Spring Trees Renew Our Hope

adult learning, arkansas, art, butterflies, coronavirus, Creativity, Faith, Forgiveness, hope, Imagination, Love, nature, Painting, pandemic, picasso, Spirituality, trees, vision

Picasso is often thought to have said, “Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.” However, just as we tend to view anything on the internet as true, along comes a meme from Abraham Lincoln reminding us of the exact opposite proposition. As one of my old debate team mentors in high school used to say, “Consider the source. Use a verified source. Use a trusted source. Use a legitimate source. Facts, not opinions, count in the argument.” This is the flag we raised, put a light on it, and saluted every day in speech class. This also limited my library quest, for my search engine of choice in those low technology days was the card catalog at my neighborhood library and rummaging through whatever national news magazines came on subscription there.

Abraham Lincoln said it, so it must be True!

As much as I love this quote, “Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life,” and resonate with it, it doesn’t sound like Picasso. He’s also purported to be the source of “Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.” It’s not too different from “Some men see things as they are and say why? I dream things that never were and say why not?” This latter is a famous line paraphrasing George Bernard Shaw’s play Back To Methuselah, and was spoken at Robert F. Kennedy, Jr’s funeral elegy.

Perhaps it doesn’t matter we aren’t original thinkers, but only that we stretch our thinking beyond what we already know. In 1982, futurist and inventor R. Buckminster Fuller estimated that up until 1900, human knowledge doubled approximately every century, but by 1945 it was doubling every 25 years. By 1982, knowledge doubled every 12-13 months. Today, knowledge doubles about every 12 hours! For some people, this is absolutely too much to bear, and for others, it’s a reason to yearn for simpler times. However, I’m not willing to give up the GPS and maps in my vehicle, for I have a tendency to be chronically lost. I do find some interesting backroads along the detours I take in error. I just get lost less often than I once did.

Art and other creative ventures are the means by which we deal with our anxieties of this world, for if we have pain and troubles there, we can either create a world of beauty to balance our struggles or we can let all that pent up energy out so it doesn’t eat us up from the inside out. If we’re making landscapes, we might have butterflies or forest fires, depending on how we process our soul journeys.

Margaret’s landscape has the breeze blowing through the trees and flowers. The clouds are also carried along by these same winds. She was wanting to paint a flittering butterfly, and wondered out loud “How does a butterfly fly?”

I didn’t know exactly, and wasn’t into acting out my inner butterfly, but Apple Music has a wonderful tune by Ludovico Einaudi called “Day 1: Golden Butterflies.”

I found it on my phone and played it for her. Art class calls upon all the senses, just as reading a biblical text does. How can we get into a mood or intention of a writer or an artist if we don’t use every one of the senses the good Lord gifted us with? Art isn’t just for the eyes, but we should appreciate the textures even if we don’t actually touch them.

In our Friday art class, I always show examples of how other artists have approached our theme for the day. I collect them in my Pinterest account. For Spring Trees, the goal is to use the cool side of the palette, with a variety of greens, and add spring colored flowers of white, pink, or yellows. Blues and violets also show up with wisteria and bluebells. As I showed the group about a dozen different artists’ works, I reminded them: “You can’t go wrong! Every one of these artists solved spring trees in a different way. Some painted only the tree, some painted just the reflection in the water, others painted the whole landscape. Some focused on the people more than the trees. If your colors stay cool, if we can tell these shapes are trees, and if you use your own ideas to elaborate on this basic format, you’ll do a great job! We can always improve on the next one.”

People are so worried about pleasing others, or not measuring up to some standard. What standard are we setting for ourselves anyway? If we want to shoot baskets like LeBron James or Stephen Curry, we’d better be prepared to work. Curry shoots around 2,000 shots a week: He takes a minimum of 250 a day, plus another 100 before every game. It’s a counterintuitive fact that a player with the supplest shot in the NBA, whose overarching quality is feel, has the hands and work habits of a woodchopper. Likewise, LeBron works out even on his “off day,” with only Sunday as a day of rest. Check out this workout. This is why he’s called the “King.”

