Living life this way is a blessing

Surrender, Grace, Focus, Wonder
Living life this way is a blessing

A few years ago walking home from the beach I hear a loud voice tell me to stop, turn and look across the harbour to homes on the edge of the sea, it’s the voice of my grandmother. Demanding, firm, wise and loving, for years I listen to her council and am  comforted by her presence.

“You will live there in the end house on the point of land facing that tiny Grace islet”

A series of dreams deepens the message from grandmother as she takes me to the house and shows me living within.

A year later I meet a woman, friend of the deceased owner of this house who asks if I want to see inside.  Lovely experiences like this often come my way.  We had just sold our small farm property and were about to leave on a two month painting retreat in France.

With Grandmothers insistence I contacted the inheritor, perhaps he would rent it to us on our return from France.

He amazingly said yes! and gave us a two year lease. We left for France, our belongings safe in our new home waiting for our occupancy on return. I begin in earnest to ask grandmother why was it so important to live in this house.

The most inspiring dreams occur.

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Song Of The Universe

Celebrating a dream manifest to reality

Dreams are the stuff of my imaginal realm

Fulfilling instructions a dream gives is sometimes difficult.

My connection to spirit fuel my paintings, they are threads that weave into the enormous web of life. Dreams speak loud. Will I fulfill the life contract I am asked to express, be the hollow reed, embrace the illumination I am gifted. Each choice matters each choice shapes the character of who I am. Each choice resonates for all to feel.

 I merge into five days of intense hands on learning and fulfillment, making a physical manifestation of a dream that had come to me months before.

 

Under the wings of a master goldsmith I fashion a brooch that represent experiences I have, dreams over the past year ask to come to life.

My medium is usually paint on paper. But more is asked of me. I stretch my comfort to fabricate these visions and meaning into a brooch.

Martin Ebbers, a German master goldsmith with over thirty years of award winning excellence accepted me into studio. From 10- 6pm for five days he coaches me on the alchemy of molten metal.

France Originals – Gallery Showing April 2, 3, 4

Click to see show paintings

Painting in France to an art show on Salt Spring Island

“Spring in France is a wayside blossoming. The southwest a burst of viridian green meadows feed ample cows and sheep that dot this fairytale landscape. Squares of land sing as dandelions carpet landscape. Plum, cherry, pear in quick succession welcome bees as farmers prepare market gardens, help birth lambs and and put the newest foals out to pasture. Every curb is array with a graduation of colour. Daffodils, tulips, irises, while colour climbs and softens stone walls drape cracks of crumbled age, now afresh with delicate wisteria. Hanging clouds of mauve foam lazily trail over trellises as we devour our lunch quiche washed down with the lightest of wines from the region.

A Road Trip South

Mt Shasta California

Winter 2015 the American South West calls. I search for warmth and quiet time to ponder new paintings and stories.
We allot three weeks away to drive some of the spectacular California coast between Carmel  and Santa Barbara, settle for ten days in Palm Desert for sun, swim, yoga and reading, then to slowly make our way back home to Salt Spring Island. It becomes a leisurely drive of deep conversation, spawned by thought provoking pod casts. An awesome drive for the natural beauty that evokes silence and wonder.
The Oregon countryside is green rolling lush with tucked in farms, grazing sheep and cattle. The vistas to Mount Shasta, its majesty clearly defined sends shivers of remembrances for previous dreams triggered by this energy vortex. This time is no exception as reverie swallows me, I travel into the snow capped mountain to visit the Crystal Cave with towers of milky calcite lite from an inner source. A resonance sends chills down my spine. Drip drip, liquid lime echoes past me down a black corridor. At the cave entrance Lake Shasta is many meters below. Steep sloped muddy bank meet a flattened lake a shadow of its former self. My lucid dream fades as our drive

A Walking Meditation

A CURIOUS WALK, again in 2015

I walked a circumambulatory journey around my island home. A walking meditation with attention for the love I feel for Salt Spring Island and the precious Earth we inhabit.  I write about this walk in my April blog 2012. Five years hence my remembrance is curious. I had the thought that this undertaking be a grand walk the length and breadth of Salt Spring on main roads, forest pathways, coastal  beaches and through main villages. I surrender to however long it takes.  I walk an average of 2 hours each day ultimately covering over 150 kilometers. I begin each walk where I left off marking my place with prayer flags and blessing the walk with gratitude for each experience . I see this walk a pilgrimage, one of many in my life.  Curiously

Painting where the veils are thin between imaginal and real.

Newsletter December 2014

I am a storyteller.  From travels and dream I draw on characters that guide me to lands real and imagined.

My north light studio cantilevers over Ganges Harbour.  The  bay is a constant thrill of bobbing boats, sea planes coming and going, fishermen hauling crab nets as gulls swirl, dive and play in the fragrance of briny morsels.  Today the water is a platinum jiggling jelly.
Last night the sea an awareness……
The wind howls and slaps waves against the rocky shore below.  A star filled heavens blink, nod and carry me to DreamTime of other velvet nights pricked with thousands of stars.  I lean over boat rail to view a mirrored reflection of the cosmos a swirl of effervesce illuminates the aqua radiance.  Bear comes to me.
I have received many bear gifts, stone carvings, a bear claw, a deer skin drum with a beautiful painted bear gifted by a shamanic healer who led me on several sweat lodges.  Rereading  journals  I discover my drawings of bear and writings of

Toujour Amour

France a love affair of countless journeys over decades I  surrender to its warm embrace and paint from my heart. A year lived  in Provence.  A walk on a 1,000 year old pilgrimage path in Languedoc.  Sojourn by aqua Mediterranean to experience colour through the eyes of Chagall, and Renoir.  “Toujour Amour” is a love of everyday France. The swoon of castle tops on The Dordogne,  or a sip of wine under a gnarled olive tree.

These newest paintings are experiences, whispered secrets in fifteenth century stone hamlets it’s slate roof tops glint in evening luminescence. Stone homes burnished, ages worn brightened in each season.  Iris, wisteria, rose, a moving tapestry of life lived to fullest.

Time lost in Fairytale hamlets and deep in prehistoric caves awakens as I stir pigment and water.  My imaginings energize on canvas.  I surrender, to the breath of ancient, myth, magic.  I vision a story, a design of simplistic line, movement of multilayered beasts rendered by 14,000 year old artists on the  walls of Lascaux.

I ask what is it that calls to be painted then feel the cord of creativity, a soul lust urges me to express and sing my experience.  Energy bubbles and yearns to be repeated through the filters of my perception, this France is a toujour amour.