Art School Really Messed With My Head!
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Physical Inspiration: File Clam
Long, fleshy tentacles fringe the mantle of the File Clam which are sticky and detach easily when touched. Some file clam species swim, they clap their shells together using a strong adductor muscle, creating directed jets of water that emerge from either side of the hinge which propel them in the opposite direction. To distract a disturber, the clam may shed wriggling tentacles and they can move using their tentacles to 'row' with the shell in a vertical position. This uniquely created creature informed the way I made this drawing. If you haven't seen a File Clam, Google it.
Spiritual Inspiration: In the Book of Genesis God said, "Let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the face of the firmament of the heavens"...
It is hard to believe that God "created" all things, isn't it?! Sometimes I still have a hard time saying that aloud in certain company. But by faith, I ask God for understanding about the things that I have a hard time with.
There are a few things that I marvel at when I read about how God/Jesus/Holy Spirit created the world...the bible actually records that God/Jesus/Holy Spirit spoke the earth into being. That is very different from how human beings create, which was really hard for me to accept. I was trained to think otherwise, art schooI really messed with my head! ...We...have to use our physical bodies to create, this makes us less than God and distinctly separates my act of creation apart from how God creates, thus rendering me - unoriginal.
My art mentor, friend and wise, Jewish, religious woman said to me one day as we were discussing great artists/people and their creations, "the distance between them and God is narrow". After eating humble pie, I reminded myself that some of the most important technological advances and great art works over the centuries were created after having studied God's original creation.
That day I decided that if I want to be effective, I would have to rearrange my thinking. I can honestly say now that my work is a very simple interpretation of what God has already created.
And...the Book of Genesis consistently reminds me that after He created all things, He saw that it, what he created, was good.
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Title: Observed and Recorded Permutation of The Holy Spirit - XI
40 inches x 82 inches-pastel erasing on dura-lar
Location: Bakersfield Museum of Art
Event: #OpeningReception Extended