Portrait of an Angel

Portrait Of An Angel
Mirror, Shoes, Oil Crayon, Poem by Summer Knight

I originally started working with this piece this spring, and actually it started brewing as far back as last year when I found the poem. I am finding that patience with an idea is amazing, because time is truly a benevolent friend. My first attempt to work this poem, did not feel right. The work was hauntingly beautiful, but it literally felt like being punched in my chest. The feeling wasn't right, it was too personal and painful. I didn't recognize the discomfort correctly at first, I thought it was fear and I wanted to push through fear, but a lucky accident occurred and I was given the chance to cool off and sit with the "finished" piece before showing anyone. The longer I sat with it the more I felt the truth of what wasn't working and in turn saw a clearer vision. Then I put the project on the shelf and haven't touched it in 4+ months.
Today, I decided to take it out.......
I started off with my "idea's" but in the process I let go of form and "saw" what I needed to literally see "You Like Me" and the piece emerged! But what shocks me is that it aligned itself in a way it couldn't possibly have any time sooner, and its meaning and significance to me in this moment is what it was whispering to me all along....ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!

I am not certain what to call this work, is it an installation, a sculpture??? The audience is also an integral part of the piece, because it is the viewer reading the poem and looking at himself in the mirror that completes the piece.

I am continuously grateful to my beautiful sister Summer who endlessly inspires me with her beauty, honesty and courage. Everything I do from my heart is with love for her.

I want to share excerpts from another poem, which has been ringing in my soul.

If you put on shoes that are too tight
and walk out across an empty plain,
you will not feel the freedom of the place
unless you take off your shoes.

People at a distance see you walking there
and wish they were out in the open like you,
but as the saying goes, They are not in your shoes.

Your shoe-constriction has you confined.
At night before sleeping, you take off
the tight shoes, and your soul releases
into space it knows. Dream glide deeper.

.............

Normally when a horse gets the scent of a lion,
it keeps a distance. But there are exceptions.
Every now and then a horse comes
that will gallop into the blazing moat.

Do not hold back what you know to say
about your inmost self. Say everything,
no matter how much hypocrisy and hesitation
you sense is here. Don't guard the mystery.

Heat the horse so hot it rises off the track
into the emptiness of the soul.

(The Freedom Of Place by Rumi)


LOVE LOVE LOVE

At every place any time

Mongolian Rainbows and Mountains

The Friday of my last blog post, I was researching these amazing rainbows in Mongolia online. They look as if they begin or end in those mountains. A link between the heavens and the earth.
Driving home that evening there was a mesmerizing sunset over our Catskill mountains, I tore my gaze to look to the left for a minute, and there in our sky was a beautiful full arc rainbow!!!
I immediately jumped out and took these pictures, so excited by the magic:)

Germantown Rainbow 11/13/09

It made me think that its all here, the same magic is everywhere all the time, just as its one great sky embracing all of this earth, one great galaxy embracing the planets in our solar system; one great life connected without any boundary.

Germantown Mountains and Sky 11/13/09

Continue

My recent purchase: The two books by my bed.

"We must accept our reality as vastly as we possibly can; everything, even the unprecedented, must be possible within it. This is in the end the only kind of courage that is required of us: the courage to face the strangest, most unusual, most inexplicable experiences that can meet us. The fact that people have in this sense been cowardly has done infinite harm to life; the experiences that are so called "apparitions", the whole so-called "spirit-world", death, all these Things that are so closely related to us, have through our daily defesnsiveness been so entirely pushed out of life that the senses with which we might have been able to grasp them have atrophied."
-Rainer Maria Rilke

Along with these words of wisdom and courage I continue to explore my trip; this interconnection between Mongolian Shamanism, Mongolia's Landscape, Bi-Polar, My Art, My Sisters Life and Death

I am currently applying for an artist opportunity to make art in Mongolia's landscape.
Yes, I am scared; scared I won't be accepted, scared I will be accepted.
I am going to apply, and I am going to let go of what I can't control.
If we only act upon what we know, we are limiting ourselves to what we "Know".
What we "Know" is not infinite.

I want to go somewhere over the rainbow......

An extremely rare rainbow - a circumhorizon arc, was seen in the sky when we put Summers ashes in to the ocean. This is an image of one.
(Not the one...I don't know if anyone got a picture?)

Rainbow in Mongolia Video by Amir - MySpace Video

Somewhere over the rainbow, way up high.....

Reality Upside Down

Pilot Jay Morrissett, background left, relates how he and his plane ended upside down in a farm field in Clermont Wednesday to State Police Investigators Comesanas, Mazzacano and Walthour. Morrissett was en route from Concord, NH to Kingston when he experienced engine trouble and attempted to land the plane in the field. (Robert Ragaini/Hudson-Catskill Newspapers)

Wings fell from the sky

This is soooooooo unbelievable!

