DANCE CHURCH: ANOTHER IMPROVISATIONAL ACT OF THE SPIRIT

DANCE CHURCH: MOVING WITH WANDJINA. (art by Hallelujah Truth)

Hallelujah for DANCE CHURCH! In my small community of Decatur, Georgia, DANCE CHURCH takes place on the second Sunday of every month. Local citizens gather together, bringing music, objects for an temporary altar, and the SPIRIT to MOVE!

Since I have dedicated myself to MOVEMENT for 2013, I journeyed out to DANCE CHURCH on this second Sunday in January and was enlivened!

REFLECTING ON 2010: Taking the REVERB 10 CHALLENGE

Dear Pilgrims 'tis the season to reflect as each day grows in darkness, and we prepare for the shortest day of the year. Three women have created a wonderful reflection place at REVERB10. Hallelujah for this opportunity to "soul blog" with other like minded pilgrims! I will be blogging in response to their daily prompts and encourage you to join us! Reflection is the fodder for new ideas!

Here is the PROMPT for December 6th:

What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need more time for it?

For me the first thing that comes to mind is pushing pungent sticks of cloves into a fresh perfectly round shaped orange to create a sense or scent of the winter holidays because a friend of mine always makes enough to fill a large bowl and I thought I would do ONE for the EXPERIENCE. Try it, the citrusy juices burst from the orange and along with the woody fragrance from the cloves coats your fingers! A very tactile and fragrant experience!

Or should I recount the image I drew of my persona Hallelujah that echoes one of Leon Bakst’s dancers? She is drawn in watercolor pencils on paper and surrounded by images made using archival pens. This more voluptuous Hallelujah may be a one time only departure from a demurer Hallelujah sojourner! We shall see!

I WANT to write a book called “From HOWLS to HOWL-a-lujahs” that documents my 3- year journey from being “stuck” creatively to exuberantly living the life I imagine each day! I moved from being a fulltime teacher who longed to live the life of an artist to BEING the artist who teaches part-time! Because I have done it, I believe everyone can be fully experiencing the life they desire!

Yes! I need more time for writing this book, and I know it is my responsibility to CREATE the time in my busy artmaking and teaching schedule to write “From HOWLS to HOWL-a-lujahs!”

ALTER/ALTAR MYSELF THROUGH ART

 As a PILGRIM and ARTIST, I seek to alter/altar myself. I travel my journey looking for THE magical interactions with CREATION that will transform me and honor my soulfulness.

Everyone understands that the word “alter” means “change.” And we might all agree on the positive outcome that this proverb expresses “A rolling stone gathers no moss” –that we stay youthfully unencumbered if we allow ourselves to keep moving to new physical and metaphorical locations. Using another figurative comparison…isn’t it desirable to be like maturing snakes shedding old dry outgrown skins of our former selves and with that skin—stale  un-useful thoughts and behaviors?

But what does it mean to make “altar” a verb? In the 80’s, when I was getting instruction about Buddhism from the man who served as my Master, Dr. James Yu, at Buddha Heart Village in a small town in Alabama, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that when Buddhists bow to Buddha, they are essentially bowing to the concept of an ENLIGHTENED SELF. The SELF is HOLY. Because of this HOLINESS of the SELF and all of living creation, each living spirit can be “altared”—transformed by enlightenment, thus being lifted away from the physical birth-death life cycle. Each of us is responsible for “altering” and “altaring” ourselves along our journeys from the PHYSICAL to the SPIRITUAL.

Our PHYSICAL LIFE is a process of changing and becoming, and this SPIRITUAL JOURNEY is mysterious, magical, and ultimately the only PATH for me, and I do it through my ART. My ART PILGRIMAGE holds the potential of CHANGING, EXPANDING, and MOVING ME towards BECOMING “a” Buddha—or in the very least along the pathway of being more of an ENLIGHTENED BEING. 

That’s it for today’s SOUL BLOGGING. HALLELUJAH for all of us PILGRIMS on our JOURNEYS. HALLELUJAH wishes you all a MEANINGFUL TRIP through this life. Write me and tell me about your “alter/altar” experiences. What is your AVENUE? Do you alter/altar through ART? Another way? Blessings to you all.

1st Anniversary of “COFFEE WITH HALLELUJAH”: Making Time for Creativity Each Day

 Out of CREATIVE GRACE, Hallelujah entered this world a little more than a year ago. She flowed from my imaginative womb singing YESes to each artistic possibility. Hallelujah has been celebrating my SOULFULNESS with the joyful ease of a cat napping, stretching every inch of my BODY into SPIRIT and IMAGE.

