Be the Lion

Be the Lion

"Be the Lion" - mixed media on gallery wrapped canvas, 20 x 16 x 1.75.  Ready to hang.  Available March 20-21 at Artistic Souls Gallery.

If to find our way to our core is to face the lion, then to stand by our core is to be the lion. And to sustain the practice of living from our core—to live out of our courage—is to find our way in the world by tracking inner courage and where it lives. - MARK NEPO

​I am trying to live out of my courage.  

But to do that, as Nepo says, we have to find our core - face the lion.  It is pretty tempting to dodge that beast with the teeth and sinewy muscle.  It is really easy to skirt around the edges and do a little fancy footwork, keeping out of its path.  What I really want, I know, is to be the lion.  

And when you're looking for something, generally it finds you.

I didn't set out to paint this portrait.  But recently a lion came into my life.  A woman who faces her own lions and keeps on going, even when she's shaking in her rain boots.  This human IS the lion, but doesn't see it yet in herself.  I happened to snap a photo of her in a moment of fortitude and badassery, and that photo was stuck in my mind until I freed it onto the canvas.

Liberties were taken with this painting - it's in my own style, with my own interpretation of strength and resilience scraped and layered and scratched into it.  It is every one of us who has faced a lion even when terrified - even when we couldn't see our own courage.  I look at this piece and feel doubly resolved to live from my own core as I find my way in the world.  I hope she inspires you as well, dear reader.  She is you and me.

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About the art:  beginning with a canvas covered in black gesso, creating a rough sketch with white charcoal.  Slowly adding in layers, following the paint where it meanders away from the inspiration photo to let texture and nuance form where it might not have been before.  Liberal use of a sprayer bottle and rubber wedge.  Scratching into wet paint with colored pencils to add texture and movement.  Resisting the urge to overly define.  Stepping away when her gaze told me the lion was in the room.