A Timeline Spiral of Art and Life

I am becoming a student again. On May 5th I begin a course in Botanical Chemistry and on June 22nd I begin a year long course on Helenistic Astrology. The synchronicity of events since my walk through Parc André Citroën in the summer of 2021 has landed me where I am now, embracing those basic threads of my life that have been constant since my arrival on the wonderful planet Earth. 

What are some of those threads? The mysterious nature of plants and all that they give in the form of beauty, medicine, dye molecules, geometric patterns displaying strength of materials and durability. From plants we can make paper, fabric, woven baskets, ropes, buildings, rubber, plastics, glues, dyes, inks and pigments. We can nourish ourselves with roots, leaves, berries and fruits. Plants decay and nourish the soil for other plants.  They communicate with one another through underground networks. 

The nature of rocks is equally fascinating. Rocks and minerals can also be ground into a fine powder for use as pigments.  The geometric structure of rocks, crystals and minerals inspire designs, patterns and structures. The intensity of colours is outrageous and beautiful. 

"Piezoelectric crystals are a class of crystalline materials capable of inducing changes in charge distribution and generating electric field responses through mechanical stress. The unique properties of this material make it useful in many fields, especially in sensor technology and energy conversion." (from Stanford Advanced Matrials website)

The patterns of both plants and rocks has always fascinated me.  Within the patterns, even as a young child, I found rhythms, harmonies and disharmonies of life's journey.  The patterns rang true for not only the individual human but the collective experience of humans moving along the bumpy path from birth to death.  We are not as solitary as we might imagine, or might want. Humans connect, disconnect and connect again not only with other humans.  We also connect and disconnect from nature.  It is when we disconnect from nature that imbalance occurs.

In my major attempt to sort through more than a dozen portable hard drives of images created over my lifetime, I'm seeing both the forest and the trees.  Recurring shapes, themes, styles and techniques become more obvious over several decades of work produced in sketchbooks and on canvases. I'm putting together short videos of images grouped in different ways, by medium, by theme, by stages in life.

By creating a timeline of my art, I'm able to reconstruct a timeline of my life. Helenistic astrology offers more lenses through which to view the events on the timeline and the surprising connection those events have with the planetary alignments that occurred during those times.  The art I created also reflects the influence of those cosmic energetic forces. I'm feeling inspired and motivated to connect the dots and see what sort of art will evolve from the merging of my passions and curiosity.

The weekly meeting of Art Book Club Sketchbook Story Time ignited the fire within me to take a deeper, more honest look into what has driven me to become the artist I am and to continue to fuel that artist to stretch the limits of exploration even further. Thanks to Jill Richards and her beautiful creative geometry drawings using a Blackwing pencil, both Carol and I are hooked on pencil drawing again!  The orbs are reappearing in my sketchbooks and the transcendental world nudges me to reopen some of the doors I closed over the years, unable to balance the transcendental with daily realities and demands. Discovering the work of Agnes Pelton has also been a recent influence.

I offer you a glimpse of pencil sketches I've done beginning in the 1970's and ending with the sketches I did on the train to New York City two days ago.  I met up with my dear friend Candyce to visit the renovated wing of the Museum of Natural History.  We've been waiting for years for it to be completed so that we could visit the Gem and Mineral exhibition again.  It was spectacular!