 At this one-year anniversary, I am still HALLELUJAH-ing! This Hallelujah persona has not only informed me and been fun—but SHE has also S T R E T C H E D me. The principle of “Coffee with Hallelujah” is that if I have time for a cup of coffee each morning, I have time to DRINK in my SPIRIT as well. I have time for fifteen minutes of CREATIVITY.

Hence, the EVOLUTION of a SPIRIT—or TWO! Both the Aboriginal Creation God and I have evolved together in my daily drawings and paintings. Wandjina has captivated me since 2006 when I first went to Australia and spent hours in various museums around that vast continent. Last year in May 2009, after journeying to northwest Australia with my Chiboogamoo, I started yearning to draw Wandjina—to internalize his cyclone eyes, lightening rod hair, non-existing mouth, and whites, blacks, ochres, and siennas.

East of Broome and outside of Derby, I absorbed the work of the Mowanjum artists in their gallery and tourism center. Many of the Aboriginal artists are just now learning or re-learning the images from their Dreamtime stories that are painted in rock shelters throughout the Kimberley. The more than 200-year British occupation and subsequent Christianizing of many of the original inhabitants did create a temporary “memory” loss or gap for some Aboriginals. However, a 30-40,000 year old culture is not easily forgotten.

The POWER of their DREAMTIME is communicated in the intensity of the Wandjina, snakes, owls, turtles and other nature images—no matter the artist’s skill level. So Hallelujah has spent the first year of her BIRTH being PRESENT with Wandjina. The paintings you see here are my first attempts to FEEL my way into this ancient symbol of creation.

As the year progressed and I drew daily, Wandjina’s simultaneous earthiness and spirit informed Hallelujah. She began to wear a sienna and white skirt and a blouse with black or sienna and ochre spots. At times she sprouted lightening bolts for hair. HALLELUJAH developed a relationship with Wandjina and never journeyed without him. Wandjina began to represent THAT WHICH IS NOT HALLELUJAH—OTHERNESS! I petitioned a male DEITY-or-ENERGY to be my constant companion.

On my return to Australia this past summer in June 2010, I was able to study more aboriginal art. Imagine my surprise when I witnessed a contemporary Wandjina in the Australian Museum in Sydney! The artist had fashioned Wandjina in blues and greens, elongated his body, and had him emerging from blackness, staring at ME! I gasped! I was staring at the GREAT MYSTERY once again! Wandjina exuberant and athletic, catapulting out of the spirit world, witnessing ME!

This image resulted: a bluegreen athletic Wandjina reeling in the universe with Hallelujah who looks like an action hero, no less and no more than Superwoman! Also  present here is a female figure shroud in green, MOTHER of the GREAT MYSTERY, another important figure that evolved from my daily drawings last year.

 Hallelujah to the EVOLUTION of CREATIVITY! Happy Birthday HALLELUJAH!

FELLOW PILGRIMS, give yourself permission to CREATE. Observe your world. Seek what is TRUE to YOU. Find YOUR TRUTH. Discover that YOUR TRUTH IS OTHER PEOPLE’s TRUTH. There is a universality that connects us altogether. There is an ocean of US-ness, the collective unconscious.

 Make time for coffee with YOUR HALLELUJAH!  For now, Hallelujah asks you to wish her Happy Birthday. Soul Blog with me. Support me in my journey and tell me how to support you in YOURS! Seeking FELLOW PILGRIMS….

GASPER OF THE GREAT MYSTERY

HALLELUJAH FOR THE GREAT MYSTERY! I am a member of the ALCHEMIST TRIBE, affectionate lovers and gaspers of the GREAT MYSTERY. I am in awe of the power of LIFE’S TRANSFORMATION, no matter what it is and where it takes us. Each of us has the privilege of saying “YES” to THE CHANGE.

(Cecelia's WINGS. Huge. Colorful. Inviting Journey.)

YES—and rolling, flying, leaping into the REALM of the UNKNOWN. One might play with the possibilities—and there are uncountable ones, all the time breathing big gushing gulps of oxygen.

 I gulp huge gobs of air when I witness a FELLOW PILGRIM’s work with the MYSTERY. This is the GASP! My stomach twitches and every nerve in my body stretches and vibrates at the observation of COURAGE in ACTION. This is the AFFECTIONATE LOVE! Let me illustrate….

(Two of my watercolors envisioning PILGRIM SALLY's JOURNEY are shown here. Sally is dressed in black clothes similar to the ones she wore in the communal production (THE LUMP JOURNEY) that 12 of us women did with her when she got cancer the first time. Hallelujah is the gasping woman in the striped skirt holding the wallaby.)

