Wobbling the Paradigm

Wobbling the Paradigm utilizes various markings and printed materials to allow the literal and metaphoric layering to express new levels of collaboration with the field exploring the Underworld. Relinquishing adornments is key to the Underworld journey initiation to prepare for a shift in identity.

The Underworld like all mythological realms is layered over our everyday reality and yet is not named as such until it blindsides us. Moving from the challenge of trauma into mythos is a different journey than going from understanding of the mythic realm into adversity. The mind can discount the Underworld at our finger tips but our body knows when we enter, be it the DMV, a divorce or critical care. There are different ways to navigate, but it helps to know the terrain and the currency. In Underworld we enter consciously the mythic dimension through winter by preparing with shattering, dissolving, relinquishing adornments of identity. This gallery is from that experience.

Underworld through Somatic-Imagery

This was an experiment in creative process to shift in scale from paper substrate to large canvases using monoprint collage, blackboard paint, cold wax and oil paint. The fundamental approach is the ancient art of shape-shifting, becoming like other in order to expand awareness by embodied experience, often increasing understanding and lack of understanding. There was an exploration of ancestors, as well as making more conscious the presence of guides and mentors.

The Edge Between Worlds: Blackboard Series  

The Blackboard Series came from an Imaginal Journey into the gaze of a large Leather-back Sea Turtle. A dense blackboard kind-of-void surrounds me that I could mark and erase. It also felt to be marking and erasing in me. And as it happens blackboard-ness can be purchased at the hardware store in pints. The three paintings on canvas, Creative Wellspring—Hawaiian Dancer, Slip-of-Self—a Garment and Sumo Wrestler are framed with a mathematical equation/diagram that the blackboard surface invited.

Touched by San Miguel de Allende

San Miguel de Allende, Mexico sits carved out of indigenous material with the tools of 15th century Spanish colonialization. Ringing cathedral bells bring Los Indigos brightly dressed to market day to sell their wares to European ex-pats who balance the drug cartels in an uneasy alliance. Like what is not said in many other cities, here it comes to our fingertips from every surface. This is a place of texture—tactile, haptic—physical, emotional, cultural and historical that pours in like braille with information past the sight-dominated orientation. The marking retreat in San Miguel posed many more questions than it answered exposing colonialization as a form of the Underworld.

Moloka’i

The spirit of Moloka’i Island bubbled up through the studio floor, from morning to evening into my body without pause. It was an honor to be in that land of another world—of a world with the sad veneer of colonization.

Shell’s Dream
Diptych 2/2

Island Pollination
Diptych 2/2

Moon Rising
From The Bathtub
Diptych 2/2

Dancers Dream
Diptych 2/2

Dancers Dream
Diptych 2/2

Molokai Dancers
Triptych 3/3

Á la Wolf Kahn

Using a palette from an artist different from your own is a way to extend habitual ways of perceiving and responding. Wolf Kahn, with his electric colors, is like an energy drink to get things moving in the morning. All senses are put at the threshold of perceptions.

Á la Wolf Kahn

Threshold Through Mixed-Media

The spontaneity of at-hand materials (found objects, repurposing familiar materials etc.) invites in new data synchronistic to Wobbling the Paradigm further. The theater expression of the ‘fourth wall’ is a good metaphor for this series of work. What happens when a new aspect in the system is opened up to reveal information that requires another kind of engagement? Old concepts have to be redefined with unfamiliar resources. This series plays with this moving threshold.

Triptych Paper Dolls