.
The trees you planted in childhood have grown
too heavy. You cannot bring them along.
Give yourselves to the air, to what you cannot hold.

From In Praise of Mortality https://amzn.to/33AbL7S

For the first 24 hours after posting, this piece is 10% off and can be purchased here.

For more information about the process of monotype and the Monotype of the Day project click here.  

sunrise dream, Monotype of the Day #862

Day 130 of year 3

Tonight's poem may or may not fit this print but I've noticed sometimes the space between two different things can become something important on its own. Artists call this expanse "negative space." The air between two bodies, the emptiness between the two hands can define so much. I look for these empty spaces visually and within myself. I believe they are where the real truth lies.

Heartbeat
By Rilke, Trans. Albert Ernest Flemming

Only mouths are we. Who sings the distant heart
which safely exists in the center of all things?
His giant heartbeat is diverted in us
into little pulses. And his giant grief
is, like his giant jubilation, far too
great for us. And so we tear ourselves away
from him time after time, remaining only
mouths. But unexpectedly and secretly
the giant heartbeat enters our being,
so that we scream ——,
and are transformed in being and in countenance.

From Rainer Maria Rilke Selected Poems https://amzn.to/3lSjOUT

For more information about the process of monotype and the Monotype of the Day project click here.  For the first 24 hours after posting, this piece is 10% off and can be purchased here.

fishing, Monotype of the Day #825

Day 93 of year 3

Sonnets to Orpheus, Book II, XX
By Rilke, Trans. Barrows and Macy

How far it is between the stars, how much farther
is what's right here. The distance, for example,
between a child and one who walks by—
oh, how inconceivably far.

Not only in measurable spans does Fate
move through our lives.
Think how great the distance between a young girl
and the boy she avoids and loves.

Everything is far, nowhere does the circle close.
See, on the plate upon the festive table
how strangely the fish is staring.

Fish are mute, we used to think. Who knows?
We may, in the end, find that their silence
says more to us than our words..

From In Praise of Mortality https://amzn.to/37euSXE

For more information about the process of monotype and the Monotype of the Day project click here.
You can purchase this monotype here.

the fountain, Monotype of the Day #794

Day 62 of year 3

This is the ghost print from last night's plate with another layer on top. I've used tonight's poem by Rilke before but from a different translator who gives it a slightly different flavor. I so wish I could read it in the original German!

Sonnets to Orpheus II, XII By Rilke, Trans. Barrows and Macey

Want the change. Be inspired by the flame
where everything shines as it disappears.
The artist, when sketching, loves nothing so much
as the curve of the body as it turns away.

What locks itself in sameness has congealed.
Is it safer to be gray and numb?
What turns hard becomes rigid
and is easily shattered.

Pour yourself out like a fountain.
Flow into the knowledge that what you are seeking
finishes often at the start, and, with ending, begins.

Every happiness is the child of a separation
it did not think it could survive. And Daphne, becoming a laurel,
dares you to become the wind.

From In Praise of Mortality https://amzn.to/33tnNiq

For more information on purchasing this monotype click here or see “Buy Art” in the menu above.

raising the bar, Monotype of the Day #792

Day 60 of year 3

I'm returning to my roots. I haven't worked in black ink for at least a year. It's soothing, a mental reset. The colors of my current ink choices have me feeling a bit fed up. Because I'm only able to work with water soluble inks, my palette is considerably limited. Limits can be a good thing, they force you to stretch and think creatively but some times you just need to run free. So I'm giving color a rest for now. Overall, I'm in sort of a weird place with my work the last few weeks. It feels uncomfortable. I'm working on embracing this place of uncertainty rather than judging it. I know whatever is going on, it's necessary to my process. At the same time, my desire to spent more time on larger project is growing. Like many artists, my work has been upended by COVID. Projects that I had been working on for a traditional gallery setting prior to quarantine stopped feeling relevant. Finally though, new projects are beginning to sprout and I look forward to seeing what unfolds. I'm been reading a lot of Rilke lately, the poem below is speaking to me tonight.

I live my life in widening circles
By Rilke, Trans Barrows & Macy

I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not ever complete the last one,
but I give myself to it.

I circle around God, that primordial tower.
I have been circling for thousands of years,
and I still don't know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?