My example begins with a journey to the foot of the North Georgia mountains to an artists’ retreat with my friend Sally. It is December. Smokey gray air hovers on the deep greens of the southern pine forests. We are visiting another artist, Cecelia, who has been secluded making art for two weeks. Scarves encircle our necks, the heater blasts. Sally, a northerner, has taken off a layer of clothes. I need each piece of winter garb. We have turned off the music because our earnest exchange requires close attention.

 We talk of being daughters and other significant relationships. We speak of praying, seeking healing. Possibilities. Healing. Change. Improv-ing. Healing. Community building. Healing. Dying…and Art Making…

 Once at Cecelia’s cabin, we DO our interactive celebration and exploration of our artwork, which I won’t disclose in entirety here since “secret” societies must retain their privacy! However, Cecelia has filled her entire space with canvases, watercolors, and most attention grabbing to Hallelujah—a pair of colorful wings, almost 7 feet long—with eyes and topped with branches! WOW! GASP! AFFECTIONATE LOVE!

(Sally at Cecelia's cabin in the North Georgia mountains, December 2009. THE WINGS are to Sally's left. You only glimpse a part of them. I did not photograph Sally's work for privacy reasons.)

Cecelia straps these SEEING WINGS on and takes a JOURNEY into the GREAT MYSTERY—the time beyond this physical dimension—DEATH. NEW JOURNEY. AFTERLIFE. PILGRIMAGE. Sally and I are witnesses. The magic wings help Cecelia navigate the UNKNOWN. We ask her questions, and she answers, gleaning the information from her imagined experience in the UNIVERSE. Cecelia’s artful play is the alchemy needed to transform her human experience--body and conscious mind—into a SPIRITUAL experience. All of us are different after this shared imagining. WE HAVE BEEN “THERE”—AND NOT ALONE.

(PILGRIM CECELIA with THE WINGS on her PILGRIMAGE. These wings echo the idea of the ones she made for mother at the time of her mother's death.)

Months pass. It is spring. Cecelia has worked the wings. She has pared down their dimensions in order to make them more “wearable” and efficient to maneuver in the darkness. The feathers have ripened from pastel yellows, pinks, and blues to sturdy red, grays, and blacks. Cecelia flies again--this time in Sally’s studio. The matured wings sober us all.  They represent the inevitability of the death that awaits each one of us. I strap the wings on. How amazing to imagine flying in the life beyond this one! In the community of friends, I feel encouraged to live the good life and to face the good death.

 Sally holds the wings but does not try them on. The cancer present in her body makes us all silent. Dammit. Cecelia and I are “playing” with the idea of death so as not to be afraid of dying. For us, our own death is still conceptual. For Sally, who is dealing with cancer for a second time, LIFE and DEATH are becoming big question marks. Fast forward to now…the middle of August.

(Because there is no room to tack THE WINGS on Sally's Studio wall, an ART PILGRIM on the left and PILGRIM SALLY on the right hold THE WINGS to support Cecelia's JOURNEY.)

(I try THE WINGS on. I smile out of a disquietude. There is nothing funny about imagining death.)

The summer heat is beginning to subside in Atlanta. Since mid-July, we have known Sally is “actively dying” in her home state of Massachusetts. It doesn’t matter that my calendar has marked, “SALLY RETURNS,” in big sloppy blue ink on September 1^st. She isn’t coming back. I’m trying to remember to gulp gobs of air and to conjure the ALCHEMY I know is present to ALL OF US at this moment.

 A week or two ago, Sally requested a photo of Cecelia’s wings. Instead, Cecelia sent her THE WINGS. I don’t know if Sally ever actually tried them on, but she described her daughter and granddaughter whooping around in them like magnificent and joyful birds.

 Earlier in this blog, I offered to show you an example of what I meant when I said I am the AFFECTIONATE LOVER of the GREAT MYSTERY, especially when I get to witness a FELLOW PILGRIM’s work with the MYSTERY.

SALLY PILGRIM has caused me to GASP in awe. My stomach is fluttering. I have observed COURAGE in ACTION. As PILGRIM SALLY drifts between the translucent boundaries of land, marsh, and ocean, as she puts on THE WINGS and flies like a raucous wild bird along on her next JOURNEY, I declare my LOVE and AFFECTION for her.  I applaud her TRANSFORMATION. She has said “YES” to what is ahead of her. Yes, ALL WILL BE WELL.

(Sally's artwork made in the winter of 2010. Sally knew all will be well.)