for the Year of the Fire Horse

 

Tiny paintings on blue

 Another set of tiny paintings

1. Emergence

2. Floral burst

3. Winter Odyssey 

4. Moon and Flowers

5. Starburst Flower

6. Flying

Six tiny paintings on Green Ground

Here is some recent artwork playing with colour and form.

Acrylic on watercolour paper.

1. Moon and Flowers

 

2. Tree Spirit

3. Coiled Dragon

4. A Happy Day

5. Portal

6. Journey

Amitabha Study

 This image started as a watercolour and pencil sketch in my sketchbook.  I then photographed it and worked on it digitally in the Brushes Redux app on my IPad. 

I'm planning a painting on canvas of Amitabha holding a lotus to complete my threefold set of Avalokitesvara, Padmasambhava and Amitabha. This process, making sketches, is a way of finding out what is most essential to express about the figure at this moment.

 The way the figure sits within the lotus works for me. Over the years I have tried so many ways of painting the lotuses on which the figures are seated. In this image there is something about Amitabha within the heart of the lotus that feels like a significant discovery. There is always something to discover in these explorations of this archetypal world of form and colour.

Padmasambhava with a Cloud of Dakinis

inspired by Padmasambhava’s cloud of dakinis. 
“Oh you who are encircled
With an entourage of dakinis
……
You must come here to give me your blessing”

 

Meditating

 This is a painting of an early evening meditation where I found myself in a vast cavern of unknowing filled with a mass of subtle energies, 

the whirling thoughts and remnants of past actions and connections

permeated by the blessings of the bodhisattvas, 

transparent, insubstantial and permeable to all that arises and passes. 

In the words of the great shaman guru Padmasambhava, "I do not know, I do not have, I do not understand." . 

The certainties of life, the certainties of youth, are in the past.

Sunflowers

 Looking at sunflowers and painting.

A few studies towards the end of the summer.

Did you know there are orange sunflowers too?

A Universe in a Cedar Cone

 This August I spent a week on an arty retreat in the Herefordshire countryside with 30 Buddhists exploring William Blake and Buddhism.There was a cedar tree in the grounds and many cedar cones there for discovery. I was intrigued by the way the cone grew in a spiral with curling shape adding to curling shape.  It seemed to me as if these shapes had emerged from deep time and mirrored the unfolding of galaxies. I imagined the cones made of the dust of stars: star dust making patterns which held the deep structure of the universe. The cones held the memories of their mother tree in microcosm: holders of seeds of forms yet to appear, forms mirroring and repeating the ancient structures of life, connecting back to the primeval forests of the tree's ancestors. I marvelled at the memories of this ancient knowledge of how to unfold the essence of a cedar tree.  All in one, within, without, inside, outside. 

The first two images were painted on the retreat: a tiny watercolour and a piece made using local clay.

I took a cedar cone home and made some more paintings.

All taking inspiration from William Blake's "Auguries of Innocence"

To see a World in a grain of sand,

And a Heaven in a wild flower,

To hold Infinity in the palm of your had,

And Eternity in an hour.

Interior journeys through earth, water and air

 Watercolours inspired by reading Robert Macfarlane's Underland and Jules Verne's Journey to the Interior of the earth. I used granulating paints with earth pigments in the mix: black or red iron oxide which, for me, adds to the elemental earthy feel of the work. Crevasses, chasms, caves and elemental depths. And a moonsail boat to travel through air and water.

Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva of Compassion

 Recently completed canvas of the Bodhisattva of Compassion using a limited warm palette.

purple red vegetables

Two recent drawings from observation.(I like to keep up my drawing skills with little sketchbook exercises). The onions are watercolour. The red cabbage is marker pens.

From the archive: Simhamukha, the blue lion headed dakini

 Simhamukha is the esoteric dakini manifestation of Padmasambhava. She dances in space. She is dark blue and has the head of a lioness. Over the years I have painted her dancing. The first painting is a commission for a friend and was a collaboration with my friend first giving direction and later, once the painting came towards completion, making suggestions for tweaks and small changes.

The next painting is an oil painting which was an early attempt to depict the figure using a restricted palette of a dark red and a range of blues.

Next is a mixed media sketchbook study. I like the looseness of the mark making and the portrayal of the figure's energy. The materials used include wax crayon and ink wash and it is approximately A4 size.

And finally here is a tiny sketchbook study, around A6 size in gouache.

This was done very fast in a meditation diary as an aide memoire of an experience.