at sea, Monotype Monday

Welcome to February! I don't know about you, but the pandemic has dissolved my sense of time and I find it challenging to remember which day it is. It doesn't help that last week I took a fall while walking and injured my elbow a lot. It's on the mend, but it's kept me inside and relatively sedentary all week. It reminds me how fragile and fleeting life is. This is not depressing, it's a beautiful and inescapable truth. Good times must be seized and squeezed for every drop. I feel at sea right now without the structure of my daily posts or the ability to work as I'd like. But as my print shows, there is much richness in the sea. Structure and work will return soon enough. For now my fragile boat holds it's steady course. (Poem below the title)

at sea 2/1/21 Monotype of the Day Monday

The Ocean Moving All Night
By Rumi Trans. Coleman Barks & John Moyne

Stay with us. Don't sink to the bottom
like a fish going to sleep.
Be with the ocean moving steadily all night,
not scattered like a rainstorm.

The spring we're looking for
is somewhere in this murkiness.
See the night-lights up there traveling together,
the candle awake in its gold dish.

Don't slide into the cracks of the ground like spilled mercury.
When the full moon comes out, look around.

From Open Secret https://amzn.to/31EwLZ2

partners, Monotype Monday

An attempt at a video today below.

partners
1/24/21
Monotype of the Day Monday

between, Monotype of the Day #867

ghost ink left over from last night print used for today’s print

Day 134 of year 3
Double ghost print from yesterday's monotype. The image to the side is of the ghost ink left on the plate before I started tonight's print.

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.  

it goes both ways, Monotype of the Day #866

Day 134 of year 3

Something more simple today. When I printed this layer on top of the ghost print from a couple days back, I fully intended more layers. But this feel complete so I am listening to that instead of continuing on. I've switched up my studio time in an effort to keep growing. I'm trying to knock myself out of any unconscious ruts. So I'm working in the morning instead of the dead of night and I've replaced my usual audiobooks with music. It feels very different. I'll keep you updated as this experiment unfolds.

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty
By Rumi, Trans Barks & Moyne

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty
and frightened. Don't open the door to the study
and begin reading. Take down the dulcimer.

Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.

From one of my favorite Rumi collections, Open Secret https://amzn.to/39dqjy8

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.  

expedition, Monotype of the Day #865

Day 133 of year 3

We are all part of a great stream that moves inexorably forward. We are not the best, we are not the worst, we are part of something much bigger than we can ever know. In the studio, my work is about trust, learning to loosen my grip so this stream can carry me on. So many times I have run the rapids only to find myself in this beautiful place. Sometimes I feel like I'm teetering on the edge and yet unseen hands hold me safe. I am grateful.

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.  

conference at sea, Monotype of the Day #859

TDay 127 of year 3

onight's print is a number of ghost prints built up over time with a couple new layers printed on top. I like the adventure of printing ghost ink upon ghost ink. What will happen is a mystery. The results are always a surprise, not always a good surprise, but a surprise none the less! This print captures some of my internal landscape right now. I have a feeling, like in this print, much internal discussion is happening just outside of my consciousness. There is a yearning in me to go deeper, capture more in my work. How? I do not know but part of me that is not constrained by my conscious mind is working on it just the same. As sculptor Henry Moore says: 

"The secret of life is to have a task, something you devote your entire life to, something you bring everything to, every minute of the day for the rest of your life. And the most important thing is, it must be something you cannot possibly do."

I would amend this quote to say, "And the most important thing is, it must be something you THINK you cannot possibly do." In my experience, The Artist gives the artist the seed of an idea that often seems impossible or impossibly difficult. It is the artist's job to take the leap of faith to grow that seed anyway. The results may not be what was initially envisioned, but it will be worthwhile. Patience, trust, & perseverance will win the day. 

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.

rising, Monotype of the Day #858

Day 126 of year 3

Sonnets to Orpheus Book II, 1
By Rilke, Trans Barrows and Macey

Breath, you invisible poem!
Pure, continuous exchange
with all that is, flow and counterflow
where rhythmically I come to be.

Each time a wave that occurs just once
in a sea I discover I am.
You, innermost of oceans,
you, infinitude of space.

How many far places were once
within me. Some winds
are like my own child.

When I breathe them now, do they know me again?
Air, you silken surround,
completion and seed of my words.

From In Praise of Mortality https://amzn.to/3f9QeYu 

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.

see me, Monotype of the Day #843

see me, monotype 12 x 14”
Sybil Archibald

Day 111 of year 3

We want the world to see us for who we are, but often we refuse to see ourselves and our fundamental goodness. We like to focus on our brokeness, but what of our light.

