The Goddess Workshop, LA Convention Center, 1988

The Goddess Workshop was another installation. It was one of 6 exhibits of “cutting edge” sculptors’ work and commissioned for the ArtExpo. It was exhibited in the LA Convention Center.

My purpose was to give people an experience of identifying with their divinity in the form of The Goddess.

My original idea was a take-off on Santa’s Workshop. But instead of sitting on Santa’s lap and telling him what they wanted for Christmas, they would sit on my lap and tell me what they wanted for their lives. (I soon realized that if someone sat on my lap, their heads would be way higher than mine and not produce the trusted feeling required for visioning.) Here’s one person getting in touch with his vision.

Santa had his helpers, and I did too. A few of my acting students wore leggings and carpenter’s aprons and assisted people in the activities.

The project consisted of several parts. They were 1) community participation in the construction of the empty-faced Goddess figures 2) sitting with me at the actual exhibit and visioning their life 3) having their black & white photo taken and then applied to the sculptures 4) having a video interview about their hopes for their life 5) seeing the exhibit of the accumulated Goddess bodies with Convention Center visitors’ photos affixed, the global Goddess figures and 3 large (5′x5′) mixed media Goddess figures. Tara, Kali, Aphrodite.

Part 1: Community Participation

The first part was the construction of the pieces, and was designed to include local community members of the Beachwood Canyon area I lived in at the time. Below is the sign I had in my driveway. This is the view from the street looking up towards my home.

There was also a sign at the base of the driveway that invited people to participate in several ways. 1) They could help paint the Goddess images 2) talk to me as I worked 3) have their photo taken to include on the sculpture images. A neighbor’s boy helped me paint the Goddess figure’s background black. He was very helpful and fun to have around, as you can probably guess by looking at the photo.

Hanging on the peg board behind him are the white templates for the goddess images that come from all around the globe and date from 3,000 B.C. to contemporary images.

Here are some other neighbor-participants.

Here are some more people getting in touch with their visions for their life.

To be continued.

Designer’s TuTu’s

See these custom TuTu’s for Halloween. These women design  hot stuff for women in the 20’s age range- in body or spirit.

People say they  “custom make the hella wicked best ones” at http://www.CornflakeGirltique.etsy.com

Venice Art Walk, The Forest Project, 1989

This is the outside of the window view of Susan Gitlin-Emmer’s and my collaborative installation called The Forest Project, which was chosen for the Venice Art Walk in 1989. The venue was the Venice Action Committee.

Here’s a photo of Susan (r.) and Me.

This project was sponsored by the Southern California Women’s Caucus for Art and is international in scope. Now in 2009, the ideas are still relevant. Susan and I wanted to reawaken awareness of our connection to trees, not on a statistical level (like 2 acres of forest lost per second at the time), but on a personal, emotional level.

Wallace Stenger writes”…any relation of human being to the natural world translates as personal spiritual experience. Going deeply into nature I find myself. If I forget, or repudiate nature, I myself am lost.”

We wanted to support people to remember their personal connection to trees. We video interviewed people of all ages & colors to tell their personal stories of trees. We built a sculpture of a European Forest Goddess and housed the monitor in the sculpture.

When people came into the installation, they were given big white leaves, then had their hands inked and then they imprinted their hands on the leaf to embody the concept of Oneness with trees. Then we invited people to sit down and write on the leaves their stories of their moments or theri whole relationships with trees. Then we hung the leaves, stacked 10 deep on golden cup hooks. To me the fluttering of all those storied leaves was awesome!

In another part of the venue, cameras were set up for people to share their stories, live. In this place, Andy Lipkis, founder of Tree People, told his amazing story of how he started getting interested in trees.

Thank you Andy

Freedom

One of the things we encounter as we open, stretch and create is the energy of the inner critic. And one of the things we need to learn is how to move beyond the strictures of our critic.

One of our members, Mary Beyer, made a wonderful discovery in critic mastery. She is a well known professional painter with a large body of work and was looking for ways to surrender even further to the creative spirit. She discovered that she could let go more when she painted with her granddaughter, Kate.

You can see the zest in the piece pictured here. I love the juicy vitality. The exciting movement.

What a great invention, Mary!

