Day 9: Making a Mess

Ok now I feel like I've really, completely made a mess of this painting. I've been pushing it too much that it's now overworked. Too much thinking. That never gets me to my best work. I have to be empty when I get to the canvas. I have to be breathing well. I need to work on my issues away from the piece for now. Need to do some yoga. That's what Day 10 should be about. Then I'll be ready to just be open to it.

Day 8: Paintings Up

Edber and I finally got most of the paintings up. Just enough so I can figure out where to place the ones I haven't finished yet. Composing the arrangement of paintings in a room is a different medium (Where's Myk when you need him?!). It involves seeing which paintings are conversing with each other. I wanted to make it an imperfect balance. To have something slightly off. Still figuring out the logistics of having an opening reception.

Day 7: Etymology

A phrase kept ringing in my head for the last couple of days: "And then she invented the word, "Open". I was thinking what the world must have been like before this word arrived on someone's lips. I think of how in Mecca's world, things must still belong to oneness. Things must still bleed into each other. Then, one day, we point to something and say, "apple". And the apple becomes separate from everything else---becomes an object in her consciousness. Then, the illusion begins.

I thought of how language fortifies the illusion that we are separate (you--me) but keeps us together as well. I used to be more in tune with Mecca's mind. I used to know what she needed, almost instantly. Now, there's this gap that separates us. Maybe it started when she realized that I wasn't one of her limbs. Now we both get frustrated with this disconnection. We need language to connect us again. Things are happening naturally this way. Otherwise, if we were psychically connected all the time, why bother speaking?

This brings me to the word, "Open". What was it like when there was no word for this concept/feeling/thing ? When I painted today I wrote down the phrase--with a little change:

and
then
on a particularly gray day,
she invented the word,
OPEN
(and it was a good word)


Maybe this word wasn't invented to describe a concept. Maybe it was a command. A spell.

Cocoon

In the mind's cocoon
is a lotus
giving birth
giving breath
to constellations
the stars sing
vibrations that set
the lotus on fire.

Every cocoon
is a temple.
Every temple
must be on fire.

In the mind's cocoon
is a lotus
giving birth
giving breath
to a city with iron wings.
The city is made of
wielded,
welded sparks
sparks that set
the lotus on fire.

The mind is a cocoon.
The cocoon is a temple.
Every temple must be on fire.

Fire transforms
mountains to skyscrapers
skyscrapers to dust
dust to constellations
constellations to music
music that makes fire.

A mind on fire makes butterflies
Butterflies are flowers
that have learned
how to fly.
In my mind's cocoon
is a lotus
a lotus
on fire.

Day 6: Away Part 2

I need some time to just sit and breathe. I don't want the work to come from pressure. That never turns out well for me. I'm not one of those bits of coal that turns into a diamond from pressure. Maybe I'm a bit of coal that's just loving the experience of being a bit of coal. Dreaming of one day turning into fire that starts a chain of magical events.

Painted over the conquistador painting yesterday. It's not that I'm starting over. I'm just building over what's there. Adding history to it. I've got to find my peace before I continue with it. I'm writing this with a huge migraine and with Mecca feeling sick, too. Our bodies are telling us something. Mine is actually screaming at me with this migraine. I have to listen to what it's saying.

I have to take a double dose of gratitude today. That's my antidote to everything.

Day 5: Late Blog Away from Work:

Painted on Monday, May 11th, but didn't do the blog until today, May 13th. I felt like I forced it that day. I'm not the kind of person that can paint through a lot of emotional stress. This is just such a huge, packed week for me and for little family.

Brought Mecca with me to the gallery to paint. She did much, much better than I did. She went for it and looked good.

It occurred to me how she does everything so naturally. Right now, reasons to avoid doing things do not exist for her. There is only reason to go for it. I've learned (more like confirmed)from observing Mecca early on that Desire is a bigger impetus to act than fear. Most of her learning from birth has to do with desire. Learning how to walk was not an exercise in fear. It was an exercise in desire. The desire to explore the world around her.

I've learned so much about being human from being a mother. More on this later. Right now, it's time to let the painting breathe. I have to find its soul later.

Day 4: Listening Away

I felt like I had to step away from the painting today. I need to listen. I need to really SEE it when I come back. Sunday is Mother's Day, so I'll be back to the gallery on Monday.

From Listening: My gift today is knowing what the gift is.

Swoosh <2009> By Mecca Mamisao and Chati Coronel <72"X48"> Acrylic on Canvas


Day 3: Swoosh, Priming, Conquistadors and Eternal Wonder

I finished Swoosh today. I came into the gallery and knew I had to do more work on it. After meditation, I wrote on the canvas: We are twinkling, fluctuating stars. Mass-Energy-Mass. Mass-Light-Mass. And that was it. I knew it was done.