I just was driving to pick Sunny up, and drove past the field where my sculpture, Free Now was. There were police cars by the road and I was wondering what happened...I looked up to the hill, and there lying upside down was this plane!!!!

I rushed home to get my camera, freaking out!!!! When I returned ( like 10 minutes ago) the farmer was there, and he told me the story.

The pilot bought this plane yesterday, today was his first flight in it from Vermont. It started to stop reading the fuel and the plane wasn't getting any fuel...it almost crashed in to the road, but then picked up the fuel again to go up a bit, but then the fuel broke again, and he crashed in to the field!!!! BUT HE ONLY CUT HIS FINGER!!!!!!!

I just can't believe another pair of wings fell from the sky at this location!

(By the way I am first to publish these photo's...the press were just getting there when I took these, so you will see it again tomorrow in the newspaper, this really did just happen!)

Sharing

Free Now (at night) by Jess Puglisi

Thank you friends who have shared your beautiful words and images with me this week...its amazing to be adorned with your gifts. I am honored and encouraged by your interest and enthusiasm in my art.

I often look skyward too.

To the clouds when they are there.

To the pure colors of the air when they are not.

To experience the ever-changing nature heavenward.

The sky does not remain still.

Not even one fragment of a second.

Even in its quieter moments, turmoil.

It is always on the move.

And to the river.

There is never the same river.

Moment to moment it renews.

Every particle, branch, wave, current.

Sometimes flowing up.

Sometimes down.

Sometimes stalled.

Choked with ice chunks.

Often serene, so still, glass-like.

Reflective of the sky especially at sunset.

It catches fire around twilight even in winter.

Earth, river and sky too all ember-lit.

Like hearts.

Yours, mine, all of ours.

Churning, burning, icy, reflective.

Always on the move.

And its ships.

Silly, colorful, laden, determined.

Gliding up, sliding back down.

Heading to all kinds of places in the world.

Like my dreams.

Effortlessly hard at work.

Chugging along.

Horizon-bound.

I enjoy my daily doses of you.

Thank You For The Sky-Peter Barton 11/3/09

Stop the words now

10:15 am this morning

laying down with my sister today

As the trees let go of their leaves, making space for light in the dark.
I let go of my sisters ashes and gave them back to the wind, the sky, the earth, the sun today.

"Stop the words now.
Open the window in the center of your chest,
and let the spirits fly in and out."-Rumi

4:15 this afternoon

Fate

Mongolian Shaman Tent

Free Now

"...no experience has been too unimportant, and the smallest event unfolds like a fate, and fate itself is like a wonderful, wide fabric in which every thread is guided by an infinitely tender hand and supported by a hundred others."-Rilke

I tend to think of life as both a scavenger/treasure hunt...where you run and find a clue then run to the next, I also imagine that we are a giant puzzle, and we don't know what our picture is. We go about trying out pieces, and slowly putting our lives together. As we go along we realize that something from the past now fits, and we make progress and put that piece in its place, we also realize that our puzzle is only part of the larger puzzle, of life, and that we are all connected to the same game. Our ancestors contributed their pieces that lay the ground for ours....so, I guess "knowing" what we are going to be forever is the same as being stuck, completely faithless....because every day presents another piece or clue to our game. The "Unknowing" is our challenge, but it is also the fun and the space to find the next clue and adventure. Personal fate that I am tremendously excited about is a similarity between my most recent works, ( Free Now and Shrine of Summers Shells) and their connection to Mongolian Shamanic Shrines (ovoo's). A good friend recently suggested I see the movie, "The Horse Boy" because she felt their was a similarity between my sculpture and the shamans in the movie. I am so grateful to her, for being so attentive to my sculpture and so considerate to pass this recommendation on to me. The movie was incredibly moving and inspiring, for many reasons and I highly recommend it!

I am soooo excited about this connection.....where am I going next?

Mongolian Ovoo

Black Birds In The Trees

....The leaves are falling so quickly and I feel a sadness as I watch them fall. I want to hold time so I can savor these hues for longer. Winter is approaching soft and cold.....

I wrote this yesterday in my journal only to be followed by opening Rumi at random to read:

" Don't complain about autumn.
Walk with grief like an old friend.
Listen to what he says.

Sometimes the cold and dark of cave
give the opening we most want."-Rumi ( Backpain)

I was really wanting to hold on to what so obviously I cannot change, time, life. I wanted to stand under the trees supporting all the leaves so they wouldn't fall, so I could feel their beauty, bright and orange. But I know better...I am learning I have no control...and that beauty doesn't die.

