With my children

This photo was taken in Brooklyn by Brett Adamek before I moved to New Mexico.

On the left: palimpsest (2010) 2 panels 10in x 30in each, fabric, acrylic on canvas. “A Tissue of Lies? Could there be a more persuasively apt title for a memoir? Particularly if the rememberer of his paste is referring not so much to his own lies but to those of others…. ‘Paper, parchment, etc., prepared for writing on and wiping out again, like a slate’ and ‘a parchment, etc., which has been written upon twice; the original writing having been rubbed out.’ This is pretty much what my kind of writer does anyway. Starts with life; makes a text; then a re-vision—literally, a second seeing, an afterthought, erasing some but not all of the original while writing something new over the first layer of text.” —Gore Vidal, Palimpsest: A Memoir

On the right: healing (2009) 5ft (60in) x 6ft (72in), fabric, oil, acrylic on canvas. This piece came with me across the country. I began work on it during a fast and had to pause creation until I was eating again; the amount of physical energy required to work on this piece - which is larger than me - was intense. This piece is part of the Awakenings series and was embedded with an intention - or prayer, if you will. Not long after I finished it, a miracle did indeed happen - for only a brief moment, and against all odds.

And on me: Perpetua (2010) 7in x 24in, acrylic, fabric on canvas. A married and nursing woman, Perpetua was martyred in the Roman province of Carthage, in Africa, along with her slave, Felicity, sometime in the 3rd century’s first decade. Perpetua kept a journal while imprisoned, recording several visions that she believed foreshadowed her death and ascent to heaven. It is considered to be one of the earliest surviving texts written by a Christian woman.

Behind The Scenes: The Asteroid Shop & The Ghost Wolves shoot with LightBright

The Asteroid Shop & The Ghost Wolves are Austin-based bands I had the pleasure of working with this past week while their tour stopped in Albuquerque, New Mexico. We snapped some photos in front of these incredible murals downtown near Gold Street.

 
From left: Eric Brendo, Carley Carazy Wolf, Todd Pruner, Jonathan Konya

 
From left: Jonathan Konya, Carley Carazy Wolf, Todd Pruner, Lane Tarr, Eric Brendo

“The Asteroid Shop’s self titled debut is going to make a lot of people really happy,” raves MVRemix. “….Asteroid lays on the indie sound pretty thick, and tempers it expertly with clean electric guitars and Jonathan Koya’s crisp drumming approach…. It’s an album with staying power, if only enough people decide to get up and get on it.”

Music video blog LightBright filmed acoustic performances of both bands in the downtown area. I caught some footage of their process.

The Asteroid Shop performed “Destroyer” from their self-titled debut in the plaza near historic Route 66.

Guitar & Vocals: Eric Brendo, Guitar: Todd Pruner, Shakers: Jonathan Konya, Shakers & Vocals: Carley Carazy Wolf

After the sun set, everyone headed over to the Albuquerque train station to shoot The Ghost Wolves under the bridge.

“Their live show is a bit of a spectacle,” says the Austin Chronicle. “Musically, you’ll find hints of popular acts in the mainstream such as The White Stripes, but you can definitely feel a bit of Texas lurking…At times, Carley sounds a bit more ferocious than comparable groups, but that sort of passion only strengthens the band’s sound. We’re really excited about this group,” boasts Austin Town Hall.

The Ghost Wolves performed “Gonna Live” with some backup from The Asteroid Shop:

Guitar & Vocals: Carley Carazy Wolf, Drums & Vocals: Jonathan Konya, Backup Vocals: Todd Pruner, Eric Brendo & Lane Tarr

Learn more about these amazing bands:

facebook.com/theasteroidshop

facebook.com/TheGhostWolves 

Disconnection with the earth - Mistakes ~ Wonders

In my haste to select some colors out of my disorganized paint box (disorganized due to my hasty packing in NYC and hasty unpacking in New Mexico), I didn’t really read the labels.

As I noticed how oddly the paint was mixing with water, I considered that the paints are old. Friends often dump their unused supplies on me, and I gladly take anything. Sure there’s crust at the end of the tube, but there’s something squishy inside. Old paints to me are like aged perfume - different, yes, but not exactly bad. Actually interesting.

But washing a brush in the bathroom, I noticed with frustration that the paint wasn’t washing out. Oil paints have a distinct smell to them, and I suppose my nose must be a bit blocked up because it was not until I came to terms with the stubborn black smudges and globs in the sink that it finally dawned on me I grabbed a whole bunch of oil paints without realizing it.

This ruled out the possibility of using any plant matter - I have not experimented with oil and organic matter yet, and doubt that it would be very successful as a quick drying time is essential to my process.

But sometimes mistakes turn into pleasant surprises.

One must wonder whether mistakes really exist after all.

There are moments we never forget in life. Sometimes we don’t know why we have not forgotten them like so many other forgotten moments; we were not intending to hold onto the details as they occurred and their significance is not clear. And yet they remain forever etched, surfacing at times that only accentuate our inability to understand why we are remembering, and why now.

Other memories contain clear lessons.

When I was young, my older sister and I did not get along. We were both artists, and I think the one thing we respected about one another was our respective talents. Grumbling once over a mistake I made in a sketch, my sister reprimanded my dissatisfaction in an eerily authoritative and wise voice, “True artists always know how to fix their mistakes.”

This was an eery statement because I know her to throw out failed works and start over. But I took this wisdom to heart every time an image seemed to falter thereafter. Those words acted as a pressure against my confidence, always bending me towards a greater will to succeed.

The onset of feeling failure is a stressful moment. Interestingly, this painting began as a loose imitation of a photo I had seen before, an image of a very stressed woman. Her anxiety was beautiful, and it reminded me of a quote:

Stress is basically disconnection from the earth, a forgetting of the breath. Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an emergency. Nothing is that important. Just lie down.

—Natalie Goldberg

I believe that stress is most commonly experienced when things don’t go as we planned. Our inability to control the situation frustrates us, to the point at which we close ourselves off to the possibilities that are present.

Every seeming mistake is an opportunity. When we remain connected to the earth, to our breath - to innate purpose and being, we can begin to see these opportunities.