Artist’s Way+ Member Writes

Cat Projection

My curriculum teaches that the outside world is a projection of what is going on in my mind. In other words the world is not the cause of my happiness or sadness. The cause is my mind and the effect shows up in the situations in the world.

An alley cat (young; still a kitten) has come around and I’ve been feeding it. This is unusual for me. It is very fearful of people and won’t come near me or others and is very skittish. I can see trust growing as I walk softly and talk gently. Tonight he even lay down on the front mat with his eyes closed.  I had put an almost empty can of food out for him to finish it up, and when the cat finished, it fell off the little ledge and made a noise. It looked in my door at me as I turned to look at the little sound, and the kitten took off because it thought it had done something wrong.

I’m learning about my relationship with God, that it is still a fearful one; and I have not allowed others to get close to me, or I to them. It’s wonderful to learn this. I’ve kind of known it but not in the forefront of my mind like now. Knowing this allows me to give it up to my Source to heal it for it is no longer hidden, and of myself I can do nothing. So I will continue to Love this precious animal and gain its trust, like I know God wants to do with me. I think the kitty may have been kicked around some in its short life.

9/26/09

Tom Henry

An Artist’s Way + Group Member Creates Art For Healing

I Am Alone and Afraid

One member of our Culver City Artist’s Way+ Group is using her participation to work through early trauma.

The piece below shows how she felt and how she felt about herself.

She is a source of inspiration to us all as she paints and writes her way to freedom.

“Reach out and take my hand,” she said. “But it is DARK and I’m afraid.”

We can feel the aloneness as we look at the painting. In the group, we know her courage as she reaches out to share her experience.

The Inner Critic

In the second week of The Artist’s Way, we begin to look at the inner critic and how it tries to suppress our creativity and productivity. It can show up as a voice in your head, or a feeling that communicates,  “I’m too old, too young, too poor, too rich to deserve, too unoriginal, too original to be understood, too busy, too exhausted, too isolated, too connected with family & friends, too untrained, too squashed by previous training,” yada yada yada. It let’s you feel too little or too much. And certainly not worthy or able to make art.

I found photos of a group of my earlier pieces from the 1986-87 time period. I showed them in a Santa Monica Gallery, the Forecast Gallery, on Main Street in a show of masks.  I called these “masks” Ca-ca Phoney: The Ever-Talking Heads. People could stand behind the masks and try to speak from the energy of each piece.

On the floor below the masks, you see tape recorders with recorded voices (of what were my acting students at the time) giving examples of the voices of The Nurturing Parent, The Rebellious Child, The Critical Parent, A Naughty Girl (her skirt flips up) , a naughty boy (his pants go down) and The Playful Child.

The  Critical Parent has no eyes, so can’t really see the real person in front of him/her. His/her head is filled with judgments (3 little figures) about what “woulda, coulda, shoulda” be happening. The mouth spits out ugly venomous statements.

The hurt child responding to the harshness of the Critical parent becomes The Rebellious Child (or the Depressed/Shamed/Submissive child, not pictured.) In this piece, when the viewer pulls a string, the tongue sticks out.

Another parental mode, The Nurturing Parent, has eyes that can recognize the good qualities of the child. This parent is solid, rooted in life which is represented by nature–the sun rings and crescent moon. This parent has 3 breasts to satisfy the child’s needs, and empowering and optimistic thoughts (butterflies, sun rays, stars).

Lastly the inner artist, the Playful Child can create. Waving a joyful banner, appreciating beauty (a flower) she dances happily.

May you learn to activate your Nurturing Parent and contain your Critical Parent!

More Unearthing of Past Work

This is part of a “Crystal” Series I was working on. I celebrate the thrilling diversity of various ethnic patterns.

Recovering My Actor Artist Self

Today we had our first Saturday Artist’s Way Plus meeting.  I am inspired!

The Tuesday Artist’s Way Plus Group starts Tuesday, Sept 15, from 7:00- 8:30.

One way to keep ourselves inspired is to remember previous great artistic experiences: here are two of mine. Maggie, The Cat, and Elizabeth Proctor. I played  two such different characters at the Santa Rosa Repertory Theater, two summers, back to back.

More Found Photos of Previous Art Work

In the 80’s I was exploring Goddess Images and Indigenous Cultures through my art work. The title “More Mother Figures” also reflected my own desire for more nurturing at the time.

This piece also shows my absolute LOVE of Pattern.