If we were writing poetry, would we fail to start because we couldn’t produce from our heart and hand the words which move us, as do the passionate lines of Shakespeare’s pen? He had to start somewhere, for sure. “While salvation is by faith,” I always tell folks, “proficiency in arts and crafts usually comes from works.” The more we practice, the better we become. Some of excellence results from acquiring good eye hand coordination, or fine motor control, but also we begin to learn what our media can do and what it won’t do. We enter into a friendship and then into a love affair with it. We begin to anticipate where it will go, just as we often can finish our best friend’s sentences for them. Take a break and read Shakespeare’s 18th sonnet out loud for a moment:

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm’d; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

“The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web,” Picasso told Alfred H. Barr, Jr. Just as everything is grist for the poet’s mill, so we bring all that we are to our art experiences. If we’re glad, sad, angry, or any other emotion, this gets poured out into our work through the colors we choose, the subject matter, or the way we use the media. This pandemic will be remembered not only for its cruel loss of life, but also for its neurological complications for the post COVID survivors, since a high percentage have mood and anxiety trouble diagnoses for the first time within six months of their infection. This is how we know COVID isn’t just a bad flu.

I omit the state of depression, for if one feels blue, one can work, but true depression takes away the will to work, to get out of bed, get dressed, or have the energy to brush one’s teeth. No one gets out of that state alone. Help and intervention are needed. I’ve been a chronic depressive for over half a century, and “snapping out of it” isn’t possible for people with this health condition. If I have a sunny and positive outlook on life, it’s because I’ve learned to think optimistically and I’m medicated properly. Plus I attend counseling sessions so I can keep a good perspective on life. If life is getting you down now, please seek help from a trusted medical provider or a pastor. Jesus meant it when he said, “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10). Faith healing also comes from ordinary means.

Our art class gives our group a safe place to stretch their minds, to take self care time, and to try a new skill that won’t kill anyone. It’s not like chainsaw juggling , where if you miss, you get a free ride to the ER or the funeral home. We don’t do that sort of thing. That’s more excitement than I can stand. I used to teach middle school art classes, so I had days, when the moon was full, that I sometimes thought I was juggling chain saws. Juggling plastic spoons is more my style today.

Gail is supervising home schooling during the pandemic. I don’t know how all the other parents and grandparents are doing in this particular time, but I remember the chaos which ensued one spring break as the pink eye ran amuck through the elementary school at which I taught. The headmaster gave everyone an extra week for spring break, an act which caused my students’ parents to call me in a panic, “What am I going to DO with my child for a WHOLE WEEK?!”

I laughed and said, “Keep them away from children who have pink eye.” I suppose I didn’t commiserate with them, as they thought I should. These people are now grandparents and I hope that one week back then showed them they could manage a whole pandemic today.

Gail’s trips to fuel her caffeine need causes her to visit different coffee shops. The cup sleeves come in different patterns of corrugated cardboard. Of course, this paper product originally came from a tree, so she brought them in to be recycled and repurposed into an art piece about spring trees. Since she worked for the forest service, this is right in line with her love of nature and concern for stewardship of our natural resources. Gail also likes to plan and think her way through a theme.

Mike gets his idea in a big, global whole. Then he seems to boil it down to a manageable size in a few moments, as he mentally discards the least workable parts. In a few minutes, he’s ready to paint a scene from memory or from his imagination. He applies lessons learned from other classes. For instance, painting in the background first is easier than trying to paint up to foreground details. This painting began with the stream, the green trees, the white trees, and then the popping pink trees for an accent.

I was painting trees with wisteria vines from a photograph I took near my home. The coffee spot at the Airport and MLK Freeway had moved, so when I turned in that driveway, I came to the notice of one of Hot Springs Finest. As he rolled down his window, I turned around and smiled.

“Hello, I’m just taking photographs of the wisteria in the trees.”

“I saw your car and thought you might be in trouble.”

“Not this time, but thanks for checking on me. I often stop to take pictures of our beautiful city.”

While we were talking, his radio went off and he had to go help someone else. Life interrupts our time together, and we don’t know how much time we have on this side of heaven. Many of the things we fight over will be meaningless in the great arc of history. When we meet each other on the other side, we won’t care about these things, for our whole attention will be God and the Lamb who sits upon the throne. If on this side of heaven, we learn to love more and forgive better, we’ll all be going on to perfection, whether we are in life or art.

