Gidget, Gadget and Gizmo

 

Gidget, Gadget and Gizmo

digital painting, print, 8/2013

 

 

 

Gidget, Gadget and Gizmo, these words kept chanting in my mind, replacing the CEO approved mantra that I intended to chant.  So, I made a picture of this silly trio.

 

POP Religion

The POP Religion show that was scheduled for 9/14/13, has been postponed.  We are working on a new date and venue.  I am disappointed to postpone the show, but good things are in the works.

 

Gulf Shores, Alabama

Last week we had a wonderful family beach vacation at Gulf Shores.  Much of the peninsula is protected park reserve, so we saw a lot of wild life.

 

Here is the wildlife sighting list:

 

Eagle! Perched high in a pine tree, then it flew away on mighty wings.

pelicans, blue herons, comic sand pipers, humming birds, gulls

dolphins

shark

one sting ray and two manta rays with six foot span

jelly fish

etc. , so forth and so on

rich nature

 

 

 

I have been so lucky to vacation at Gulf Shores since I was a kid and my uncle had a cabin there. 

 

Returning there at intervals has been a high light of my life.  I still play in the surf. 

 

 

A memory cherished.  I, the child, immersed in the boundless water, rocked by the surf.  Joy, nerve tingling joy, leaping in the ocean,  playing with my sisters and cousins. Sun so bright, bathed in light.  Enlightenment.

 

Also, I distinctly remember, the seventh and most powerful waves.  I, the child me, tumbled tail over head, in the turbulence.  Legs scraped by the sand.  Beach pizza legs.

 

Sleeping, big family snoring, windows open, in the surf song night.  The child tossing, sleep disturbed by sunburn lacerated with sand.  Misery.

 

Next morning, return to the rocking waters, joy, ecstasy, outweighing misery.

 

 

 

This last week they, the family, told me not to swim in the Gulf.  "Beware of sharks, stingrays and jellyfish!"  Sandy sunburn did not stop me then, these sea dwelling creatures will not keep me away now.

 

My mature adult sensitivities are different than childish nirvana.  But, floating and swimming in the waves,  I get a small taste, a faded reminder, of how it felt to be young and holistically immersed in a peak experience. 

 

 

The last day Dave and I walked the western tip of the Gulf Shores peninsula. Where the Mobile Bay and the Gulf meet. Waters there form a rich ecological zone, where currents collide and churn the water.  We dodged blobs of stranded jelly fish on the shore. 

 

That west tip must be the best shore fishing spot around, because fisher people were there with colorful day camp carts, coolers, striped umbrellas, cell phones, lines and bait.  We chatted with the fishers,  "You catch anything?" they were delighted to show the creatures that they caught.  A twenty five pound black drum;  a shark, small, about a three footer;  and a stingray, beached by a line, the fisher extracting the hook from it's strange mouth with plyers. 

 

Hmmm, all those nasty creatures are there at the western point.  In a short walk we saw all the biting, stinging life that THEY warned me about.  I will not swim there, but a bit east on the Gulf where it should be OK??

 

 

 

 



Lets Gossip Barbie, 3

Caffeinated Barbie

 

 

 

Prozac Barbie

 

 

Let's Gossip Barbie, 3

A short story in four parts 

 

Now listen Partie Hartie, never mind, I can see that you are tweeting about your fabulous life. Whatever.

 

Pussy, when I saw Ken blowing bubbles in his barf, I was soooo grossed out.  He is soo disgusting, to think I used to think he was hotsy. 

 

Camera man #3 turned and focused on the city block sized bed with a canopy made from the foreskins of whales.  He captured Elvis and Marilyn banging like baboons, but the screen swiftly switched to the Kitchen Kam. 

 

Loopy and Desi were standing on a pile of rubble with their hands on each others throats.  Did you know that dolls turn blue when they are strangled?

 

On the Immaculate Konception Kam the anniversary guest were undulating in a daisy chain.  OMG it was the grossest thing that I have ever seen.  I hate orgies, bodily fluids are slimy.  

 

The screen was twitching from one cam to another,  there were so many exciting things going on, the editor didn't know where to focus.  No one could write this shit.  It has to be real!

