windthread

 

so looking more.   There is the question of the prompt.   of Style and Substance.   I needed to think about the meaning of both words…in context of collage.   And specifically,  in the context of just these pages of collage.  They are all i have and all i can look to that would represent Style.   Just these.   So….not a lot for definitive interpretation,  Right?   I think i don't HAVE a style yet.  and then substance….does substance mean Story?,   what Story do they convey?  Do the images speak to some central  thought?  theme?  individually and then together?  And all this while wondering too if i might just not understand the terms?   

What came more into focus is that without ….intention….with just following the prompt and going through the Possibilities i repeated a core ummmmm,   a core…..well,  statement.   That is that the Ground upon which all my imaging rests IS a constant sense/awareness/response to  the thing of Spirit.   Or we can call it the belief in a Great Consciousness of this Earth and that in which it floats.   Another way…the Consciousness of Life .   And this then brought me to the first part of the prompt,  explore the visual dynamic between your creations and your sense of attachment to them.   This,  being just so clear.   How much i loved to find Spirit,  The Great Conscious,   in each.   It's just There.   No matter which images i chose.  It repeats so steadily.   And this has great meaning for me….attachment…not just to the pages but to the underlying pervasive  display of who i am to me  and how devoted i am whether i want to be or not,  to that relationship with the Great Consciousness.  I don't need to keep trying to find out more or justify either.   It's just what it is.   This also pulls in the making of the Evolution Cloth which was begun as a resolution work for coming to terms with my own realistic sense of the state of affairs of the planet.   And then,  the state of affairs of homosapiens.    The collage work and the cloth work are totally related.   And accomplish this Of Their Own Accord.   Without my even asking.   So….attachment?   Yes.  a Great sense of attachment and also gratitude.

 

a RAIN day,  all day and as relief from the round and round stitching of Evolution,  i began the first Bee.   There needs to be MANY bees.   Because Many Bees will be needed.

this is an image Acey sent.    When i do the Going Through Ritual of all the Possibilities i hold it a while  then continue on.  Today i held it a long time and thought i would want it as the final pages of this booklet.   It will require a double page.   I want to give this image GIFTS….surround it with Gifts.    It will be a different collage from my "usual".   I spent time with this today.  I was grateful for the space of time.   Like drawing in a deep breath.  Letting it out slow.   Having learned things.

i so much appreciate all the comments and Interest in this collage process.   SO much.   Thank you for each comment in the last days.    I hope for more as it goes along….to help me See.    And i might ask questions of You too.   I think that would be a good idea.

i am interested in hearing that there is a heightened sense of sadness perceived in these pages.     yesterday,  i talked about great sadness .  There is no other way possible to feel when living the momentum of destruction of so many lifeforms of this Earth.  But also then,  the collage image itself was to me comforting and yes….hopeful.  I am hopefull that somehow Spirit will prevail and there can be a continuation of human love in some form.   In the image,  i could say that after all is said and done,  Spirit will confer and re create what ever Spirit deems needed.   And my favorite part of the image is the form on the wrist of the Spirit on the right,   which i immediately and joyfully saw as an Earthworm.    What is more a symbol of Hope than a worm?  A worm in the garden of Gaia?  

the page above.   Maybe this one?   I probably should have explained this one.   The top image is of a  soccer goal net created by kids at a Syrian refuge camp.  With what was at hand.  presented in the Nat Geo article as an example of the incredible resilience of Spirit of children in the most dire circumstances.   The kids play.   And below,   a Healer in Venezuela who takes his patients into the river where they are supported by family as he works with the Spirit of the river to heal.  They become well.   Maybe she looks dead?  

otherwise,  what looks sad?   Tell me.   

 

 

so i followed the prompt for today and looked at them all together so far….almost half way through.   And i really,  like really love them and they are so much More than i would have imagined could come out of me.   I don't want to change any thing.

This month will,  i'm sure,  change my cloth making.  I am only working on the Evolution Cloth for the month.  Not starting anything new.  I want to wait.   

The paper collage so far for me is a personal dialogue with self.   a Conversation.   What's on your mind today, grace?  well, grace,  lookie here….and me an grace talk a while.   and figure out how to feel,  how to go forward,  how to love everything anyway.   It's more,  but that's enough for right now.   The cloth making is how i try to create image for Others.   Other human beings.   Images of What I Love Anyway,  everyday,  love so hard.

so…those are some thoughts.   There is another thing that is on my mind.  And anyone's thoughts about that will be greatly appreciated.   These collages,  unlike Acey's,  are made primarily with images that are the Art of other people.   The drawings and paintings Acey sent me and then all the Photographic art from National Geographics all the photographers.      It's the image that "makes" the collage.  It's the materials used that gives strength and beauty to whatever it is you Do with it.   An example is Jude's vast collection of incredible textiles…the megamendung for instance stands out,  but also….so much of her fabric isn't Ordinary.  and not easy or even possible to find if you go looking.    I use Deb Lacativa's .fabrics.   So…cloth is one thing.   But the collage is very much another for me.   I don't have a collection of paper anymore.  i don't have Interesting and Unusual images to draw from.   And i'm on the brink of feeling like i want to go in search of some but of equal weight,  i DON"T want to.  Nisargadatta: "do not add".     So.  This.  and also…crediting the artists.   I realized a little late that i don't give credit to the artists that Acey sent…she had left the words on the borders….i tore or cut them off,  not thinking.  eeeee