RFK Jr Funeral Elegy

https://politicaldog101.com/2018/03/robert-kennedy-did-george-bernand-shaw/

Art Thoughts: Trees

https://pin.it/2IejRzm

The hidden price Steph Curry pays for making the impossible seem effortless

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/wizards/steph-curry-can-he-handle-the-full-court-pressure-of-super-stardom/2016/04/08/3dc96ca8-f6ab-11e5-a3ce-f06b5ba21f33_story.html?tid=a_classic-iphone&no_nav=true

Thriving in a World of “Knowledge Half-Life”

https://www.cio.com/article/3387637/thriving-in-a-world-of-knowledge-half-life.html

Elizabeth Cowling, Pablo Picasso (2002). “Picasso: style and meaning”, Phaidon Press. Also quoted in Alfred H. Barr Jr., Picasso: Fifty Years of his Art (1946).

https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780191826719.001.0001/q-oro-ed4-00008311

Shakespeare: Sonnet 18

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45087/sonnet-18-shall-i-compare-thee-to-a-summers-day

Ludovico Einaudi: Day 1: Golden Butterflies

https://music.apple.com/us/album/day-1-golden-butterflies/1451626902?i=1451627427

Also available on Amazon music streaming services

6-month neurological and psychiatric outcomes in 236 379 survivors of COVID-19: a retrospective cohort study using electronic health records – The Lancet Psychiatry

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(21)00084-5/fulltext

Still Life with Bottles

adult learning, apples, art, bottles, Creativity, Faith, Ministry, Painting, picasso, renewal, shadows

One of the best genres of painting is still life: it doesn’t move, it never gets tired, and it never fusses about sitting in one place for a longtime. It’s only drawback is it might rot if you take too long to do your art work. Most of us won’t have this problem, since we’ll either take a photo of the piece or go on to paint something else before that happens.

Jan Davidsz de Heem: Still Life in Glass Vase

Still life painting as an independent genre or specialty first flourished in the Netherlands during the early 1600s, even though parts of earlier paintings paid detailed attention to flowers or fruit within the whole. The rise of still life painting in the Northern and Spanish Netherlands, mainly in the large city trade centers, reflected the increasing urbanization of Dutch and Flemish society, which brought with it an emphasis on the home and personal possessions, commerce, trade, learning—all the aspects and diversions of everyday life. These still lifes featured imported flowers and fruits plus expensive objects such as Chinese porcelain, Venetian glassware, and silver-gilt cups and trays, all of which were usually rendered in a glistening light and with a velvety atmosphere.

A noted Flemish master of the 17th century, Jan Davidsz de Heem, enjoyed combining multiple flowers from different seasons along with ears of corn, a spider, a ladybird, ants, and butterflies in a glass vase on a slate ledge with red currents, a violet, a snail, and a caterpillar. Photorealistic paintings like this were in vogue then, but as the years rolled on, modern artists began to explore other directions. Cezanne retains the luxurious drapery of earlier still life paintings, but simplifies the forms of everyday objects. He’s the father of the cubist painters, represented by Picasso’s bottle still life.

Another artist shows us how to handle the reflection of the background in a glass vessel. Matisse freely paints the colors and shapes of the plants, the window, and the bright goldfish plus all the highlights from the light sources. He even lets some of the white of the unpainted canvas show throughout his work to add to the feeling of airiness.

A current painting from Pinterest is a quieter and more sedate rendering of the goldfish theme. The overall drawing is good, but it lacks energy. There’s no vibrancy in the light coming through the window and the shadows on the goldfish are too dark. Muting the values of the colors toward grey and brown will decrease the “pop” of a painting every time.

We also looked at a painting of a clear bottle with lemons in the background. Objects behind a glass will often be displaced by the surface, just as water also shifts the position of anything underwater. We’ve tried bottles and jars before, but this is the first time we’ve focused on them entirely. As a collector of ancient and odd things, these are old beer and soda bottles I’ve found over the years. They aren’t THAT old, with the oldest being about 1905. They’re all mould blown and have distinctive air bubbles and seam lines.

