On this journey called life .....Just Trust Yourself

"Just trust yourself, and then you will know how to live"  Goethe

In my ongoing expressive art group a week ago, I began a mixed media collage.  Having fun with it for days afterwards, I created this  this.  I love maps, they elicit so many fantasies, and memories for me as well.  I used to spend hours drawing them as a little girl, and then pouring over them with dreams of travel as I became a young woman.  Even, now maps  continue to hold a power over me, but in a different way. They are guideposts, signs leading to inwards reveries and imaginings.  So, they often find their way into my art these days.    

There are many art therapy directives that integrate maps and mapmaking into the art process, creating maps of your inner landscape, maps of your spiritual journey, maps of your life's path, maps of your journey in  overcoming challenges.  Creating mandala's is another ancient mapmaking process,  the experience of finding your center, creating a way to orient to your own personal true  north...and of course,  just the experience of drawing a mandala is a map of the cosmos, both inner and outer.   Oh how I love maps. 

My newest fantasy is to make a series of envelopes from old maps.  We shall see if I follow through on that one. If so I will post them here eventually.   Maps are a call to the journey towards the self.   What do you do with maps?  Show me!

Almost a Month....since Last I posted.

It has been almost a month since I have last posted anything here.  Creatively I continue to flit from art process to art process.  My encaustic painting has for the moment, fallen by the way side, in favor of mixed media collage.  I have been making cards, working in my various journals, doodling around collages and just plain playing with the art process in small doses.

I love to work small on card stock, begining with  a loose watercolor, or cutting up and old watercolor that never really worked.  

Then looking for images that seem to fit the background, adding them and then doodling around them in pen, ink and rubber stamps.

One thing leads to another and I play with them until I am satisfied.  Then I glue them onto a blank card form and walla....art with a purpose, a card to send someone or a small collage to be framed.

Occasionally I fold up one of my watercolor rejects and collage on them as well.

They take on a life of their own, becoming whatever they turn into.

Then I doodle around them as well.  What a wonderful soothing past time

for someone with energy to burn creatively, without worry about product.

I spend many an evening in the studio, chatting with my husband, on the phone or visiting with friends while I do this.  Serious art, NO, but fun, soothing and Happy Making. YES.

Sometimes I stop before I go to far, letting these small card collages be sweet simple 

statements, that can be sent to friends or maybe sold on my etsy shop.

Other times they become enigmatic visual storylines, that please me just for the sake of being.

Or they are just ways to reconfigure images that live in my expanding image bank....

in my journals awaiting more work to be done on them.  So this is what I have been up to this month, as well as being a bit addicted to my facebook mandala page where I have been posting mandala images almost every other day.  

All of this work is simply self soothing, life enhancing, art making, that takes the edges of off my day, and fills me with joy.  

Happy Artmaking to All!

Mandala Workshop coming up....gearing up

As we approach the Summer Solstice, Patricia and I are gearing up for our next Illuminated Mandala Retreat Day.  We will be focusing on the 4 elements in this mandala workshops, as well as honoring the change in the Seasons and the onset of the summer.  

The following images show the progression of one of my mandalas, to give a sense of the evolving process of this wonderful way of creating mandalas.  We are facilitators of Judith Cornell's Mandala Process, and incorporate her powerful healing technique with our own style and person centered focus for creating art.  

This workshop will be held at an interesting and colorful art studio in Healdsburg called the Cosmic Cowgirls Studio.   I love that metaphor, having your feet on the ground and your spirit in the sky.  The studio space is bright, colorful and visually entrancing, filled with a very positive healing energy.  We are excited over the prospect of spending the day there drawing healing mandala's with others.  

We have been on the search for the perfect retreat space for our workshops.  Since we stopped using Mountain Home Ranch we have been trying out a variety of new spaces for our day long retreats.  So we are anticipating a unique experience and lovely day at this studio a few blocks from the Plaza in Healdsburg, California, the heart of the wine country by the way.

If you have ever considered doing this workshop, this is the perfect time.  Come join us in Healdsburg on June 21st.  Please check out our Creative Arts Studio website for more information.  This process is a wonderful way to set intentions for a new cycle, place attention on the healing energies of the mandala, as well as learn how to draw in a unique and easy way in a supportive and safe setting.  Hope some of you can make it!!

Challenging Times

These are times of change and challenge for many of us.  I too, along with so many in the country was taken by surprise this week, when I was laid off, permanently,  from my position of over 28 years, as adjunct faculty teaching at Santa Rosa Junior College.  There is a hole in my heart for the curriculum as well as the  students and program I have taught in for so many many years.    And for the field of Art Therapy. 

