Saturday, November 26, 2011

Signatures on the Sand

Tide Out
30" x 30", acrylic on canvas


I'm happy these pieces are now complete after many months of incubating in my creative mind and several weeks of coming to completion.  There are four canvases in this series based on the photos from a previous post on April 15, 2011.  After reading the reflection, please enjoy them all.

Reflection about this series:
My brain reaches a point of saturation overload and I have to stop to debrief and take a breath.  Flagler Beach is where my "soul catches up with my body"(1); the place I can walk the bare open sands and allow the "tides to erase all of yesterday's scribblings" as Anne Morrow Lindbergh writes in The Gift of the Sea (2)

My gifts were signatures of the sea on the neutral palette of sienna, black and grey sand which appeared briefly then washed away leaving me with a sense of awe.  I was so excited at what I'd found!  I was witnessing a one of a kind brushtroke that was impermanent; created by the rhythms of the seashore and never to be repeated.  My curiosity was aroused and I wondered what this language might say, where all these tiny bits of shells may have originated and what stories they would tell.

As I transferred the land art signatures onto my canvases in my studio I realized how powerfully simplistic they are.  The marks are grand yet fragile and say just enough to speak with authroity.  I embraced their beauty and imagined them saying to me:  listen, simplify and appreciate the uniqueness of every moment in time.
References: 
(1) Warren Wiersebe, God Isn't in a Hurry, p. 48; (2) Anne Morrow Lindbergh, The Gift of the Sea, p. 16; a Grain of Sand; nature's secret wonder, Dr. Gary Greenberg, photographer.  copyright, phyllis thomas, 2011

Tide In
30" 30", acrylic on canvas

In between Tides
30" x 30", acrylic on canvas

High Tide
30" x 30", acrylic on canvas



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