Three Paintings Of Mine Published In One Journal, A Spread Across The Same Number of Pages Collectively Pulled Into A River Called A Sangha. Too, A Quote By Thich Nhat Hanh.
I currently occupy a creative space new to me. All of the paintings that I had selected to send out with hopes of being published have been. Including three in one book spread over the same number pages and drawn together by a quote by Thich Nhat Hanh. A quote the editor selected and placed beneath the third work reminding me of the inked, carved stamp I use to close handwritten letters. There is a finality to it, an unexpected one.
I have a pendulum of emotions about having a depleted supply of unpublished artwork. It is of course wonderful that much of the watercolor artwork I created over the last nine years, I started painting in 2017, has been published. Some found their way onto the cover of a literary journal while other pieces slipped inside and took residence on a page.
Yet, now the long rope above my art table has empty clothespins hanging from it. There is no new work or work waiting to be sent out. I feel like Old Mother Hubbard. I have nothing to share. I simply must start new work soon.
The problem is I have this sluggish feeling; a creative block like writers have. The editor's choice of which of the pieces should be first, then second and third in the publication and then positioning the defining quote beneath the last visually startled me with their understanding of my work and seeing the interplay between these pieces. It was like viewing a curated art gallery within a book, which of course is what it is.
I had the gift of seeing Thich Nhat Hanh speak in Boston twenty years ago. I had read their published work, viewed videos of them on-line and then noted they were speaking in the city that I still call my home, for now. I had a seat sitting close to the front row and remember hearing those readying for him to enter the auditorium affectionately refer to them as Thầy, meaning teacher in Vietnamese.
I can see it all so clearly in my mind. Him walking across the room to the place arranged for them to sit. The many people who sat on the floor and stood along the walls to hear him speak, including myself. The smell of incense curling through the air. I see his favored brown robe shift as he settled onto an elevated chair which made it easier for all of us to view him. I hear the long moments of shared silence and then his soft voice speaking with both certainty and compassion. His talk was titled Walking the Path of Love with Muddy Shoes.
When I read the quote under my artwork in the book, it was like Thich Nhat Hanh was there in front of me speaking again. It was powerful and emotional. Here is the quote:
If we are a drop of water and we try to get to the ocean as only an individual drop,
we will surely evaporate along the way. To arrive at the ocean,
you must go as a river. The sangha is your river.
THICH NHAT HANH from Creating True Peace: Ending Violence in Yourself,
Your Family, Your Community, and the World
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Yet, I find myself struggling to answer a single question. Seeing the published layout and reading the quote left me feeling like my entire body of work based on the Iñupiat statement, "The ocean is my garden" was now pulled and tied together: closed, complete. The question that keeps rippling through my mind is, "So what do I paint now?"
I need to move through the feeling of emptiness that has enveloped my creative space in order to answer that question. Perhaps writing about each of those three paintings will help me. I will pull them to a close with my own words inviting others to stitch their voices in here and there.
The first painting in the series is titled, Hark, the Herring Sing. It is on page 54 of the book. Herring and its roe are a culturally significant food source throughout Alaska. If your bucket is filled with herring and/or its roe, then you are feeling gratitude for that silverly, bluish-green fish feeding you, your family and your elders. Perhaps you would sing aloud or within the belly of your being. The Tlingit have a herring Koo.e’ex’ [ceremony] right after the harvest. It's celebratory time of year.
The title of this artwork is based on the well known hymn, Hark, the Herald Angels Sing. It removes the words "herald angels" from the title and the Christian context. Herald, in this usage, means messenger. In my artwork the herring sing the song of their arrival. They are the messengers.
The fish sing as they swim across the page in a slow mediative, communal act. Thich Nhat Hanh led thousands over the years in walking meditation. Why not fish moving in a swimming motion that beckons the same serenity? This piece has found its permanent home in a private collection. Very recently the owner told me that it hangs near a window which looks out across the periwinkle blue wave which washes over the wide open spaces of the Alaskan landscape. The herring now sing in the ocean which is the sky.
The second piece opens this post. It is titled Dristhi and is on page 55 of the book. It is a Hindu word which means focused gaze. In this work dristhi occurs as one moves; as the fish moves while it gazes outward.
The spaghetti kelp allows the viewer to move their gaze from one focal point to another while standing outside the image within the greater world. They also engage in dristi.
While painting it, I felt as if I was that middle fish. What did I see when I looked out of the windowpane? I saw me painting a portrait of myself as a swimming rockfish seeking stillness while so much was changing around me.
Let me also stitch in here the voice of T.S. Elliot who wrote in the Four Quartets, "Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought: So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.” In stillness there is movement, there is discovery and joy.
The third piece is titled Sangha and is on page 56 of the book. Perhaps it is this piece that called to the mind of the book's editor the quote they selected to place beneath it. It's a denser work with different types of kelp moving from one frame to another as the herring swim throughout it.
Sangha is defined as community. In this work the kelp and the herring collectively represent an organic, engaging community. I have been a practicing Buddhist for most of my life. I have sat in sanghas in one city or another across the country and in London, England.
A few years ago I visited the Shambhala Center of Madison, Wisconsin. I found such comfort sitting silently on a zafu next to others. After a time of quiet mediation, we spoke briefly and I was happily surprised to learn that one of those I spoke with had also seen Thich Nhat Hanh speak in Boston when I did. That is the collective beauty of a spiritual community, shared experiences that are aligned with our devotional path.
Here is that quote placed beneath this work by Thich Nhat Hanh again: If we are a drop of water and we try to get to the ocean as only an individual drop, we will surely evaporate along the way. To arrive at the ocean, you must go as a river. The sangha is your river. It is the river, the ocean, the collective community finding its way together.
Sangha haiku
Sangha is where you
find it: music, books, the woods,
communing together.
I am honored to have a series of three of my artworks in the book The Veena: Healing Waters published by Jambu Press. Too, I am deeply grateful to the editor for their insights regrading both my artwork and those of others, as well as prose and poetry.
So what will I paint now? I found my answer here within my blog. I will paint the work I have already created sketches for, counted inches on rulers for where windows will be drawn. I will paint a sea of samaras flickering in the sunlight as they fall from sky to earth.
Digitally spliced artwork of mine to illustrate the future painting.
I will paint what is now the landscape outside my window, beneath my daily steps and above me as I look up at the many shades of green alongside pastels of fruit hanging from trees. I arrived in this city a little more than a year ago. There is so much here for me to paint.
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