Oremus
By Pádraig Ó Tuama

So let us pick up the stones
over which we stumble, friends,
and build altars.

Let us listen to the sound of breath in our bodies.
Let us listen to the sounds of our own voices,
of our own names, of our own fears.

Let’s claw ourselves out from the graves we’ve dug.
Let’s lick the earth from our fingers.
Let us look up and out and around.

The world is big and wide and wild
and wonderful and wicked,
and our lives are murky, magnificent,
malleable, and full of meaning.

Oremus.
Let us pray.

From https://onbeing.org/programs/padraig-o-tuama-and-marilyn-nelson-a-new-imagination-of-prayer/ Also see Daily Prayer with the Corrymeela Community https://amzn.to/3mCfzN0

rise, Monotype of the Day #841

rise, Monotype, 13 x 14.5”
Sybil Archibald

Day 109 of year 3

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

boat, Monotype of the Day #840

boat, monotyoe, 12” x14”
Sybil Archibald

Day 108 of year 3

I added ink directly onto the plate on top of the left over from last night’s print. I like the effect.

KEEPING OUR SMALL BOAT AFLOAT
By Robert Bly

So many blessings have been given to us
During the first distribution of light, that we are
Admired in a thousand galaxies for our grief.

Don't expect us to appreciate creation or to
Avoid mistakes. Each of us is a latecomer
To the earth, picking up wood for the fire.

Every night another beam of light slips out
From the oyster's closed eye. So don't give up hope
that the door of mercy may still be open.

Seth and Shem, tell me, are you still grieving
Over the spark of light that descended with no
Defender near into the Egypt of Mary's womb?

It's hard to grasp how much generosity
Is involved in letting us go on breathing,
When we contribute nothing valuable but our grief.

Each of us deserves to be forgiven, if only for
Our persistence in keeping our small boat afloat
When so many have gone down in the storm.

Source: Robert Bly's Facebook Page

mystical journey, Monotype of the Day #837

mystical journey, 12 x 14”, Sybil Archibald

Day 105 of year 3

Whatever happens in the outer world, we still have control of our inner world. The studio can be a kind of a fortress in times of distress. Working is a way to maintain connection to the fundamental goodness of the human spirit. I've often felt that is it the job of the spiritual artist to maintain a connection to the light and work to bring its energy into the world. There can be a lot of difficulty and darkness out there, but there is an inner wellspring of creative light which we can use to trace back to our source. When we can't change the outer world, it's time to turn inward and delve for the light.

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

Conversation, Monotype of the Day #836

Day 104 of year 3

I'm looking forward to some good conversation at the South Orange and Maplewood Studio Tour, Outdoor Edition. Grab your masks and join me Saturday November 7th and Sunday November 8th from 11-4pm. I'll have monotype from the Monotype of the DayProject and a new installation piece. We will have 6 artists on one block including jade carving demos, photography, painting, printmaking and more. Hope you can join me Warren Court, South Orange, NJ.

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

ascent, Monotype of the Day #835

Day 103 of year 3

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

dream of climbing, Monotype of the Day #809

Day 77 of year 3

My printing plate is literally falling to pieces but somehow, miraculously, it keeps producing monotypes. I had planned to try my hand at making a new plate using gelatin and vegetable glycerin instead of the one I get at the art supply store, but the supplies never arrived. I began to get irritated so I tracked my package only to find I had never placed the order. Everything was still sitting in my cart. I chose to laugh. Every moment is a choice, not so much in the physical world, but in the mental world. How will we choose to meet the moment? With excitement, acceptance, peace or with irritation and upset? It's up to us. I write this to remind myself of the lesson I learned while in the hospital last year and throughout all the years of my illness, happiness can be an inner choice not a set of situations in the world. Poem below the title.

Halleluiah
By Mary Oliver

Everyone should be born into this world happy
and loving everything.
But in truth it rarely works that way.
For myself, I have spent my life clamoring toward it.
Halleluiah, anyway I'm not where I started!

And have you too been trudging like that, sometimes
almost forgetting how wondrous the world is
and how miraculously kind some people can be?
And have you too decided that probably nothing important
is ever easy?
Not, say, for the first sixty years.

Halleluiah, I'm sixty now, and even a little more,
and some days I feel I have wings.

From Evidence https://amzn.to/3n4ezT8

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.