So, yesterday on my home from dropping off Sunny, I saw this view in the graveyard and it further reminded me of my grief and challenge to accept change. It reminded me of last autumn passing black bags in the trees on the highway as we drove to my sisters memorial. I remember the grief so thick, I remembered thinking that the bags looked like crows, but because I "knew" they were bags my feeling towards them was different then to birds in trees, and wondering how our minds are closed by what we "know".

Pictures of Free Now

I have taken down Free Now. These are a few pictures taken at different times, different days.
(I am looking forward to seeing other peoples pictures)

This was a tremendous experience artistically and personally for many reasons.
I loved working outdoors, I loved working with these materials, I loved doing something so new, I loved having a dialogue with the farmer who loaned me his land.

I loved following the inspiration.

I love and miss my sister who continues to be my guiding muse and teacher.

Free Now

F r e e N o w
Please Visit in Person at 1300 rt. 8 Germantown, NY 12526 (Between rt9 & 9G)
(It will only be at this location until this Thursday!)

“Free Now” a sculpture/movable environmental installation. Free Now is created using discarded clothing, step ladders and feather wings. The sculpture stands about 20ft high and is approximately 30ft in diameter. Free Now is inspired by my sister Summer's courage to live here on earth, as well as her courage to leave this earth. The sculpture is also inspired by the Greek myth of Icarus, and all the many bird girls who painfully struggle to walk this earth out of love, but eventually return to the sky and sun where their spirits can freely fly. The piece is made so it can be easily dismantled and re-mantled allowing me to put it in different environments and public spaces both indoors and out ( the beach, a field, an empty building as well as a traditional gallery). Thus sharing the piece freely with the public.
This is the first public viewing!


Free at last
by Antony and the Johnson

Way down yonder in the graveyard walk
I thank God I'm free at last
Me and my Jesus going to meet and talk
I thank God I'm free at last

On my knees when the light pass'd by
I thank God I'm free at last
Tho't my soul would rise and fly
I thank God I'm free at last

Some of these mornings, bright and fair
I thank God I'm free at last
Goin' meet my Jesus
In the middle of the air
I thank God I'm free at last



In addition to my work, I encourage you to visit the Icarus Project online.

" The Icarus Project envisions a new culture and language that resonates with our actual experiences of 'mental illness' rather than trying to fit our lives into a conventional framework."-Icarus Project

"He cares no more for warnings, he rushes through the sky,
Braving the crags of ether, daring the gods on high,

Black 'gainst the crimson sunset, golden o'er cloudy snows,
With all Adventure in his heart the first winged man arose.

Dropping gold, dropping gold, where the mists of morning rolled,

On he kept his way undaunted, though his breaths were stabs of cold,
Through the mystery of dawning that no mortal may behold.

Now he shouts, now he sings in the rapture of his wings,
And his great heart burns intenser with the strength of his desire,

As he circles like a swallow, wheeling, flaming, gyre on gyre.

Gazing straight at the sun, half his pilgrimage is done,

And he staggers for a moment, hurries on, reels backward, swerves
In a rain of scattered feathers as he falls in broken curves.

Icarus, Icarus, though the end is piteous,
Yet forever, yea, forever we shall see thee rising thus,

See the first supernal glory, not the ruin hideous.

You were Man, you who ran farther than our eyes can scan,
Man absurd, gigantic, eager for impossible Romance,
Overthrowing all Hell's legions with one warped and broken lance."


A passage from the poem-"Winged Man" by Stephen Vincent Benet 1907






Swim with me my mama when I dive in the ocean of death

I will cry if I am not with my family

You could be my friend eternally




Swim with me my sister when I dive in the great white ocean

We must try, try to find a way that we can see

See each others faces in the sea



Swim with me my sister when I dive in the great white ocean


We must try, try to find a way that we can see

See each others faces in the sea

The Great Ocean of Time-Antony and the Johnsons

Shrine of Summers Shells

Shrine of Summers Shells

The 'Shrine of Summer Shells' is a monument showing the beautiful shells my sister left behind.

This piece is created using my sisters clothing, and her collected sea shells. Her clothing collection is in itself a beautiful body of art. Amassed during her life, each piece holds story's, memories, smells and visual clues in to her radiant spirit.
Her bedroom was always a jewel box, with precious bits of beauty exquisitely displayed.
On top of her dresser she created an incredible alter of jewels to wear, along with bejeweled picture frames of loved ones, shells, seeds and feathers. This alter would frame her face when she looked in to the mirror, reflecting back her beauty including all that she loved and admired .

Catch

".....When you went deep, we threw our nets to catch you. When you went high we threw our nets to catch you. To bring you close to us."
excerpt from Summer Love by me

These photo's are of an installation, 'Catch' within the Bird Girl Project. Inspired by a letter/poem 'Summer Love', I wrote to my sister as her spirit departed this earth.