Grace and a Show

Up Coming Gallery show announcement: Lucia Douglas Gallery, Bellingham, WA. Feb. 3-25th. A three person show with Cass Nevada, 2-D artist, and Brian O'neill, potter.
Opening reception: Thursday, Feb. 2. gallery website here.

"Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.--Emerson

This is how I try to begin each new year. A new start... with a look forward, not behind. I usually start with making lists for the year.. because I am a list maker. But this year I decided to give in to this word that has been at the edge of the shadows in my brain for awhile now-- GRACE... because I want more of it in my personal and art life. I found this quote some time ago: how you climb up the mountain is just as important as how you get down the mountain. and so it is with life, which for many of us becomes one big gigantic test followed by one big gigantic lesson.
in the end it all comes down to one word, grace. it's how you accept winning and losing, good luck and bad luck, the darkness and light. You can not separate your life from your art.

self portrait, collage

"You can have other words-chance, luck coincidence, serendipity. I"ll take grace. I don't know what it is exactly, but I'll take it." --- Mary Oliver.

"My belief is that it is most important for an artist to develop an approach and philosophy about life---if he has developed this philosophy, he does not put paint on canvas, he puts himself on canvas." -- Jacob Lawrence

I asked several friends to send me their description of the word GRACE. Some of these friends I know in my personal life and art, and some of them have connected with me online in the blog world.

Janna Gougeon, encaustic and collage, blog here.
"Two meanings come to mind: a gift of spirit.. always there..not always recognized; the second: with gentleness, sensitivity, respect, understanding."

Robyn Gordon, detail, wood carving. Blog here.
"Grace is the thread of goodness that meanders through my life...from the wild calls of Loeries at dawn, or the answer to a prayer. I find that we need to slow down to appreciate those moments of grace or we tend to miss many of them.

Ruth Armitage, acrylic, yupo paper. Blog and website here.
"Grace is when one exhibits apparently effortless kindness and acceptance. It is the most beautiful of the personal qualities because it is motivated by love for the world and mankind."

Tangie Belmore, acrylic and collage, website here.
Tangie believes Grace to be this: "an elegant sensibility of focus and passion with authentic composure. Serene, warmth, beauty, refinement, sensitive, calm, wisdom."

Leslie Avon Miller, collage, blog here.
"Tension is who you think you should be, relaxation is who I am. That is grace."

India Flint, eco (natural) print dyes on fabric. blog here.
"It is a word that I associate with my (late) maternal grandmother--who I never saw responding to any situation, no matter how stressful, with anything other than grace (even to me when I was a vile teenager). It is something I aspire to, not only as a person but also in my work, to have it appear as such, seemingly effortlessly formed, despite the turmoil that lies behind.

Nancy Neva Gagliano, her 'rapt' rocks series, blog here.

Grace surrounds me, and you,
Meshing us together.
Its that vibration blanketing our souls,
Protecting and nuturing.
And, Grace comforts me as it eases into awareness
In a moment of contemplation, during a pause,
Or during a time of appreciation,
Washing away worries when a slow breath is exhaled.
Grace is always there.
I am the one that is occasionally absent.
--- Nancy Neva Gagliano, January 21, 2012.

...INNER STILLNESS

It seems keeping company with stones is
Keeping company with eternity
From such a distant place
That still resides in me.
We hear it in silence.
We feel it in stones.....
And you release it in this gathering together.
----- Neva Gagliano

The above piece of poetry was written by Neva who also sent me these wrapped rocks and heart shaped rock. Her wonderful blog is called Openings Connecting and you can find it here.

Newest acquisitions: One Ammonite and two trilobites - fossils

"Although cycles of time can express permanence, in the garden the clearest symbol of eternity is the rock, an image of the mountain." Marc Peter Keane, The Art of Setting Stone

"I speak of naked stones.. in which there is both concealed and revealed a mystery that is slower, more vast, and heavier than the destiny of a transitory space." Roger Caillios

The stone was there before the wind,
before the man, before the dawn:
its first movement
was the first music of the river.
---- Pablo Neruda, Stones of the Sky

In Japanese gardens, compostion follows from placement of the first stone: all elements become interconnected. The same can be said for painting, or collaging papers, or assemblage. We make decisions whenever we make a mark, place a paper, paint a shape, or attach an object. There is something in the artistic experience, in the moment of creation, that is entirely onto itself, private and untransferable. Finding this stillness within ourselves for every moment of creativity, is our connection.

ELEGANCE

All that is cared for.

Left Alone in the stillness

In that pure silence married

to the stillness of nature.

---- Linda Gregg

"Because I cannot work except in solitude, it is necessary that I live my work and that is impossible except in solitude."
----- Pablo Picasso, 1881-1973