One is from the bottling company of my hometown, the Star Bottling Company, which first produced the Uncle Joe and Aunt Ida soft drinks, before becoming part of the Coca Cola bottling family in 1904. Before the Coca Cola Company created a line of flavored drinks, most of the bottlers created their own brands, with orange, root beer, strawberry, grape and fruit-flavored drinks. Because they weren’t allowed to put them in bottles with the “Coca-Cola” script, the bottlers developed their own “flavor bottles.”

The writing on many of these bottles indicated they were property of the local Coca Cola bottling company. Collectors can find an enormous variety in flavor bottles, and most are very inexpensive to collect. Mine are of the nondescript, ordinary variety, but I have fond memories of the experience of finding them. Plus the excitement of a field trip to the bottling plant, which both got us out of school for a morning and introduced us to the wonders of industry.

The earliest known man made glass date back to around 3500 BCE, with finds in Egypt and Eastern Mesopotamia. Discovery of glassblowing around 1st century BCE was a major breakthrough in glass making. Archaeological findings in Egypt and Eastern Mesopotamia indicate the first manufactured glass dates back to 3000 BCE. The oldest fragments of glass vases found in Mesopotamia date back to the 16th century BCE and represent evidence of the origins of the hollow glass industry. Beside Mesopotamia, hollow glass production was also evolving in the same time in Egypt, in Mycenae (Greece), China and North Tyrol (now part of Austria). The first glassmaking manual from the library of the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal (669-626 BCE) dates back to around 650 BCE.

Because glassmaking was slow and costly, it was luxury item and few people could afford it. Around the end of the 1st century BCE, Syrian craftsmen discovered the new technique of “glass blowing.” This revolutionary event made glass production easier, faster and cheaper, so that glass, for the first time, became available to ordinary citizens. The tools and techniques of glass blowing have changed very little over the centuries.

The Romans traded glass across the vast RomanEmpire and beyond. They were the first to use glass for architectural purposes when clear glass was discovered in Alexandria around 100 CE. Venice was the center of the glassmaking craft.

The art of glass making flourished during the Roman Empire and spread across Western Europe and the Mediterranean. Glass was one of the most important items of trade beyond the borders of the Roman Empire. The Romans were the first ones who began to use glass for architectural purposes, when clear glass was discovered in Alexandria around AD 100.

THREE ROMAN GLASS VESSELS
C. 1ST-4TH CENTURY A.D.

Other examples in the image above of the Roman expertise in glass blowing include a pale green bottle, with the four-sided mould-blown body with rounded shoulder and tapering cylindrical neck, the wide strap handle attached to the shoulder and curved under the lip, 5¾ in. (14.5 cm.) high; a pale green jug, the squat spherical body with diagonal ribs, a pinched handle attached to the flaring neck with trailed ring, 4¾ in. (12 cm.) high; and a pale yellow unguentarium, 4 5/8 in. (11.8 cm.) high. These were from an auction lot at Christie’s.

A flourishing glass industry was developed in Europe at the end of the 13th century when the glass industry was established in Venice by the time of the Crusades (1096-1270 CE). Despite the efforts of the Venetian artisans who dominated the glass industry to keep the technology secret, it soon spread around Europe. Eventually all the great gothic cathedrals of Europe would have stained glass curtains or large windows of colored light illuminating their interiors.

Because stained glass is translucent, we see both the color and the light. When we paint with acrylic colors, the light reflects back from the pigments in the binding medium. In watercolor, the white paper adds brightness since the colors are transparent. This means we have to “fool the eye” and use highlights plus color values near to the background colors to give the illusion of clarity.

Gail is getting good at analyzing the shapes and setting them down on a small canvas during our short class period. This still life had both the extra solid apple and the very clear bottles in contrast. It was more challenging than it sounds. How do you balance the heavy with the light, the solid with the transparent, and the cool blues with the warm reds? Adding a strong background color helps tie the two together.

Another way to bring everything together is to ignore the apple all together, as Mike did. This is called artistic license. He included the red in a cloth crossed by another golden fabric. He uses multiple viewpoints, for the base of the bottles are on one plane and the tops are flipped forward. I don’t know if he changed position or just sat up straighter when doing the bases. I also gave him one of my brushes to use in class, since he’s been using the same one forever. He wants to paint a straight line, but is using a round brush. He needs to take a lesson from Tim, the Tool man Taylor, and “use the right tool for the right job.” Of course we all know that means the one with “more power!”