 

i read the prompt very early.   There's a 3 hour time difference,  right?   and it was still dark and i put the kettle on for tea water and read it again and  well…..i felt uhhh,  sad.   I felt blank when thinking of the term care package.   when thinking about wants and needs that care packages have to do with.   and i realized how all my sense of what i might want and or need in this world today has been altered so radically by things so far beyond my sense of ,  of what?   beyond my sense of….anything i ever might have imagined.   I realized how i live now with a great BLANK SPOT  out in front of me.  How i don't even go there anymore.  How it's been easy to not live in the future because my sense of future has been stolen and crushed.   I felt very sad.  I thought that i wouldn't do this one,   at least not now,  maybe not ever.   

but then….i trust Acey.

so after listening to two This American Life podcasts while i worked at creating a pot of chicken soup without garlic because i forgot to get some,  and with only thighs,   adding a ton on onion,   making the sleeping bed go away,   feeding all who rely on me for feeding,  sweeping the floor,   rearranging the overfull compost thingy,  pulling my hair back and into the barrette,   i cleaned the Everything Table and read the prompt again.   and Again.  3  times.   Nothing had improved.   So i just got the baggie of scraps,  the folders of images and began the ritual of Looking Through.   Maybe's off to the side.  No's in a pile.   I had zero idea if anything would come.  And then There.   The central image of the Two of Them that are the Same but Other….how i'd looked at that many times now but this morning felt a flood of love for this image.  And it went Easy from there.  

i don't have words for this.  I DO have Deep Feeling.   Who is Who and does it matter?   What's happening here?  What has already happened?   I really don't WANT words for it.   I just want this.   and i Really just WANT THIS.    I've looked at it off and on through the day and i can imagine looking at it off and on through Many Days,  like Many.   Maybe there will be more articulated Story.  But if not,   just this.   Just This is good.   This is very very Good.

what does the gift look like?  make a connection between the gift's unexpected appearance and what you instinctively know about its healing/positive purpose in your daily life

this was quite immediate.   the image of the dream spirit….the gift.   the rest came quickly too,  as if it was waiting.   and then, as i glued the images down,  those words came.

you will be given what is needed.    As it is needed.

surprise at this because i'm not much for words and image together….image stands alone,  but  there it came.  Clearly.  There was no doubt.  

the gift is the cup  first,  and then what the dream spirit gives….this came into the cup from the palm of her hand.  When this is gone,  there will be more.  As needed.

 

 

i did glue it down.   It's good.   And i look at it today,  in contrast to today's, (which is above now,  should be below but i somehow deleted it there )  and it caused me to think that this is more actually a collage…to me,  meaning several components touching one another creating a whole…of many.

 

lost pic here somehow…..the pic at the top,  todays,   goes here.

 

this is different.   what would be the term for it?    And then i realized how similar it is to the way i work with cloth.  Placing things and leaving space,  the space to me being an important component in its self.   I want to think about that more.

But i like it.   The gold/yellow ground is tissue wrapping paper.  The prompt said:  the key is visual and/or tactile and immediately it came to mind.  Down in the Paper Tub at B.   All that,  it, drawing paper,  cards envelopes pages of things had gotten wet  when in the cardboard packing box  and moved into the dry tub as is last year.  And then sat and,  sits still.  I LOVE it.   it's creases and lines are organic and this particular piece was against something that bled color into it,  marking it,  much how cloth is marked with plant material,  metal.   The color is an indigo.   It could not be more beauty Full to me and as i worked with it i wondered if i could do more On Purpose.   There's alot of paper in that tub that i mentally and emotionally just wrote off as wasted…but now…i'm thinking…..Wait!  go look.  Maybe not,  maybe not at all.  maybe just fermented.  

i love running my finger over it.  so, yes.  tactile AND visual.   the other part of the prompt was to express something the viewer wouldn't know unless you left them a clue.   The indigo imprint and the tissue itself feels like a veil between.   As i am doing,  i went through all the paper looking for what might be  The Ones.   Then…without intention,   just placed some and here we have it and i looked and thought if it responded to the prompt…it did.   How you might not know that there is such a part of me that still  so much wants to be able to Call magic….to place sticks in a certain way to simulate a nest,  to place objects near and maybe maybe Crow will come.  So now you know.

 

 

i listened to  Future Primitive Podcast….futureprimitive.org   to the podcast of  Jan 7  Asking the Right Questions,  interview between Joanna Harcourt~Smith and Daniel Christian Wahl  whose book is Designing Regenerative Cultures.  Many new ways of thinking,  many good  HARD questions.  