Transformation Through Time

Supporting people, with the powerful healing aspects of artmaking, and being able to facilitate creative growth, has been deeply enriching and rewarding for me.  I have been blessed to witness transformation on many levels, over and over, with artmaking as the catalyst.  

I am in mourning, but also filled with hope and possibilites for opportunity.  It is time for me to take my skills on the road and to share in different ways and venues.  Fear definitely rears its head, but along with it is transformation and surrender.  

Things I am grateful for:

1. The opportunity to witness so many people grow, change and transform through art
2. The beautiful, tragic, and inspiring individuals I have met, taught and befriended.
3. The community and staff I have worked with through Disability Resources Dept.
4. My creativity, strength and resourcefulness.
5. Art, ART, AND MORE ART
6. The stories of so many individuals
7. The opportunity to grow, change and develop professionally with like minded individuals.
8. Many many mentors and friends.
9. My family, husband, son  and cohorts.
10. The synchronicity of the universe.
11. My dog chelsea.
12. Vision and creative impulses.
13. Living and living in beautiful northern California.
14. Beeswax!!! and the bees.
15. The sanctuary of mandalas.
16. Time for artmaking!!!!!!  And Visioning...and dreaming!
17. And on and on and on into the future.

Fall Mandalas complete

Here is the completed mandala's that I began on the Fall equinox.  Once I finished my gratitude mandala, I went straight to work on my Fall mandala.  When I start I can't stop...so now I can go back to working on my encaustics... Whew, I love drawing with color.

Small Fall Equinox mandala.

Mandala Progression

I love to draw with prismacolor pencils...and whenever I begin a new mandala I am lost for days whenever I have a spare moment...in between work...and details of  a life fully lived.  Here is the Mandala I began at the last Mandala workshop.  This is a gratitude mandala, in honor of the abundance and blessings in my life

I focused on the image of the house because it symbolizes my life and all that is filled with meaning and joy.   This is as far as I have gotten...but I plan on cleaning up the inside of the house and enriching the colors encircling it.  I love to slow down and move into the soothing esthetic trance that creating mandalas with prismacolor pencils brings forth.  MOre to come.. on this piece I am sure. 

More Mandala's from Workshop

Here are a few more photos from the Fall Illuminated Mandala Workshop.   

Fall Equinox Mandala Workshop

Last Sunday, we facilitated another Illuminated Mandala workshop at my studio.  This is a photo of the outside of my studio.   I love doing these mandala retreat days.  The process is so healing, I get to set intentions for the new season and witness what comes through for the participants.  



Here are some of the mandalas created in the group that Patricia and I taught.  

You can see the begining scale of light drawings as well as the begining of each mandala in black and and a progression of some of them.  

The work that every one did was beautiful.  We spent the day focusing on the harvest and all the gifts of abundance in our lives that we have harvested.  

It was a lovely day. 

Evolution of a Mandala - Summer Solstice- Universal Shapes

I have been slowly, but surely working on the mandala that I began at the Summer Solstice Mandala Retreat Day.  I am almost complete, but not quite.  I am just waiting for inspiration to know where to go next to bring it to completion.

Here is its evolution.   

By the way the shapes I chose were the triangle, spiral and equal distant cross...

This is the initial drawing of white on black...finding my way....


This is far as I have gotten.  The summer feel comes through strongly.   It feels like it needs something more...but what....I will wait until I get a sense of direction before I add anything else.  

Happy Summer!

Summer Mandala Retreat- Five Universal Shapes

This past sunday, we facilitated another Illuminated Mandala Retreat Day.  Both Patricia Waters and myself, are facilitators of Judith Cornell's Illuminated Mandala Process.  



For the Summer Time Mandala Retreat Day, which we held up at Mountain Home Ranch in Calistoga.  We focused on Angeles Arriens Five Universal Shapes... which are the circle, square, triangle, equal distant cross and the spiral.



 www.angelesarrien.com.  

If you don't know about her work please  check out  her website.

What amazing work everyone did.  Here are some photos of the days process  work.  

For more information on Angeles Arriens Shape

Preferential Diagnostic Tool,  you can find it in  her book "The Signs of Life".

Although most participants didn't complete their mandalas at days end, since it is a slow and meditative process,  they were all stunning .   

I have posted a few of them to just give a taste of their power and integrity.

We  will do these retreat days around the solstice and equinox, as well at the begining of the year.   Our Fall Mandala Retreat day will be on September 22.  See our website for more information.

www.creativeartstudio.com

Now I have a mandala to while away the summer time hours, with slow meditative drawing....which I just love to do.  

I will post my mandala's process in the days to come.  Enjoy the Summer!!