“Here, use this flat edge artist’s brush. I think you’ll like it.”
“Wow, it really paints a smooth edge.”

“Yep, I been suggesting you get a better brush, but you keep using the old one. I finally decided you needed to experience what a real brush feels like in your hand.”

“If I go in the store, do I need a special license to buy a real artist’s brush?”

“They’ll take your money. That’s the only license you need.”

He laughed. I’m glad he has a sense of humor. We’ve been doing this class for about two years now. It takes us a while to learn from each other. We have to learn how to be transparent and open to one another, much as a clear glass bottle is open to light shining through it. The greatest challenge for any of us as adults is accepting any instruction or critique at all. In seminary, I always opened my tests and papers after I repeated my mantra, “I am not my grade.” If I got a good score, I didn’t let it go to my head, but worked even harder on the next effort. If I didn’t score well, I took that grade as an opportunity to define my arenas of insufficient knowledge. I could work on that for the next time.

As we read in the scriptures, the apostle Paul writes:
All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching,
for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,
so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient,
equipped for every good work.
~~ 2 Timothy 3:16-17

If we weren’t willing to be transformed, why would we read our Bibles or attend to the teachings of God’s holy word? If we let the good word go in one ear and out the other, and it never makes an impact on our hearts, minds, or lives, we’re dead in our faith. We’re called to have a living faith, one full of hope, and actively bring that same hope to our hurting world.

Johnny Nash, who recently passed away, had the number one song on Billboard’s Hot 100 song list in 1972, called “I can see clearly now.”

I can see clearly now the rain is gone
I can see all obstacles in my way
Gone are the dark clouds that had me blind
It’s gonna be a bright (bright)
Bright (bright) sunshiny day
It’s gonna be a bright (bright)
Bright (bright) sunshiny day

I think I can make it now the pain is gone
All of the bad feelings have disappeared
Here is that rainbow I’ve been praying for
It’s gonna be a bright (bright)
Bright (bright) sunshiny day
It’s gonna be a bright (bright)
Bright (bright) sunshiny day

Look all around, there’s nothing but blue skies
Look straight ahead, there’s nothing but blue skies
I can see clearly now the rain is gone
I can see all obstacles in my way
Gone are the dark clouds that had me blind
It’s gonna be a bright (bright)
Bright (bright) sunshiny day

It’s gonna be a bright (bright)
Bright (bright) sunshiny day

Oh what a bright (bright)
Bright (bright) sunshiny day

I hope you have a bright, bright, sunshiny day,
Cornelia

Johnny Nash
https://www.lyrics.com/lyric/33799733/Johnny+Nash/I+Can+See+Clearly+Now

History of Glass
http://www.nissinkglass.co.uk/info/history-of-glass

Historic Bottle Website
https://sha.org/bottle/

Manufacturer’s Marks and Other Logos on Glass Containers
https://sha.org/bottle/pdffiles/ALogoTable.pdf

Star Bottling Company
https://www.fohbc.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/UncleJoBottling.pdf

Body and Mold Seams
https://sha.org/bottle/body.htm

Read about an early bottle filling machine here
https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Brewers_Journal_and_Barley_Malt_and.html?id=9hwxAQAAMAAJ

New Year, New Class

adult learning, art, Attitudes, change, cosmology, Creativity, Faith, flowers, Forgiveness, Habits, Imagination, Love, Ministry, New Year, Painting, renewal, righteousness, trees, vision

Happy New Year to everyone! I like nothing better than putting an old year down for the count, cleaning off my desk, and starting fresh. While I may be the same old gal, at least I have good intentions of improving myself over the next year. Since we have an extra day in 2020, I might meet my goal! My first act in the studio was to clean my palette, since it had an accumulation of color layers. I find the old colors distracting when I want to paint a new color scheme.

I was glad to meet some new students at Oaklawn UMC, where I volunteer to teach an art class for adults on Fridays. In addition to Gail and Mike, who’ve learned my own language and now need minimal guidance, I’m blessed with some new folks who’ll get an opportunity to get out of their houses and into the creative spirit.