 

But the most interesting sight, listen up Pissy Hellion, EavesDropKam focused on Barb and Joe looking at each other with sizzling eyes.  The camera actually caught beams of electricity shooting between the two.  Then, wait til' you hear this! 

 

Barbie mumbled, "It is time for my mani-pedi", and slipped out the back door.

  

GI Joe mumbled, "It is time for my shooting practice", and slipped out the back door.

 

WHAT do you think about that,  Paris the Heiress?  Princess Hasbeen? I saw it with my own eyes.  They are doing it like dingbats.  It was right there on the screen anyone could see them sneaking out, making a stealthy amorous exit, with poor Ken dead to the world upstairs, dreaming of the third level of hell/heaven, one, the other, or a mash up of both in raging psychedelic technicolor . 

 

Anyone could see it. Barbie and Ken!  All the mainstream newcasters have ignored this story.  Mattel has bribed every news person between here and Mars.  Only the Natural Inquirer has been righteous enough to cover this tale of two nine inch dolls.  The Inquirer even ran a picture of them sexting.  You should see this,  look at my phone, here he is, GI Joe in his turbid toreador outfit with a tassel dangling from his tallywacker.

 

to be continued.....To continue reading the story, click "Newer Post" at the bottom of this entry.

 

 

 

 





 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Phoenix Dance

Phoenix Dance

 

 

Phoenix Dance

 The Persistence of Symbols of Rebirth 

 

 

 Phoenix is the comeback kid of mythology.  Phoenix is the rebirth and resurrection bird of persistent worship.  She lives a thousand years, for a thousand years she soars and sails, she surfs, on streams of cool clear air.  After an eon of living, her clock runs down, and then she fulfills her destiny to crash and burn.  From the purification of fire, from the ashes of her own autocremation the Phoenix is reborn to soar another thousand years. 

 

Lets face it y'all, life is hard.  Sometimes it seems that all is lost. Failure and exhaustion, are universally a part of human existence. It is a wheel, a roller coaster, an enlightening adventure. Success and joy, failure and defeat.

 

The wheel of Fortuna turns round and round.  We go up and we go down. We all know, there will be change, sunshine; before a driving rain. Light and dark, day and night, Our spirit, engaged will take a flight.

 

When we crash and burn,  we NEED to see the phoenix at the end of the tunnel. Hope keeps us going.  Hope is the sperm of rebirth.  DNA is in the egg and the egg is in the DNA. 

 

At the bottom swing on the wheel of Fortuna cycle, we may be crushed or we may tap into rebirth.  Mind, body and spirit are resurrected with the will to soar.  The ashes of defeat contain the diamonds of a comeback. 

 

 Phoenix analogies, regeneration myths are found in all cultures, world wide.  Universally cosmologies offer a resurrection from the ashes of failure story.  Russians, Native Americans, Turks, Pacific Islanders, Tibetans and Japanese offer regeneration mythologies.  The crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus also mines the human need for reinvention. 

 

The emblem of the Phoenix has been used frequently in  literature and movies.  Ex: " Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix."  Drug rehab facilities are named Phoenix, because even Lindsey Lohan may grab the reins of the marvelous Phoenix and rise to a pristine palace of potential.  Technologies and rockets are named for the bird of rebirth.  The rocket is in our soul, keep hope.

 

Universally throughout history, there is a cavernous human longing for the hope of rebirth.  The persistence of resurrection myths demonstrate the persistence of the human need for a comeback.

 

The Making of Phoenix Flying Dance

 

I finished this digital image today.  I am excited to see how the print will turn out.  I would like to further develop the image into an oil painting. I can not promise you that this will be created, because I have a lot of images in the pipeline.  Paintings are circling in my head like helicopters over Louis Armstrong airport after Katrina.  (Yea, I know, I used this metaphor already, but I like it enough for repetition.)

 

For reference, I harvested the ballet dancer image from the web.  In the tossing of the dancer image from web site to search engine, and all around the world, for forty times or more, the name of the exquisite dancer and the name of the master photographer, who captured her flying leap, frozen gracefully for all time in midair, have been, regretfully, lost.  Thus, it is called an orphan image.

