7 Levels Deep

These are some crazy times. We’ve been stripped of certainties and forced to redefine our lives. What is of true value in our lives? Friendship. Sharing. Communication. For me, the common factor is love - letting others know that I love them, am here for them, and letting them love me back. Yet, first and foremost, I must love myself. Who ever I am today is where I begin.

Burt Bacharach had it right with his song: “What The World Needs Now Is Love”. Because of the Covid 19 shutdown, I’ve found new ways to be grateful for who I am and how I live my life. Self-quarantine requires solo T.L.C. Being alone, who better to love me, than me?

First color wash and wax

The act of creating can be a helpful tool - it reflects the now and heralds change. It can show us who we are and what we may want to alter. For me, creating art is like creating love, each painting contains little bits of my love for life. I create for me, for sure, but it’s also to invite others to feel good, too.

Forced change, as in the Covid shutdown, most often results in a realignment of perspective. In the middle of things, I can forget that there’s so much more to life than raging headlines. While the shift has been trying and worrisome, oddly, I am the happier for it.

Second color wash and wax ironed off. At this point, I’m thinking the white wavy lines are distracting and I can’t see enough of the bamboo or moon.

This might interest you: it’s a 2-person Q and A game from Dean Graziosi’s book “Millionaire Success Habits”. Person A asks Person B: “What is important to you about being a successful artist?” (I tried to do it to myself but the answers were far more surprising and authentic when done with a friend.) Whatever Person B says, is then tagged on to the original beginning phrase and asked again by Person A: “What is important to you about…”. This Q and A is repeated 7 times. I think you’ll be amazed at what you say.

I did this with sister Jean and we went from her first impression of “being able to treat others, giving joy to others” to “it’s about self-love and showing others the value within them”. We never did crystalize what the original question was. (So like us). It was maybe something like: “What is important to you about being abundant in your life?”, but I’m still not really sure.

Here I’ve asked for critique from my art group and have darkened more behind the bamboo, and created a second bamboo on the right by using crayons and pencils to darken the area around the design. (At this point, simple watercolor washes will not adhere to the waxed paper and I have to get creative to make any changes. Also note, I despised that right hand bamboo and experimentally cropped the painting to see if that would make me happier.)

Other questions might be: “What is important to you about being the happiest you could be?” or “What is important to you about being your most authentic self?”. As Jean and I proved, any question (or no question at all) will lead you on an interesting journey.

As to self-quarantine? I have found I’m kinda built for it. I love having so much more studio time and, with the help of my co-creative art group, I’ve been happily (with some spectacular failures) exploring and expanding further into my creative self, who is all about love. She loves trying everything and nothing gets in the way of her fun. Sounds like a good way to move forward to me.

So, what is important to you about…? I’d LOVE to hear your answers! Or, if you want, we could do this together.

More feedback from the group encouraged me to keep the right bamboo and add more turquoise to make the left side bamboo standout more. You’ll note I decided to not crop the painting. This painting and lots more are in the Beaux Batiks category on my new and improved Website!

Hang in there…I love you!