Exploring the creative process is a wonderful way to come close to the God who created us in God’s own image. Since God is always creating, we who’re made in this image are also creating. Sometimes we make art, design homes, style our clothing choices, or plant gardens. Also we’re making families, cooking meals, or building birdhouses. Even in our sleep, we create a dreamworld unlike anything anyone else can imagine. We’re all artists, but most people quit thinking they can “do art” about the age of eight. This Is a sad commentary on peer pressure, but it also reflects our society’s preference for professional specialists. We tend to identify talent early and track students accordingly.

The practice of making art is beneficial at any age. Our goal doesn’t have to become the next Picasso or Michelangelo. In art class we learn new skills and put them to use in our own unique solution. This bolsters problem-solving skills and satisfaction that we can take into everyday life. I always tell my classes, “I expect everyone to find a different solution, since you’re all different personalities.” They never disappoint me!

Art class gets us out of the house, so we’re not looking at our own four walls. It can help alleviate boredom and keep our minds busy, and may even help prevent feelings of depression. It also helps with hand-eye coordination, cognitive abilities, and concentration.

I’ve always subscribed to the “works righteousness” school of teaching art: those who work will improve more than those don’t. If we keep on working, over time, we’ll show improvements. This will foster self-esteem and self-awareness and cultivate emotional resilience. We have to trust the process.

When we critique a work, it’s not to criticize or only to give negative feedback. A work always has positive aspects, those parts which meet the goals of the day, and negative aspects, or room for improvement. Approached in this manner, students can grow in their skills because the critique reduces and resolves conflicts and distress, which comes from being judged, and it helps to promote insight into their work for the future. As an aside, it might even enhance social skills, if they begin to speak this way in their own conversations outside of class.

Art class isn’t about being the best artist in the room. It’s about the connections between creative choices we make and our inner life. Too many of us are so busy taking care of others, we haven’t time to listen to God or to ourselves. If we take two hours on a Friday to do this, we can touch the part of us that yearns to speak within the silence, and give voice to the creative spirit within our lives.

I hope I assigned the correct name to each person’s art. I may be old and could claim “sometimer’s disease,” but I have the school teacher’s DNA which causes me to mangle my students’ names for the first month. I’ve done this since I was in my 20’s, so I might be incurable. I can edit this, however, if I’ve accused folks wrongly. Doing Art is wonderful, for we learn from our mistakes, so they bring us closer to perfection, rather than diminishing our goodness.

Spring Flowers

adult learning, art, Creativity, Easter, Faith, flowers, garden, Garden of Gethsemane, Good Friday, Holy Spirit, Imagination, incarnation, Israel, Ministry, nature, Painting, picasso, Prayer, purpose, salvation, Spirituality, Stations of the Cross, Travel

How many colors exist in creation? Many more than we can buy in a tube at the art supply store and even more than the number of paint chips at our local building supply store. Recently I gave my adult art class an assignment to use their primary colors and white only to mix new colors, since I noticed they were not getting middle values in their paintings. I too enjoy the brightness of the primary colors, so this was also a challenge for me.

Power of the Cross

The following week I needed to do less geometry and more nature, but I came back to the cross theme once again, for these flowers are from a photo of the Easter “Living Cross” at my church. While we can’t see the arms of the cross, anymore than we can see Jesus today, we know the cross is there, just as we know Jesus is present for us in the power of the Holy Spirit.

This makes Christ alive, not only in our hearts, but also in the lives of all who suffer: the poor, the immigrant or stranger in our land, and the oppressed. Even the land itself, which suffers from human caused climate change, can be a place where we meet the living Christ.

Spring Flowers

The Garden of Gethsemane in Jerusalem is a powerful place, for it was where Christ was handed over to his captors by a former friend. From there he went to death on the cross and resurrection for our salvation. This garden retains this energy of struggle: Jesus prayed to get his will in line with God’s will.

