Archive for the ‘The Golden Trees’ Category

Posted on March 7, 2010 - by the raijin admirer

The Golden Trees – Gallery

Posted on March 8, 2010 - by the raijin admirer

How the Earth Became a Mother

In the beginning, there was no Moon, and the Earth had no order. It hovered around the Sun with no rhythm; no song. Because the Earth was lonely Father Sun could do nothing but watch. The Earth was erratic, frantic like a child bored by solitude, one day spinning out of control, the next day at a standstill staring out into space; pining and yearning.
All the Grand-Fathers, the God-Heads of all the Elemental Spirits, of Plants, Animals and Men could not settle and cast their seeds; or create bodies in which to breathe in their own Nature. They tried in vain to give life to the different races of beings on the Earth, but their Grandchildren could not live long away from their Water-Holes for Nature, their Mother, had no Law; no Rhythm, and was simply too dangerous and immature to depend on.

It was then that Grandfather Owl-Man: the watcher in the night; the wise one decided that he must see the Great Father in the Sky and offer his thoughts and a solution. He traveled to the Sun, where the Great Father sits in watch, and requested an audience, where he suggested that his friend the Fire-Bird would fly out into the Cosmos and visit other Galaxies and Universes where she could find a planet willing to return with him and become Earth’s companion.

And so it was decreed, that the Phoenix, the most beautiful of the Bird-Clan, would fly out into the black sky and find a companion for Mother Earth.

Everywhere he went and asked, but all the Planets had a home in their own Universe, and none was willing to leave and live far away. Phoenix was sad, because she was failing in her task, and she roamed the sky, afraid to return until he had had another bright idea to replace the first one. The Earth was big, and her Nature was to yield, and so the Fire-Bird thought that she could easily give a part of herself and give birth. Not only would she then have company, but then she would also blossom fully into her adulthood.

And so the Phoenix searched the sky for a life-giving stone, that class of stone that floats across the sky waiting for its opportunity to fertilize, and bring with it the designs of the Creator. Soon Phoenix had spotted one in the distance and reaching over she grabbed a hold of it and flew with such great speed towards the Earth that it burst into flames as it traveled across the sky. The heat was intense, it was consuming the Phoenix, and upon finally reaching its aim the Fire-Bird could not find the strength to let go, crashing into the Earth with such an impact that it was destroyed and the rock broken into 10 thousand pieces. The Great Stone from the Sky had been scattered all over the surface of the earth, only to be buried by the dust and ashes as they settled again and allowed light to return to Earth. So much dust had been raised that it had made night for many months. Yet when the dust settled there she was, the Moon, daughter of the Earth, floating around her mother in an eternal embrace. The earth was so happy with the moon that to this day it dances, circling round and round her daughter. The birth of the Moon had brought the great lessons of Motherhood to the earth.

From that moment on all the God-Heads were able to bring life to their own species, molding them from the mud and water around the Waterholes and slowly the grey earth became green and teeming with life.

But all was not right. Phoenix had died bringing the seed to Earth, and was now no more. Although happy to finally be expressed on the land and seas, all the Gods still mourned the loss, and once again Owl-Man took it upon himself to visit the Great Father in the Sun, Who recognizing the two Heroes; Phoenix in the forefront, and Owl-Man behind the scenes, decided to reward them manifold.

From the fiery eruption of a Volcano in the middle of the East-Ocean he brought the Phoenix back to life, conceding her eternal life, for now and ever, in the most beautiful of Dances of all. Whenever a species became extinct, Phoenix would thrust herself into the Volcano and let her body be consumed by the fire, so that she could in Spirit guide the Soul of the God-Head towards the House of the Father, where it could again be re-united with the Source. With the last being of its species the God-Head dies, and is led by the Fire-Bird home. When it returns Phoenix brings back a new God-Head, who will begin work to bring its species to existence upon this Earth. Phoenix is then reborn from the Volcano to again grace the inhabitants of this planet with her visits. She is present in every self sacrifice that takes place.

To Owl-Man, the all seeing wise one that blends into the background the Maker gave the invisible golden touch of intuition and seeing beyond. Away from prying eyes, when Owl-Man comes to Earth to whisper in the ears, or be present in the dreams of one of his children, he rests on the mythical Tree of Life, which turns gold until he leaves again. Many people have searched for Owl-Man throughout the Centuries here at Guanjama, and some claim to have glimpsed the God-Head sitting on the Golden Tree, shrouded in a thick white mist that only allows a fleeting glimpse before it once again veils the miracle.