Painting #2:

I spent a lot of time priming the second canvas today. Priming is a big deal to me,a big part of the process of painting. It's not just about making sure that the surface is even and prepped for the color that will be painted over it. It's the start of the painting itself. Because it comes right after my meditation ( I do 100 breaths or a session of chanting before I paint), priming is a direct extension of my meditation.

Today, I got a lot of insight while priming:

First, I realized that by priming the canvas, I am giving this piece of cloth its history. And because paint comes in varying degrees of transparency, a lot of this history shows through my work. Much like people carry their history with them whether they mean to or not.

Then, I looked at my hand and thought about my history. Specifically, the history of my hand. This led to my next insight. I watched my hand make brushstrokes and thought of my ancestors. I thought about my ancestors' hands. The DNA coursing through my hand is the same as the DNA in theirs. Same as that hand somewhere in history that threw a spear through someone's heart. That picked coconuts from a tree. That hand that held a rail to board a Spanish Galleon or that hand that scribbled equations on a blackboard. Or that hand that held another's for 50 years.

I thought about the simplicity and the magnitude of the history of my hand. And how all that history goes into each brushstroke. I blessed this painting with the power of all my ancestors. More importantly, with this painting I blessed all the hands that made mine.

As I was finishing up for the day, I thought about the people that say painting is dead. How can it be dead when it is still filled with so much wonder? Painting is a mystery I never want to solve.

Day 2: Swooshing, Painting with Mecca



I think I will change my start time at the studio. I try to get there by 8 am but Edber and I haven't perfected our system yet. I still make breakfast--made banana nutella crepes today-- and then make my way downstairs. I love slow breakfasts. I have to really enjoy that coffee. Living , being very very alive is giant a part of this process!

Edber's finishing a project so I took Mecca with me. Mecca and I have drawn together but this is the first time we painted with each other. She chanted with me, too! She was saying Ommmmm with her hands together. Such an amazing creature. We walked around the gallery while chanting. We blessed the space with our voice. I love Mecca's voice. I can't wait to have conversations with her. I guess painting IS our conversation today.

I had a dream the other night that we had moved some big shelf in our place and suddenly, our place opened up. Expanded. I feel like this is what painting is doing to my heart. I move molecules and then my heart opens up. Expanding.

Mecca and I started today by painting a new layer over the last one. The color of milk. Mecca made some squiggly marks on the side. White on white. Looked like Japanese script. I loved it. Her strokes made the painting feel very zen--especially because she was making these marks from top to bottom.

Then I wrote the word SWOOSH! which will probably be the title of the piece. I was thinking of a quote from Bjork about going down to the bottom and then going swoosh! This was my swoosh! I was happy to be swooshing with Mecca. I am happy that Mecca blessed this painting, too.

I think I'm onto something. This fits. This makes sense to me. Looks like a strange looking flower, I think I will continue with this thread. I can see the difference in my strokes. Squiggly like Mecca's, playful, childlike but very decisive. There is nothing tentative about them. I have blessed this painting with my whimsy and my big courage, today.

Open Studio

I am creating a new thread with this blog to coincide with painting in a new space at the Groundfloor@Santeecourt gallery. I'll be painting there every morning from 8am to 12 pm (except Tuesdays and Saturdays). I'm opening the studio during these hours to invite people to come in and see/ be part of the process. My love and gratitude flies out to Chris and Andrew and Sarah for sharing the space with me.



Day 1: A New Open Listening

I am listening through the brush again. Breathing, blessing through the brush again. Today I set up my painting office, which is a trunk on wheels, at the gallery on the ground floor of the building where we live.

It felt like an old tune in my head. A very very old hum coming back into my heart and my mind. Like I never lost a beat. It felt like home. My home/hum moving through me. I felt plugged into the source. Easy.

Here's my theory. If I can somehow contain a blessing--the light vibration of something good and nourishing--in canvas, push it in there with paint, then that blessing can shine out of that piece of cloth into the space where it's placed. Maybe I can change the vibration in a room-the quality of energy that people are immersed in. Maybe this is how to encourage peace and happiness into another's life. Crazy, no? Ambitious, but I'm going for it.

I started my first two blessing vessels today. Worked on the first layer. As usual, my listening first brought words. Open here now listening being. Om shri maha lakshmiyei swaha (my abundance, health, creativity mantra). Words opened up to color. I'll let it sit that way in space until I paint next. I want to feel it change the energy in that room.