If the story ended here, we’d have no living crosses full of beautiful flowers on Easter Sunday. Out of pain and struggle comes great beauty. Most of us will avoid any challenge in our lives, thinking the easy way is the best way. Intentionally causing others to suffer pain isn’t acceptable for moral reasons: “do no harm” is a good adage, as is “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Setting achievable goals and challenges are different. These cause us to grow. They may also cause us discomfort, but this isn’t pain.

On this canvas, Spring Flowers, I had to overpaint and scumble to create the textured grays of the background. I even had to repaint the wispy border flowers several times to get their petals colored and straight, plus to get the ground varied enough to make them stand out.

One of the artists I most admire is Picasso, for he was always reinventing his style. Today artists pick a style and stick with it. Perhaps this is lucrative and makes economic sense. Still, I wonder what happens to the creative spirit when it’s not nurtured, challenged, and expressed. Of course, this may be the difference between a great artist and a good artist, and only the centuries will tell which among us now will be great.

The Sea Shell

adult learning, art, Children, Creativity, Faith, Holy Spirit, Imagination, Love, mystery, Painting, salvation, seashells, shadows, Uncategorized, vision

I have hidden inside a sea shell

but forgotten in which.

SEASHELL AND DRAGON FRUIT

Now daily I dive,

filtering the sea through my fingers,

to find myself.

Sometimes I think

a giant fish has swallowed me.

Looking for it everywhere I want to make sure

it will get me completely.

DRAGON FRUIT MONSTER

The sea-bed attracts me, and

I’m repelled by millions

of sea shells that all look alike.

Help, I am one of them.

If only I knew, which.

BIRD ON A SHELL

How often I’ve gone straight up

to one of them, saying: That’s me.

Only, when I prised it open

it was empty.

In art, beginners can get so caught up with drawing the forms and representing reality, they lose sight of the emotions and meaning of their work. Small children, on the other hand, will take an idea such as a snowman in a snowstorm, and completely obliterate their surface with white swirls until all sight of the ground, the snowman, the house and the children who built it are covered up. Their work is more about the experience of the falling, swirling snow than it is about the distinctive parts. We hang this on our refrigerators and exclaimed with amazement when they tell us the story.

In a year, they’ll be interested in the separate objects and have a well defined ground and sky, even if their objects aren’t in realistic proportions. The proportions are sized according to the child’s interest, and by age 12 most children want to create drawings with realistic perspective and images. Sometimes as they age, they begin to lose their sense of magic and mystery, and need their imagination primed more, but this isn’t impossible.

Adults often have difficulty using their imaginations, for they’ve had too many years of completing to do lists, getting things done, and unfortunately, much work is mind numbing. Some of them also are products of schools that taught to the test and to the “right answer,” rather than teaching thinking or logic skills or creativity.

The disciples asked, “Who is greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 18:3-4)

For us as artists or as people of faith, to enter into the humility of a child is a counter cultural act, both today and in ancient times. We don’t find self help gurus preaching simplicity or poverty, but we do find plenty selling the siren call of prosperity and power. Jesus always speaks of the least of all as being the most of all, which is why the smallest child has more honor and greatness in the kingdom of heaven than the most important citizens of this world.

Some of us hear this text as a call to never question the faith we learned as a child. Unfortunately when we hit the stumbling blocks of adulthood, we find our simple faith’s pillars of belief are on shaky foundations. We can either crash and burn, or we can ask the questions of trusted and learned guides who have gone on the path before. Then we can shore up our foundations with mature understandings, or remodel our understanding so we can live with joy anew.

In art, we can either repeat the same forms over and over, or we can critique our work. In the school I attended, we had a routine—the first three comments had to be positive, then the next had to be those which needed improvement. Since we never called anything “bad” or “wrong,” the person on the hot seat never felt diminished. “You could have darkened the background more, so your foreground objects would have been more prominent.” This is better than saying, “You didn’t make the objects in front stand out,” since it doesn’t offer a solution.

It’s humbling to receive criticism, even positive feedback, because we want to be accepted just as we are, especially in faith. Yet Jesus didn’t die on the cross to leave us just as we are (justifying grace), but rose from the dead to perfect us and make us holy, just as he is (sanctifying grace). In faith, we come as humble children to grow in grace before God and to come to full perfection of love of God and neighbor that is entire sanctification. In art, we work each day to join our hand, our hearts, and our vision into one spiritually inspired whole. The more we know ourselves and can connect with the spirit of the creating God, the better we’ll make art with an inner life.