From Rilke's Book of Hours https://amzn.to/2ZxWMJH

For more information on purchasing this monotype click here or see “Buy Art” in the menu above.

you must grow & you can grow (ghost print) Monotype of the Day #789

Day 57 of year 3

"You must change you life" is the final line of tonight's poem, Archaic Torso of Apollo by Rilke. After I named the first print it immediately came to mind. It's about a damaged sculpture of the Greek god Apollo. Although it doesn't exactly fit this piece, I've always loved the poem because it reminds me that there can be great power in brokeness. The speaker in the poem experiences this power and feels the call to transform. A variation of the last line, "You can change your life", has been my motto for many years. My deep belief in this idea, confirmed by my life and supported by my studio practice, has gotten me through some very difficult times. The circumstances of the external world sometimes, probably often, can not be changed but the inner world is always ripe for transformation. True and lasting change in the external world most often comes from healing the inner landscape. When our inner relationship to a situation changes, even though nothing in the world has shifted, everything feels different. These prints are depictions of change and growth in my inner world. (Poem below the title)

Archaic Torso of Apollo By Rilke, Trans Stephen Mitchell

We cannot know his legendary head
with eyes like ripening fruit. And yet his torso
is still suffused with brilliance from inside,
like a lamp, in which his gaze, now turned to low,

gleams in all its power. Otherwise
the curved breast could not dazzle you so, nor could
a smile run through the placid hips and thighs
to that dark center where procreation flared.

Otherwise this stone would seem defaced
beneath the translucent cascade of the shoulders
and would not glisten like a wild beast's fur:

would not, from all the borders of itself,
burst like a star: for here there is no place
that does not see you. You must change your life.

From Selected Poems: https://amzn.to/2Zfc1an

a light in the forest, Monotype of the Day #692

Day 322 of Year 2 (Actually Day 327)

I found it difficult to cooperate with my materials tonight, that happens sometimes and it's ok. I let it go, tomorrow is another day. We are in a period of great change so I've posted one of my favorite poems on the subject. This is a time of listening among other things. Listening is active, not passive and deep listening has the power to transform.

Want the change
By Rilke, Trans. Barrows and Macy

Want the change. Be inspired by the flame
where everything shines as it disappears.
The artist, when sketching, loves nothing so much
as the curve of the body as it turns away.

What locks itself in sameness has congealed.
Is it safer to be gray and numb?
What turns hard becomes rigid
and is easily shattered.

Pour yourself out like a fountain.
Flow into the knowledge that what you are seeking
finishes often at the start, and, with ending, begins.

Every happiness is the child of a separation
it did not think it could survive. And Daphne, becoming
a laurel,
dares you to become the wind.

From In Praise of Mortality https://amzn.to/3ctFu4c

dream of strength, Monotype of the Day #625

Day 255 of Year 2 (Actually Day 260)

It must be spring that's driving my use of yellow. I feel it's glow waking me up and stirring things inside that have been quiet too long. To me trees have always symbolized strength. I admire their quiet growth and evolution. Nothing dramatic, just the gentle unfolding of a promise planted long ago. Tonight's poem is from Rilke's Sonnets to Orpheus, probably my favorite book of poetry ever.

Sonnets to Orpheus Book I, I
By Rilke, Trans. Stephen Mitchell

A tree ascended there. Oh pure transcendence!
Oh Orpheus sings! Oh tall tree in the ear!
And all things hushed. Yet even in that silence
a new beginning, beckoning, change appeared.

Creatures of stillness crowded from the bright
unbound forest, out of their lairs and nests;
and it was not from any dullness, not
from fear, that they were so quiet in themselves,

but from just listening. Bellow, roar, shriek
seemed small inside their hearts. And where there had been
at most a makeshift hut to receive the music,

a shelter nailed up out of their darkest longing,
with an entryway that shuddered in the wind-
you built a temple deep inside their hearing.

From Sonnets to Orpheus https://amzn.to/2Jl4VZk (My book is out of print, but this should be the same translation)

what lies behind?, Monotype of the Day #584

Day 214 of Year 2 (Actually Day 219)

No words have been coming the past few days though new project are beginning to hatch and grow. I am in that uncertain space where marks have been made but the road map remains unclear. I am off on a new adventure and I am grateful to be at the beginning again.

Sonnets to Orpheus Book 2. 12
Rilke, Trans. Stephen Mitchell

Will transformation. Oh be inspired for the flame
in which a Thing disappears and bursts into something else;
the spirit of re-creation which masters this earthly form
loves most the pivoting point where you are no longer yourself.

What tightens into survival is already inert;
how safe is it really in its inconspicuous gray?
From far off a far greater hardness warns what is hard,
and the absent hammer is lifted high!

He who pours himself out like a stream is acknowledged at last by Knowledge;
and she leads him enchanted through the harmonious country
that finishes often with starting, and with ending begins.

Every fortunate space that the two of them pass through, astonished,
is a child or grandchild of parting. And the transfigured Daphne,
as she feels herself become laurel, wants you to change into wind.

From Duino Elegies & Sonnets to Orpheus https://amzn.to/31ZbYQd

crack already, Monotype of the Day #440

Day 74 of Year 2 (Actually Day 75)

So many things are cooking in the studio I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed. Because I am still recovering from my trip to drop my son at college, I am resting more than I'd like. Recently a friend told me that even with all my health challenges, I get more done than many people. I'd like to believe it's true, but it's hard to feel it when projects that could be moving forward quickly inch along. Everyday, I press forward with my work. Some days it's easy and a joy, and some days it's by sheer will alone anything gets done. Still the minutes on difficult days add up to hours over all, things move forward, and I am grateful. I know that the flow of work carries me forward. Some parts of my stream are wide and slow and some narrow and fast. Patience and faith in process are what is needed.