 

 

Day 9   The Holy

in your most creative endeavors,  what part of yourself do you reach for most instinctively

It's not glued in.   Today was the day to foray into town to see if the documents had arrived for the MVD and then go from there.  This disrupted my morning collage ritual.   Getting ready,  i felt myself so far away from the morning space as it's been over the last days.  Severed.   Just as i got to the gate down there,  loading through the 2 bags of trash for the trash receptacle  at the road phone and it was Alyssia  asking if it was an ok time to come by and bring ice and FOOD.  At first i said no,  but then ok,  she would go by the Post Office and bring mail….ok  and they were all in the mood to bring by food,  already loaded in her car from her grandfather's visit at the airbnb.  Grandfather left this morning.  Lots of stuff,  dips and chips and all manner of things from Trader Joe's.  delicacies.  And that went on for a good chunk of time,  the delivery

When they left,  i  got the collage stuff.  The single image i had found to be Right in the early morning….the eye  and then went from there.   I didn't glue it down.  My body energy was off.  But i set them in place and they feel right.  true.  and good.

What i am loving most,  what i most want and seek   is that sense of an open window.  A freedom of responding to the  prompts with no forethought  with no end result in mind.  Just spontaneous response.   Just surprising myself.  It's a beauty FULL way to  begin the days by surprise and it's quick,  immediate,  like opening a window in my mind/heart

 

 

beets from the Garden.   Crisp   FlavorFULL   zinging with nutritional vibes

 

Evolution continues

it rained all night and into the Morning.   I'd gotten up before light,  long before light here and read the prompt.  Draw a line.  I can't draw a line i thought.   Scatter it's path.   If i can't draw a line,  how would i scatter it's path?   I can't do this,  i   ….thought.  And then,   the piece of paper of the Spirit Women came…one of the ones Acey had sent.   Went back to sleep, cold and rain on roof.   Woke and found the image before the first cup of tea was ready.  Sat with it.   And then it went as it went.  

late this afternoon i watched the trailer for Queen of the Sun again.  Used to be able to watch the Whole of it on utube.  Not anymore.  So i watch the trailer,  waiting till the end to see Her,  covered with

bees       I would cover this sort of collage with bees.  

 

Once again,  a double paged image.  If i'd ripped it to …fit… i would have lost parts that i could not lose….

the small illusive illuminations appearing in photographs,  sometimes like this….of existing forms.  Sometimes floating orbs of light,  often soft neon  blue or green.  The feeling that they are always there like this but show themselves this way in certain moments.  How seeing them…they are Seeds.   Maybe visual seeds of understanding about the Unknowable.

Prompt:  the essential you that speaks to an important part of yourself that has rarely/never been included in the way you've used   [seen]  this type of image in the past.

i can't connect it any better…just a way i Be sometimes when i am open enough to understand in such a momentary way how Everything is Everything  and vibrating at such a high frequency

 

 

 

this is a stretch,  i know.    but i'd made a deal with self before i began this challenge to not second guess.  To not evaluate on whether it is OK or not.  To receive what comes without judgement.   So…again.  not much of a collage which by definition consists of pieces.    It is possible that i will go back.   at the end of the 30 days and find that i can alter.  Maybe,  maybe not.

I love this.  Very Much.  

so i did.   I stitched.   And didn't look again at the booklet until evening came and Alyssia and the kids had come and gone,  batteries switched and new ice in the fridge,   the Goats fed and Talkie,  exercised her Agency and refused to go to the safe place.  Instead making a B line up and to her branch.

I took out the booklet.   Looked at the images from this morning and yes,  they CAN go in,  formally.  I will cut them off the printer paper and glue to 2 pages,  spreading across both,  opening out.

The contrast between Cloth and Collage.   Maybe these words/thoughts are true,  maybe not…time will tell,  but today after some days of no Cloth,  i felt great comfort in the familiarity of the stitching down. Me and me.   And i felt the difference of the Collage work….it Animates and gives form to a  me i haven't known before.   Not in Cloth or Drawing.   That me,  it feels,  has been quietly waiting,  and now can communicate with me.    That  me and i sat with the Soul above.  The 3 of us.  We exchanged ,  the three of us,  tho no words were spoken.  

I had left the Cloth on the Everything Table.  Usually when they're on their way i clear it.  But this was just an efficient drop off so i left it.  Emrie climbed up on the chair and knelt,  looking. " What is this"  she asked.   i said a Cloth.  Sewing.  I'm sewing it.  "but what is it"  she said…..that whole sentence,  perfectly.  but what is it?   I said…it's Evolution and she smiled and said Oh.  Evolution.  and asked for a Ritz cracker.  It's time to start sewing in her presence.   It's also time to begin letting her Collage.

Cloth Making.   Collage.   Perfect Sisters.   They compliment and take me with them.

 

and i found her.   Probably the most Important,  the most PRECIOUS image i have.  Tree Woman.   Carried along over maybe almost 40 years.

 

and the me that makes the bed,  makes the bed.  it's a lot of work,  making the bed.  The pink/peach wool blanket seems especially heavy  tonight.  But the bed is made.  I will sit here a little more and then go lie down.   The Others will wait for me,  in the morning.