 

 I changed the low rez web picture digitally. It has been totally painted in Photoshop.  Colors, lines, shapes, all have been interpreted.  If anyone can supply me with the names of the artists who created the image, I will be grateful to know and publish the contributors names. If the artists object to the mess that I have made of their beautiful creation, then I will destroy the pictures. 

 

Nothing is created in a vacuum.  Artists do not just pull a full blown creation out of the isolated personal cerebrosphere.  Inspiration comes from imagination, from experience, from nature, and especially from the creations of other artists.  Each artist interprets, creates, art from the soup of all that is.  There is a current of development flowing through all work. Artist have been borrowing from each other since the second fertility goddess was carved with stone from stone. And, there is persistent cross fertilization between the various artistic disciplines.  How blessed we are, to be able to stand on the shoulders of giants. 

 

Before digital painting, before web images, I scoured galleries, art museums, and books, with hungry eyes.  I now delight in the banquet of beauty and inspiration that I find so easily on my computer.  (But will never replace the nirvana of seeing an actual paint and canvas masterpiece.)  Artistic options, like the options of most other endeavors, have been expanded by the flickering pixils museum in a box.  Just as the new technology of photography fired the imagination of the impressionists, giving them the theory of broken light/broken color, in the latter decades of the 1800's, current technologies fire the creative edge of art today. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Kindred Spirit

 

 

 

 Circus of the Moon

Digital Painting, completed about a year ago

 

 

 

KINDRED SOUL WITH A THOUSAND EYES

On Monday, the first day of the work week, when I valiantly try to pull myself together, and when I try to organize confusion and rectify regression,  I phoned Hughes Net tech support.  We had been unable to get on the internet, something wrong with the connection.  We were unable to find out the latest exciting adventures of Kim Kardashian and Paris Harlot.  We were unable to buy more stuff,  from the comfort of our own home. I think that there is a little space left where we can stuff more stuff in the closet.  We were loosing track of our Facebook friends, what were they having for lunch?  Did they take a picture of their shrimp and oyster po-boy?  This was serious, something must be done.  

After finding the Hughes phone number, dialing, navigating the labyrinth of which button to push, getting a real person to talk to,  validating that I am really myself, being transferred, validating that I am me, being transferred, and assuring that I am still myself (by this time I was beginning to wonder if my multiple personalities were acting up again), I connected with Gandhi on the phone.  Gandhi is not his real name, I am sorry to say that I did not catch his name, but we will call him this most honorable of names. 

As I followed his directions, Gandhi, in his beautiful voice, walked me, patiently,  through various computer maneuvers. I followed directions and was soon ready to test the internet connection.  As my phone partner and I waited for the home page to open, I asked him,  "Where are you?"

"India."
"I am in Louisiana" spoken with the imperialistic assumption that he knew where the disaster and corruption state is located.
"How is the weather there".
"We have had too much rain, but I think that the sun is coming out.  Early spring is here, the huckleberry is blooming".
"Do you like nature?", Gandhi questioned.
"Yes, nature is important, it feeds the soul.  OK, the home page has loaded".
"OK, now see if it can pull up a web page."
I think, click for a web page.  Then say, "I am pulling up Wikipedia."
"That is unusual, not many people use that site".
"Not everyone is curious". I laughed.
"Ahh," he paused, " my father taught me,  'A person is born with two eyes, but, if he is curious and if he reads, then he has a thousand eyes'".
I thought, I processed words until the concept dawned, "That is wonderful,  I want to tell my children about that".
"I told my daughter, but she didn't listen".
"Some things are the same, the world over".

Wikipedia loaded.  We rang off with sincere thank yous.  I felt a bit warmer and happier. I wished that I had caught his name. I thought about the distance between us, and the differences in our situations. I thought about our voices traveling thousands of miles instantaneously. It was a chance, ephemeral meeting of kindred souls.  I wished that I had asked him to pull up my blog. If he left a message, then we could continue the dialogue.  I wished that I had said, occasionally, maybe, I wish, you/I speak wisely, perhaps it will come back to the children, in a few years, when they are ready.  See, you remembered what your father said.