Sometimes in art, we decide to repeat a certain set of forms because we get approval from others for our work. We do this to the danger of our very lives. While we may continue to sell our work and earn the acclaim of critics, if we aren’t pushing the boundaries of artistic creativity, we are stagnating and not growing. The greatest artists–Picasso, Rembrandt, Matisse, and Michaelagelo–never quit growing. In faith, we work out our own salvation with fear and trembling, knowing “it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Philippians 2:13).

Poem translated by Michael Hamburger. Published in 1983 by Bloodaxe Books. http://www.bloodaxebooks.com

Source: Selected Poems (Bloodaxe Books, 1983)

Art, Cabbages and The Spiritual Life

Creativity, Holy Spirit, Imagination, Ministry, purpose, renewal, salvation, Spirituality, Uncategorized

“No good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit; for each tree is known by its own fruit.” ~~ Luke 6:43-44a

My family was known for its colorful sayings. “You can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear” and “a zebra can’t change its stripes” were two of my parents’ favorites. Yet the whole of the spiritual and the creative life is about transformation! If I took these sayings to heart, I would never have started on the great journey that has been my life’s work!

Both the artist and the person of faith believe that something ordinary, even ugly, might be the raw material for a work of beauty if only it were to be put under a shaping hand that is tapped into the creating and inspired power that is the source of all beauty that moves and cares for the world in which we live. Picasso can take the rusted out bicycle seat and its handles, weld them together to create a bull’s head, and so create a thing of beauty from what once was destined for the junk heap. The master’s hand transforms the useless and laid aside into something desirable and valuable.

The parable goes on to say “figs aren’t gathered from thorns, nor are grapes from a bramble bush” (6:44b). This is obvious to anyone who knows where food comes from! When my daughter was eight years old, I served a small church on the southwest side of San Antonio where many of the truck farms are located. She saw a field of bright green balls, all growing in straight rows and sitting directly upon the soil. “What’s that?” Cabbages. “Why are they on the ground?” That’s how they grow; they’re plants. “Ugh! I’m never eating cole slaw again!” More for me. Your loss, my gain. All plants grow in the ground: carrots, lettuce, potatoes, watermelons. “Disgusting!”(I figured when she got good and hungry, she’d get over her disgust at where real food comes from. Everyone needs to know that real food doesn’t come neatly wrapped and clean in cellophane or a box at the grocery store.)

Jesus says “the good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of the evil treasure of the heart produces evil for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks’ (6:45).

So are we born good or born evil, with no hope of changing, like the zebra with its stripes? If this is so, then why did God bother to send us a Savior? Transformation must be possible, for we can be saved, and saved to the fullest! We aren’t trees, sow’s ears, or mere zebras. We are born in the image of God, made in his likeness and we are destined for eternity. The God who loves his creation will not let his creation fall again into hopeless despair.

Like the artist, God takes our rough materials, even those that have been thrown on the junk heaps of life, and reworks them into something new and beautiful with his recreating power. Even the worst of us, who have destroyed our lives and the lives of those around us, can receive forgiveness and renewal. We can be transformed by God’s recreating power! Where our nature and fruit might have originally been for evil, with Christ we can now be and work for good. A greater hand than ours has touched our hearts and lives. That transformation by the master Artist will shape us until we are the masterpiece God wants us to be.

We won’t live the life of a great work of art hidden in a climate -controlled museum, surrounded by a gilt frame or guarded by security. Instead, we will go out to share our beauty with the weak and wounded of the world. We will be a living witness to the work of transformation, not only in our creative work but also in our lives. We won’t be like cabbages wrapped in cellophane waiting for God to take us up to the heavenly banquet. Instead we will be the living, breathing fruit of God’s tree of life bearing fruit for God’s kingdom until Christ comes in his final victory!

Our practice this week is to find images of transformation in your world. You could take photos and post them to your Facebook page, you could make a collage from magazine photo cut outs, or you could write a poem of the images you find in your life. Offer this experience to God and give thanks for the new creation that is at work in your life!

Joy and Peace, Cornelia

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