Drifting All Night on the Black River

Drifting All Night on the Black River

​"Drifting All Night on the Black River" - charcoal and acrylic on Arches 300 lb paper, 22 x 30.  Available here and at Artfinder.


Did you too see it, drifting, all night, on the black river?
Did you see it in the morning, rising into the silvery air –
An armful of white blossoms,
A perfect commotion of silk and linen as it leaned
into the bondage of its wings; a snowbank, a bank of lilies,
Biting the air with its black beak?
Did you hear it, fluting and whistling
A shrill dark music – like the rain pelting the trees – like a waterfall
Knifing down the black ledges?
And did you see it, finally, just under the clouds –
A white cross Streaming across the sky, its feet
Like black leaves, its wings Like the stretching light of the river?
And did you feel it, in your heart, how it pertained to everything?
And have you too finally figured out what beauty is for?
And have you changed your life?
– Mary Oliver 

Sometimes the art tells a story I didn't know I needed to hear...until I hear it.  

What began as a rough charcoal sketch (and, in the end, decided to remain rough and sketchy), became instead a story of being present in the midst of change.  The ever-present change, shapeshifting, flowing nature of being that asks us to settle in to being, well, unsettled.

​The pose and awkward arms of this figure captures the way I feel most days, living at the edge of my eyeballs, arms akimbo, trying to appear graceful while exuding awkward attempts at balancing.  

I don't generally leave a painting here.  It feels undressed, exposed, bare.  But the story calls for that very thing, and so here she remains, ever-changing and present, too.

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Here at La Maison Magnifique du Malarkey we are getting ready for Portland Open Studios in October!  Slowly, slowly, the studio begins to take form and become presentable to guests.   If you're in Portland, please stop by!  I'd love to give you a personal tour.