Inviolable Wholeness

"Inviolable Wholeness" - mixed media on canvas paper, 16" x 20".  Available here and at Artfinder.

I can't show you what I've been working on ....a surprise commission for a special couple, a book cover, a portrait.  A busy beehive of secret works, one of which had me humming and singing with glee.  The very best kind of commission!

And so I give you a sweet repeat today - this piece has been in the archives since 2017.  She received a little freshening and a new name.  A rebirthing of sorts.   She's been tucked away long enough that I was delighted to see her - wondering how I did that as I looked at her little nuances and glyphs.  Artists, you know how it is.  We can't appreciate our own work until the passage of time and new perspective changes our viewing eyes.

So it was not surprise when this week's chapter in Mark Nepo's The One Life We're Given brought new meaning to this painting:

Inviolable Wholeness

In its inviolable wholeness, life lives us, it composes us. This is something far different than the old cliche "Turn your life into a work of art"; we are works of art --but we are not the artist.     - Lou Andreas-Salome
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Nepo expands on this quote: What feels unbearable is how life carves us into a work of art that is never finished.  When in difficult experiences, we fear they will never end.  When in wonderful experiences, we fear they will end.  But there is no arrival, only inhabiting the journey,..

If this moment were a science fiction multiverse time-bending movie, the camera would pull away to reveal the artist painting the painting while life carves the artist.  Now maybe that's a lot to contemplate on a Tuesday, but I think that just means more coffee is required