And still today, everywhere in the world, hidden within the earth, one can still find pieces of that first seed that crashed into the Earth and gave birth to the Moon. Broken pieces of eternal beauty, that if found, bestow the greatest of blessings upon they who found them.

Posted on March 9, 2010 - by the raijin admirer

The Inside Story : The Golden Trees

For a long time I had been entertaining the idea of one day working with the whole imagery and concepts related to the Golden Tree. What appealed to me the most is the prevailing notion incurrent in so many myths, stories and spiritual philosophies, (or at least in my interpretation of them), that the tree, with its roots firmly grasping the dark depths of the earth, and arms forever yearning and reaching out into the light, is symbolic of an internal human condition. It could also be interpreted as a metaphor for our dual condition as sentient beings, drinking from both dark and light, in a balancing act of experience, between the cold, concrete material reality and the light and elusive spiritual one. Without delving too deeply into this endless potential of possible relations, I just wanted to outline part of what the Golden Trees symbolizes to me, because this is the inside story behind this series, and this is the notion that, above all, colors and permeates all paintings in it. And here, besides the intent of each action, there is also the context during which the action has taken place. What I mean is this: Regardless what symbolism the intellect has chosen as a vehicle through which to display itself, the concurrent emotional experiences or baggage is what truly comes through as the invisible soul of what is conveyed. To make it clearer, it is as if the greater quality of melody; its emotional impact arose in greater part not from its face-value, or obvious technical expression, but from the imprinted energy and characteristic organic details that lie behind. And here the Gold comes into play. In many ways, Gold symbolizes the Sun on Earth, here serving as a dual metaphor for its fertilizing properties; light that brings life, and its spiritual properties; light that dispels darkness. Therefore when Owl-Man, The God-Head or Elemental Spirit of the Owl, comes down to Earth and rests on a tree, then that tree becomes Golden or bathed in Golden light. Consciously, I have decided to omit the Owl from this series and focus solely on the trees, for therein lie enough dimensions and avenues for exploration. Each thing or entity alone can be source for a myriad of extrapolations and interpretations of form, content and meaning.

Posted on March 14, 2010 - by the raijin admirer

The Underlying Flair : The Golden Trees

To have intricacy in simplicity; segmented areas with the least possible gradation. Avoiding blurring colors without distinct divisions; wearing down forms to their root shapes, without hiding meaning, or concealing layers.

Focusing on that which catches the eye, the background becomes blurred and abstract.

We can only give our full attention to one thing at one time, otherwise we are divided, and still sometimes the object of our focus shows its other face; that of the world without science, bound only by the depths of our imagination; limited only by a cage of our doing.

Emulating tendencies from past ages, there is a concerted effort here to avoid elaborate perspective work or even shade and gradation to enable depth to rise in a different way; from the imagination of the observer.

As in the series: The First Wave, there is an attempt to break shapes down to some representational essential form, simplifying detail, synthesizing and re-molding a new image from it, much like one would do with a logo or symbol.

In fact the work is in reality building up from symbols of the represented forms, adding new layers and ‘re-clothing’ the unit after having stripped it down from its obvious every-day realistic shape.

Drawing the curtain of the apparent world and painting the world behind the scenes would be a good motto to this series, and so would the concept of dreaming trees, but in the very end after all that process of elaboration of what I wanted to do; what I wanted to reference, and where I wanted to go with all this; all the planning and programming, I left all of it behind to be just an influencing and limiting subconscious agreement, and the motivation came solely from on source: painting pretty pictures that my baby daughter would like.

As I progressed in each painting I would ask her if she liked it. If she said that she did, I would continue; if she didn’t I would drop it altogether and start a new one. The underlying flair here is that small children are pure in their approach; their personal judgment isn’t tainted by social judgment and their response is as honest as may be.

Posted on March 5, 2010 - by the raijin admirer

Art Exhibition – Stockholm, Sweden, 27th of March – 27th of April

Saturday, the 27th of March was the official opening for this second series of paintings based on the tale: How the Earth Became a Mother. Now on the 27th of April it will come to a close.

“Thank you for coming. It was a great vernissage.“