Artists do not suffer from depression more than other segments of the population. Look at law enforcement or teachers, if you want to see people who suffer for their jobs. Many artists may have an inclination towards substance abuse and dependency… can’t really argue that point. Many use substances as a catalyst for creative expression. Many do use meditation as well. There is a form of meditation which involves meditation in motion. The objective is to achieve effortless motion, the motion being carried through perfectly balanced chi. It actually doesnt require a great master. I have accomplished this, and I am certainly not a zen master.

Not all artists go to the same place when they work. In fact, in a given life span a given artist may experience many different levels of their own psyche and ego. That’s the magic of creative expression.
The mystery is that any of us survive our own reflection in the looking glass, Alice.

By the way… when you are down there, please inform the rabbitt I will not be present for tea this afternoon. I have a tai chi engagement…

tidepool

I have been giving some thought to climate change, and wondered if we caouldnt rebuild coastal cities decimated by tsunami and hurricane in a manner designed for the conditions. Submersible Communities.
It seems to me we have the tools, materials, and know-how. It’s totally feasible, and what a tourist attraction!

I recall college crits, those awful deconstruction sessions where everyone winces and waits for a turn at having their work verbally mauled in a group setting. It seemed I could not get through one without somebody saying something about symbolism, and somebody else saying this or that was cliche’.
It goes without saying that most symbolism is cliche’. It has to be, in order to be a symbol. It’s not a symbol until most everyone recognizes it and associates some meaning with it, eh? In school, I hated symbolism, for just this reason. I avoided using symbols which were in any way recognizable. I knew it wasnt a clever notion, but I decided to make up my own symbols. The reason I knew it wasnt clever is that several others were trying to escape the crit ravens in exactly the same manner. Symbols were like shiny things glinting from your work in a crit, and the ravens loved shiny, glinty things… it brought out the raptor in them.

Raven 1 > “What is that exactly? I don’t get the relationships, here… what does that have to do with the rest? ”
Raven 2 >”To me, it just doesnt make sense. It’s just wierd.”
Raven 3 > “Well, if you HAVE to have some kind of mark that is ONLY significant to you, shouldnt you let the viewer know it IS significant?”
Raven 1> “You can SAY you are redefining the symbol on a personal level, but everyone else still sees a mark that means male. So, I don’t see what your point is.”
Me > Here, have some more cheese… (put something IN your mouth, please!)

I eventually came to realize the magic and mystery of symbolism lies in the layers of meaning. The longer a particular symbol is utilized, the more layers of meanings will come to be associated with it. Language, including symbols, evolve with time and cultures. The fact that something as simple as a dot can manifest so many different meanings is simply fascinating to me. <— That one is a period. If I make it larger, it might become an earth. Make it yellow, it is universally recognized as a sun. Add another dot, and the possibilities expand exponentially.

There is no such things “just” a flower, a generic tree, or a leaf out of season. Human beings assign meanings to things even when they are not aware of doing so. Most everyone will say they have a facorite color, but have you ever considered whether you prefer a certain shape to another one? How about alpha-numeric characters? If you had to choose, would you pick a triangle, a circle, or a square, to represent you? Why?

Tags: Add new tag, shapes, symbolism, Visual languages

Lady in Red

 Marcio Diaz   Semantics Gallery Edmonds, WA

Diane Archer 

Fabian Napolsky

Jennifer Lommers

Tags: discovery, experience, haunting image, mexied medium, visual art

When Mukilteo resident Dawn Westmoreland acquired Everett Artists Supply& Framing three years ago, she hoped to provide a great place for Snohomish county artists to purchase supplies. In no time, she was also providing space for classes and workshops, as well as monthly exhibitions of local artist’s work.

Educators came to know the place well, as Dawn contributed thousands of dollars in donated and discounted merchandise and supplies. The services provided to the community continued to grow within the limited space, until the space in Evergreen Mall was no longer sufficient to the purpose.

Everett Artist’s Supply and Framing recently moved to a location at 9304 Evergreen Way in south Everett, where they still offer a great selection of artist’s supplies and a world class Master Framer, a broad spectrum of classes and workshops, and now will provide studios for rent to local artists, as well as a gallery in the Art Annex building. The Annex features five bright studios of varying sizes, the gallery, and “dirty” studios on a lower level.

In short, Everett Artist’s Supply and Framing has become the quintessential center for visual artists in Snohomish County, and a vital community resource. The light and airy atmosphere lends itself to cheery creative chatter and will, no doubt, foster many festive gatherings and workshops.

Students & teachers always receive a 10% discount on purchases at Everett Artist’s Supply and Framing, as well as military.

Shop and compare prices… go ahead. You will be amazed at the savings!

Hours are 10 a.m. – 6:00 p.m. Mon- Sat.

Summers are always filled with activity, but some exceed even my expectations. This summer, I am helping an Everett Artist’s Supply and Framing move to a new location with expanded outreach and community services (which includes my own studio), preparing for an early autumn show, and providing a youth summer camp with a life casting experience.  

There are other considerations, of course… the Maplewood Rock Club, gardening, music festivals and theatre… and somewhere in the mix there’s a requirement for minimal amount of eating and sleeping.

This brings to mind a question of visual representation… for I wunder how I might characterize such activity, visually. Also, cycles of life, or seasons. Not annual growing seasons, mind you… but the seasons of a life time, which may span years. Circles, or circular patterns are one time honored method for representing cycles. “Busy” patterns are a common method of depicting a hectic or chaotic period of activity. But, the possibilities don’t stop there…

There are three concepts floating in my mind. They are: membranes (the fabric of space time), oceans (for this environment is not unlike the membranes), and visual languages… the human experience. Each time I consider how I might relate membranes to others, I am drawn back to the analogy of the ocean. Fish swimming in the ocean suck in the water, blow out the water, live out thier lives inside the body of a fluid abyss… much like we do on land. We breathe the air without thought for where it’s been or what microscopic particles may be carried into our innermost parts by the action. We walk, run, fly, kill, die, and copulate without much thought for the membrane we live in. It is alive, as surely as the ocean is alive. In fact, we know there are lakes beneath the ocean where some oceanic creatures go “fishing”.  Is the ocean a different membrane? Is the totality of our physical existence pinned to one membrane of the proposed 11 which theoretically make up the sum total? Is there no place where these membranes might fold together? If, in fact, these membranes do meet and meld… perhaps at the edges, perhaps at the black holes, it might produce some strange effects for us human beans. We might enter into a  membrane”subduction zone” within our physical reality. Really, it might explain alot of the “mysteries” humanity has recorded in anals of history. It might even make divinity a bit more comprehensible.

Now we come to the visual languages portion. I wonder what language the membrane(s) might be written in? Obviously, it is not one which is available within the limitations of human vision. Suppose every breath we take is recorded into the membrane. Every breath, every thought, every action makes an impression or a ripple. Each of these things converts energy from one form to another, so it is not only conceivable… it is wholly implied, that this is exactly the case. This would mean that any being with the ability to decode or read the membrane(s) would have access to every breath, thought, and action which ever occured, or will occur. One would have to be able to interpret the impressions of every sort of energy conversion, of course, in order to understand the impressions and ripples and such. The energy released in an massive earthquake might otherwise be confused with that of single days child birth, on a global scale.

But the membranes arent just global… they are universal. The music of the spheres is, indeed,  played on strings. My mind reaches again and again for the visual language of energies in a constant state of flux and flex. As always, I must conclude… wouldn’t that be something~!?

Tags: energy, Membrane, metaphysics, physics, String Theory, visual language