Here Is My Heaven

Here in California to paint in plein aire is such a way of life among artists that it almost becomes mundane and ordinary.  Each artist’s statement sounds the same.  We are all motivated by the earth’s beauty and our love of connection.  But here’s the rub.  This ordinary is as extraordinary as the birth of a new baby or the explosion of a distant star.  I paint as part of a community.  We chase the light and live for the feel of rocks under our feet and a mist of salt covering our bodies.  We live for the slick feel of paint as it caresses a rough canvas.

Me in my heaven

I paint as a meditation.  Setting up the altar of my easel in preparation for my ritual, I gently wrap myself in my paint spattered apron. My mantra is the windchime sound of my paintbrushes as they jumble between my fingers and the hollow clink of metal as I open my turpenoid can.  With a tap and a swish I enter the present moment. 

A series of moments are captured with each movement of my brush.  I connect with everything.  Within the intimacy of a relationship with a rock or the ocean I enter into the rhythm of the earth.  I sense the breathing of the earth in the ocean’s heaving tides.  My breath and movements mirror the crashing waves. 

I blend my colors as I begin my dance with the paint.  When the palette disappears into the world around it my eye knows it’s time to begin.

I close my eyes and listen....I lick my lips and taste the salt.  The scent of ozone fills my nostrils.  When I leave this place pieces of it leave with me.  What you see here are the remains of the day...

Each of these pieces carries bits of the heaving deck of the boat or the crunch of my aging knees as I carry my gear up and down mountains to enter my heaven.  

Most of my time is spent away from these places but the moments I live there last forever.  

That’s why I do this.