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Earth and Trail, 4Earth and Trail, Down to Earth
Earth and Trail, down to earth, head in the clouds, feet on the ground, grounded, air head, ethereal lightness of being. Straight and narrow. The road less traveled. I did it my way. Straighten up and fly right.
This year I have painted most everyday, but slowly, with lots of breaks spent outdoors. I have ignored trying to market my art and have had no shows this year. I have vegetated, and grown my roots. Tendrils strong and weak probing the moist Louisiana earth.
I painted the series, "POP Religion", in about 2011 to 2014. A series that occupies a small corner of slanted thinking, A niche of convoluted confabulation. I invented a multilayered charming theory, a personal pantheon, a fantastic theology, and communicated it with pictures and words. http://janetboydart.blogspot.com/p/pop-religion.html So, I spent a few years on an idiosyncratic body of work. I had two small shows in 2014. A solo show of about 18 POP Religion pictures at Donna Duffy's beautiful Tripolo Gallery and two paintings included in an Antennae Gallery show curated by Gerald White. I received a lot of good and satisfying praise from these shows. But...but...people often made comments about the strangeness of the work. And, "Why don't you paint landscapes?" To which I huffily replied, "Everyone paints landscapes." I have a close connection with nature. I live on acreage in the deep country and take walking meditations in the woods, swamps and creek banks here. Landscapes have frequently popped up in my work over the past decades. And, so, I began to paint landscapes more seriously. This gave my poor overwrought mind a bit of a rest. That inner radio still buzzes, at times, with arabesques of thought knots, but not as cacophonous as before. The pictures still suggest a depth of experience. I spent the whole year painting landscapes. Gently absorbed with layout, color, brushstrokes and portrayal of subjective material imagery. I hope you like these pictures.
The year 2015 is closing with short sunny days and long dark nights. My best time is spent pruning the woods. With hand tools I carve trails and small fields in the fervent, fertile Louisiana jungle. I dream of collaborating with nature to create a paradise of beauty and wild food. My collaborator has her own ideas. Canopy falls and flooding and febrile unstoppable natural growth oft go astray from my impossibly idealistic plans.
With hand tools, pruner and large branch cutter, my current gardening project is carving out an elder patch. In the rich and damp soil close to the creek, Elder grows wild. She grows wild, but competes with the devilish privet and the aggressive wild grape. Elder is beautiful, provides food and medicine. Her ancient reputation asserts majical powers.
I believe in ten impossible before breakfast. I believe in the impossible, because belief in the arid rational, that which consensual reality considers real, depresses me. What with the warming climate, and the twisted politicians, and the immeasurable number of refugees running for their lives, things that I know I cannot change. I believe in my own self created, voluntary delusions to get me through the day. Out damn spot. Text message Mr. Clean.
I believe in creating a belief system with roots and branches. I believe in keeping your belief systems lite. Because, we are frequently wrong.
I believe that one small person with a few hours a week and small tools can create a natural wild food garden. I believe that I can encourage the wild plants that I want for their beauty or utility, that I can make a trail flourishing with wild nutrition, there for the picking. Come see, you can walk and nibble delicious wild things, until your tummy is satisfied. Bring back Eden, make friends with the snake.
Maybe, I have a thousand years to encourage the useful plants and "weeds". Well, no, that wont happen, my brain, though flexible, cannot ignore insidious insipid decrepitude. Impossible dreams.
I believe that I can be compassionate and loving in all my encounters with fellow humans. Well, I try to be compassionate, but true deep understanding is beyond my abilities to love, so I will try to just be kind and present. My intentional attention, my focus and eye contact, will assist a dear person to jettison their sincere belief of finding the savior in a bottle. Sure, I believe that.
I believe that I might not be totally human, but an alien high bred. Scratch that one, I don't want you to think that I am a nut.
Is that ten?? Ten impossible beliefs? Impossible things, but necessary for me, for a mind set that keeps me on an even keel, that hides the confusion inside, that may even pass as consensual reality sanity.
Impossibly, I believe, that nature will provide if you give her enough compost and kisses. Some strong, but weak idea that I can get a divorce from the consumer role at the grocery store, I want relief from trying to choose the softest and most economical tissue paper from a cacophony of choices. I believe that I can eat wild leaves with ten times the nourishment of canned spinach, and ten times the taste bud satisfaction. See me ambling in the woods, eating a leaf here and there. My feet barely touching the ground. Almost levitating. Well, not really.
Elderberry Plant
Elder berry plant, sambucus nigra, is a small tree that grows prolifically when give its own space. The flowers are beautiful, perfumed, and make a heavenly cordial. The berries are used for wine, jam, and medicinal preparations. The trunk has a hollow core that is made into flutes. But the trunk is poisonous and must be dried before putting to the lips.
The mythology of elder goes back to pagan times. The plant was, sacred, used in ritual for the Goddess. See the above link for details.
Well, dear friends and readers, I will go now, with my small tools, and labor to remove the undesirable privet and grape. from the Elder patch. I will assign another patch for the delicious wild and sweet grapes. Then after an hour or so of gentle exercise, I will go to the studio and put another thin wash of translucent paint onto thick pebbly textured paper.
These paintings "Earth and Trail", have been created in this year of 2015. They are 16"X20", acrylic on Strathmore paper. I hope that you like them.
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