Winter Wonders: Visual Meditation
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts (photos taken over the Christmas holiday while at Whistler, British Columbia)
January 4, 2008
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts (photos taken over the Christmas holiday while at Whistler, British Columbia)
The Earth will be going on a long time Before it finally freezes; Men will be on it; they will take names, Give their deeds reasons. We will be here only As chemical constituents- A small franchise indeed. Right now we have lives, Corpuscles, Ambitions, Caresses, Like everybody had once- Here at the year’s end, at the feast Of birth, let us bring to each other The gifts brought once west through deserts- The precious metal of our mingled hair, The frankincense of enraptured arms and legs, The myrrh of desperate, invincible kisses- Let us celebrate the daily Recurrent nativity
As I mentioned the other day, Waverly Fitzgerald has created a French Revolutionary Wall Calendar which features my nature photographs illustrating the seasonal theme of the particular month in the French Revolutionary calendar, for instance, January is Snowy/Rainy, and each day is marked with the item meant to be honored on that day. Usually these are plants and trees; every day ending in 5 honors an animal and every day ending in 0, a tool. She will be shipping the first orders out the last week of this year. The calendar costs $16 for the print version including shipping ($10 if you want to
I am out at my hermitage and forgot to bring my camera, so I can’t show you what I’ve been working on. So instead I did a lap around the Sacred Arts Ring and offer you much beauty to peruse below. I will be posting for the Solstice on Friday and then taking a blogging break until the new year. I’d still love to hear your comments and feedback on the previous post, so thank you to everyone who has commented or emailed so far. I want to offer a warm welcome to the two newest members of the Sacred Arts Ring:
“a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots a bud shall blossom.” -Isaiah 11:1 (from the second Sunday of Advent) Yesterday I gathered together all of the images I had found of my aunt and uncle (my mother’s siblings) as children and worked on creating something for each of them as a gift this Christmas. I am not very close to my uncle so I am not sure how this will be received, but I felt the need and desire to create it. This journey of reaching back across time and telling these stories through image
I haven’t posted my own art in a couple of days mostly because I have gotten absorbed in sifting through photo bins and selecting more images for future work and then scanning them into the computer to reprint. I have noticed a little twinge of guilt rise within me — you said you were going to make art every day during Advent, aren’t you letting this preparation of materials take too long? Ah my inner-taskmaster, I have actually grown fond of her as she often helps me to get things done, however I have also learned to recognize when
Tim You’ve only just arrived Now you’ve begun to go My God, how much I love you How my whole body aches with The glory that is you. Constantly changing, sometimes slowly, Sometimes in one heartbeat Or the blink of an eye. Becoming, always becoming, your self. Already my hands rest open You sitting there in the palm of my hand Stretching your wings Testing the wind Learning to fly. -Rebecca Johnson ***** Rebecca was a participant in our most recent Awakening the Creative Spirit program. She came with perhaps the least background in
I thought some of you might be interested to see the original photos I cropped to make the art piece for Monday’s Poetry Party. The woman on the top was my paternal grandmother Erika who died when I was one year old. The middle woman I actually don’t know, I found her photo among the others and loved the way she was looking at the camera. She is connected to my family in some way, but it is still a mystery. The woman in the bottom photo was my great grandmother, Erika’s mother Ernestine, but she went by Erna. Erika and
This journey of making art for Advent has been an illuminating one for me, as I take time to be with the images of people who are a part of my very lifeblood and discover how their stories are precisely my own story. Sometimes this commitment of making art means just showing up and allowing whatever unfolds to happen, even if it doesn’t feel as done or revealing as some of the other art I have been making. Such is the case with the piece above, it is only a waystation to something else, but I decided that if I didn’t finish a piece one day,
I got a very gracious email from Jan Richardson, whose book Night Visions I highly recommended here a couple of weeks ago as my all-time favorite Advent resource. She reported that she is now sold out and hopes to have it re-published by next year. But she also shared with me an Advent blog she has created: The Advent Door — even more of her wonderful art and words for me to savor. I’m looking forward to making a cup of tea and lingering there for a while. So head on over for a visit, but before you do, make sure to