Paintings imagery most often arises of its own impetus, only later informing me of content. The space between things gets wider with awareness. Shamanism is woven through the lives as those who go between realities. Artists of all disciplines as well as children, until they learn better, naturally connect to the life energies around them.
This image takes me back to Chejudo, the Japanese name of a small island off the southern coast of South Korea. Basaltic stacked boulders as fences crisscross the terrain where trees grow horizontally in the wind. At the center the island is a huge volcanic crater. From the rim you can see the sea on all sides with agile mountain goats dancing on the rim. The wild horses there were brought to island in ships by Genghis Khan in the Goryeo Kingdom, 918-1392.
When I was there staying there in a Buddhist temple, adjacent was an indigenous woman shaman who I found as I wondered at night looking for the chanting ritual of the nuns. She was a mudang who performed her nightly rituals by firelight. Like shamans all over the world, the mudang shape-shift into animals for knowledge and power. Later in a thatched house with basalt bolder walls I found something like a shaman museum filled with dust and spiderwebs. The fish-shape objects in a variety of carved materials is similar to Yin or Yang of that iconic symbol. It is a shape that finds its way into my paintings. I can feel the smooth polished shape, that represents the soul, in the palm of my hand before I recognize it in paint.