Sonnets to Orpheus (Book 2, XXIX)
By Rilke, Trans. Barrows & Macy (Link to book below)

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.

Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent Earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.

From In Praise of Mortality: https://amzn.to/2lhW3eS

everything is coming up roses, Monotype of the Day #332

I'm not satisfied with my green. The options are limited. I've ordered a different blue and yellow so we shall see. On the bright side though, after releasing a lot of difficult experiences through my prints the past few days, something new has bloomed. The emptier an artist can become, the more they can be filled.

I believe in all that has never yet been spoken
by Rainer Maria Rilke, trans. Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy

I believe in all that has never yet been spoken.
I want to free what waits within me
so that what no one has dared to wish for

may for once spring clear
without my contriving.

If this is arrogant, God, forgive me,
but this is what I need to say.
May what I do flow from me like a river,
no forcing and no holding back,
the way it is with children.

Then in these swelling and ebbing currents,
these deepening tides moving out, returning,
I will sing you as no one ever has,

streaming through widening channels
into the open sea.

the artist and the egg, Monotype of the Day #316

This image is a riff of two illuminations in Hildegard of Bingen’s work, one from Liber Divinorum Operum (Book of Divine Works) and one from the Scivias. These are images that have haunted me ever since I saw them when I was 18. I’ll see if I can post them tomorrow. Tonight, I need my sleep!

What birds plunge through is not the intimate space
by Rainer Maria Rilke, trans. Stephen Mitchell

What birds plunge through is not the intimate space
in which you see all forms intensified.
(Out in the Open, you would be denied
your self, would disappear into that vastness.) Space reaches
from us and construes the world:
to know a tree, in its true element,
throw inner space around it, from that pure
abundance in you. Surround it with restraint.
It has no limits. Not till it is held
in your renouncing is it truly there.

xoxo

emergent, Monotype of the Day #315

So I made a lot of truly horrendous prints tonight before I got to this one. The learning curve is steep with my new graphite ink. You might think this is funny, but making terrible prints is wonderful. It keeps you on your toes, challenges you, puts a spring in your step. Unfortunately, you really can't see the full beauty of this ink in a picture. When it's fully dry it sparkles and shimmers with a life of it's own. Which brings me back to something I've touched on before, will I let social media change the way I work so it’s more presentable online? No, I won't so you'll just have to come to my next open studio to see these pieces in person.

Variation On A Theme By Rilke
by Denise Levertov (The Book of Hours, Book I, Poem 1, Stanza 1)

A certain day became a presence to me;
there it was, confronting me -- a sky, air, light:
a being. And before it started to descend
from the height of noon, it leaned over
and struck my shoulder as if with
the flat of a sword, granting me
honor and a task. The day's blow
rang out, metallic -- or it was I, a bell awakened,
and what I heard was my whole self
saying and singing what it knew: I can.

xoxo

supported, Monotype of the Day #310

Late night tonight! Hospital time requires patience. 😊 I may have overworked this print. Knowing when to stop is the trickiest part of making art for me. When I’m at home and really listening it’s easy to tell. But the moment my mind starts to run, I lose the sense of my body and that’s how the direction comes through. Here it’s more challenging to stay present especially when it gets to be this late at night. Still, it’s such a blessing to be able to continue my work. I remind myself that my job is not to judge myself or my work, but just to work and have faith in the transformational nature of the creative process.

You who let yourselves feel: enter the breathing
by Rainer Maria Rilke, trans. Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy

You who let yourselves feel: enter the breathing
that is more than your own.
Let it brush your cheeks
as it divides and rejoins behind you.

Blessed ones, whole ones,
you where the heart begins:
You are the bow that shoots the arrows
and you are the target.

Fear not the pain. Let its weight fall back
into the earth;
for heavy are the mountains, heavy the seas.

The trees you planted in childhood have grown
too heavy. You cannot bring them along.
Give yourselves to the air, to what you cannot hold.

circling, Monotype of the Day #302

When I was feeling really well a few weeks back, I had a glimpse of my old life where I could go out and do what I wanted. It was wonderful and now as I slip back a bit toward my usual state I am so grateful for that experience. It showed me how the mind gets conditioned and stuck in habits. How easy it is rest and then become accustomed to resting without even considering other possibilities. The body has limits, but it's so important not to add to them with limits from the mind. My art provides so much adventure, so much engagement in my life that I rarely feel my limits keenly. But one of the messages of the past few months is to widen my mind and let go of the ruts. There is so much that is possible if we don't dwell on what is not. Today a poem from Rilke ❤️

I live my life in widening circles
by Rainer Maria Rilke, Trans. Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy

I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not ever complete the last one,
but I give myself to it.

I circle around God, that primordial tower.
I have been circling for thousands of years,
and I still don’t know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?