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'Spirituality in Art'

 

STATEMENT in Regards to 'Spirituality in Art' written for MOFSA, the Marianne Oberg Foundation for Spiritual Art ... sadly however am not 'regional' to NC.  Positive side is that by not reading the small print (the tree within the that forest) I stepped out on a limb to attempt a new statement in a different direction, speaking of an encompassing statement not just words pertaining to a small group of work.  These thoughts have always been with me throughout my work and process.  here they are...


I believe spirituality is a vein that runs through my artwork and in the activity that inspires and provokes an artistic experience wether in the studio or in spontaneous recognition of art in my surroundings.  Those spontaneous moments most often inhabit nature and are experienced solely through the senses.  Our creative minds I believe are designed to seek out a vein of spirituality in art and to offer our perception of this world with something deeper and more profound than a literal interpretation. The literal, perhaps a photograph or map, is simply a scientific 'abstract'.  The holistic experience is the art, a journey of engaging, creating, and processing.  My artwork excludes the literal. Instead it is suggestive towards an experience.  Alluding to flight, silent encounters, 'little world' microcosms, and employing undefined birds and silhouettes as my 'anima', I attempt to create an experience.
 
Art, as I understand it, has allowed me to view the world with increased nuance.  God, as I understand Him, has allowed me to inhabit the world with more grace and hope.  In many ways this outlook or mindset has set a course for my artwork, that manipulating the nuances of color, light, suggestion of form and movement I can hope to create a connection to an experience.   Let that artistic experience stumble upon more grace and hope for this world.  To be uplifting.

Our higher power, who in my faith is God the Father, creator of the world and who provokes a deeper understanding of His subtle nuances and His majestic sweeps by allowing us to freely align ourselves with purpose.  

We can always seek change.   My spiritual journey becomes one of hopeful exploration and reliance on my higher power simultaneously engaging in free will. The purpose behind the new work I wish to create will be a visual experience of change, redirection and regrowth as I allude to the natural action, to shed or to molt.