I have just completed a new acrylic painting and it shows why I call my paintings shamanic. When I write about being shamanic I do not mean be a wannabe shaman, I mean being Nature. Knowing that everything that is, is alive. Everything wants the dignity of its own lived experience. Even the most altered of man-made materials originates from the Earth and continues its vibration in whatever form it has. My acrylic paints are highly altered, for example, the natural iron oxide that is the pigment of raw sienna is suspended in an acrylic polymer emulsion which is in turn inside a plastic tube. And yet these elements still sing on the paper, creating a feeling of being in Nature.
When the sky moves as I move past the painted surface, and the clouds form and fade depending on my angle--this is the shamanic painting being alive.
When the texture of the paint and paper combine to create a surface I cannot predict or fully control, this is the painting showing me its lived experience.
When the feelings of vast space and peace arise in me as I look at the painting, this is the song of being in this place--of passing though the veils that cause the layers of reality to appear separate--and I am again on the beach, and it is the last morning.
