Friday, November 30, 2012
Thursday, December 31, 2009
The Year's Ending - a time for reflection and fullness
As an Expressive Arts Educator and Therapist, I've noticed that significant times suggest specific investigations in art making. Endings and beginnings are such moments. Even though January 1st is an arbitrary demarcation (it is not the Solstice - a real celestial event, for example), still, because it is a national and international holiday the time feels special. Most businesses are closed at least partially. Many people have extra time away from ordinary activities. Thus, it provides an especially rich opportunity for contemplation and review.
While social gatherings call for feasting and other festivities, there is a quieter kind of fullness that can come from reflection. I have reflected on the passing year for nearly 40 years. As you might know, I am an avid journaler, and strongly advise all my students and clients to make an art journal their companion. This time of year is a great opportunity to review last year's journal, or begin a new one - or both!
2009 closes with a 20 year phenomenon, a Blue Moon on New Year's Eve. It gives a feeling of something rare and unexpected. 2010 is a decade marker also. So, you can look back one year, 10 years, or the Blue Moon's 20 years.
Janus, the Roman god for whom January was named, has two faces - one looks back and the other looks forward. Focusing today on looking back, some simple writing prompts could guide you:
1). In 2009, what three things have you learned; what two questions do you have; what one thing surprised you?
2). Or this one: List ten images from the year that are burned brightly into your memory. Describe them poetically. Challenge your writing to use words that capture color, sounds, smell, movement - words that make writing come alive by waking the senses. As Lynda Barry says "Get inside the image and look around!"
For a more visual contemplation try one of these:
3). Look at a favorite place - desk, bedside table, kitchen table - somewhere you send some time and might collect little items - a happenstance altar. Do blind contour drawings of these things. For example, right now at my desk is a tiny Fimo bird made by Amara Burksmith for my sand tray collection, a butterfly magnet, a metal mask of the god of work from Peru, a penguin "chill-o-meter", a deep Spanish orange candle - well, my desk is pretty messy! But the point is,there are lots of things here to make a still life for an end of year drawing.
4). Or, try this: A collage of wrappings, ribbons, cards or pieces of cards that accumulated over the holidays. I like to paste down things that have a compatible palette and write in the margins little reminders about the celebration or gathering. I also like to include menu items, clothing people wore, as well as the more typical things like who was there and what we did, or gifts that were exchanged. BTW - I am loving my fine Sharpie pen. Perfect for making little inscriptions.
Then there are rituals that can help mark the end of 2009:
5). A study burning bowl is a powerful place to send to ashes and smoke those items that need elemental transformation. I've had clients make a list of bothersome insults or trials to ignite,or sometimes we burn the original offensive document - letter from an x-lover, for example. One can also make marks in the journal with the ash!
6). Finally, taking a clue from Jewish tradition, a ritual bath, a Mikvah, is a wonderful way to wash that year right out of your hair and every inch of you! There are many ways to transform your ordinary bathroom into a more sacred space: candles, bath salts, unguents, music - let yourself please yourself! Using "lotion therapy" to anoint your body and feed your skin afterward can also help make ready for something new.
Any of these experiences can leave you with a feeling of satisfaction. Not just living at break neck speed, but also being sitting to be nourished by the simple reflection on what has occurred, what finds itself right at hand at the year's close.
To that end, a poem:
Love After Love
The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other's welcome,
and say, "Sit here. Eat."
You will love again the stranger who was yourself.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
--Derek Walcott
May our own lives be truly a feast for the heart. Happy New Year!
Judith Greer Essex
While social gatherings call for feasting and other festivities, there is a quieter kind of fullness that can come from reflection. I have reflected on the passing year for nearly 40 years. As you might know, I am an avid journaler, and strongly advise all my students and clients to make an art journal their companion. This time of year is a great opportunity to review last year's journal, or begin a new one - or both!
2009 closes with a 20 year phenomenon, a Blue Moon on New Year's Eve. It gives a feeling of something rare and unexpected. 2010 is a decade marker also. So, you can look back one year, 10 years, or the Blue Moon's 20 years.
Janus, the Roman god for whom January was named, has two faces - one looks back and the other looks forward. Focusing today on looking back, some simple writing prompts could guide you:
1). In 2009, what three things have you learned; what two questions do you have; what one thing surprised you?
2). Or this one: List ten images from the year that are burned brightly into your memory. Describe them poetically. Challenge your writing to use words that capture color, sounds, smell, movement - words that make writing come alive by waking the senses. As Lynda Barry says "Get inside the image and look around!"
For a more visual contemplation try one of these:
3). Look at a favorite place - desk, bedside table, kitchen table - somewhere you send some time and might collect little items - a happenstance altar. Do blind contour drawings of these things. For example, right now at my desk is a tiny Fimo bird made by Amara Burksmith for my sand tray collection, a butterfly magnet, a metal mask of the god of work from Peru, a penguin "chill-o-meter", a deep Spanish orange candle - well, my desk is pretty messy! But the point is,there are lots of things here to make a still life for an end of year drawing.
4). Or, try this: A collage of wrappings, ribbons, cards or pieces of cards that accumulated over the holidays. I like to paste down things that have a compatible palette and write in the margins little reminders about the celebration or gathering. I also like to include menu items, clothing people wore, as well as the more typical things like who was there and what we did, or gifts that were exchanged. BTW - I am loving my fine Sharpie pen. Perfect for making little inscriptions.
Then there are rituals that can help mark the end of 2009:
5). A study burning bowl is a powerful place to send to ashes and smoke those items that need elemental transformation. I've had clients make a list of bothersome insults or trials to ignite,or sometimes we burn the original offensive document - letter from an x-lover, for example. One can also make marks in the journal with the ash!
6). Finally, taking a clue from Jewish tradition, a ritual bath, a Mikvah, is a wonderful way to wash that year right out of your hair and every inch of you! There are many ways to transform your ordinary bathroom into a more sacred space: candles, bath salts, unguents, music - let yourself please yourself! Using "lotion therapy" to anoint your body and feed your skin afterward can also help make ready for something new.
Any of these experiences can leave you with a feeling of satisfaction. Not just living at break neck speed, but also being sitting to be nourished by the simple reflection on what has occurred, what finds itself right at hand at the year's close.
To that end, a poem:
Love After Love
The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other's welcome,
and say, "Sit here. Eat."
You will love again the stranger who was yourself.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
--Derek Walcott
May our own lives be truly a feast for the heart. Happy New Year!
Judith Greer Essex
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