A series of paintings marking my first published work : Featured in the independent UK based publication 'The Mindful Editions', These paintings were made in 2021 for the book and were subsequently published in print during the summer of 2022.
More details about the publication can be found on the official website and web-store:
https://themindfuleditions.co.uk/Edition-02-1
The following paintings explore five main themes at the forefront of my emotional and spiritual journey during 2021.
All five paintings are unified under the passage of Time; the past, present and future. The cyclical nature of ones life and journey on this earth.
Painted between 06-12 2021
Family Meal
First of the five paintings, created around the theme of Family and Memory. A scene that explores the nostalgic view of recalling a memory, from a time when a get together with my extended family in Brazil, was possible. The painting highlighting he flawed nature of our memory as we find the many missing details in the scene, and notice the dream like qualities emphasised with the texture employed through out.
Family Meal process; sketch to final
The Stream
The second painting is the theme of nature. My local forest and park provided a grounding place that I would go to, that helped create some pause between all the building stresses of post graduation job seeking and lockdown blues.
It also helped to remind me of the inseparable bond humans share with nature, a nature we often believe we have left in the past as we build our cities and 'develop' our lives. The quiet stream that flows through the forest as it's bloodline, is the same as the veins that flow within our bodies. The more in tune to our environment and nature we can become, the richer life may be.
Embrace of The Ocean
An integral part of my emotional state and development was powered by the theme of Partnership. The cold tone of the pallet hinting how I took the restructuring of the role it played in my life, and the way in which I saw its reality changing. An image that personifies the emotional turmoil of heartbreak and uneasiness, as the waves that wash upon a shore. Waves that over time, can wash over you and pull you deeper out to sea, with the risk of drowning. And lastly, the ghostly figure that cannot be identified as real or not, remains tightly embracing the figure, perhaps an image of what once was.
Reflection
My interpretation of my personal process of reflection and growth having a cyclical nature, always returning to a familiar place, yet never being the same as I once was.
Breath of the sun
And to close the collection, the final of the five paintings, I look onward from the process that just took place. The Journey continues, the future undefined, what lays ahed unclear. Yet I set forth knowing, however much I doubt it at times, to always trust the process. You will get to where you need to be, when it was meant to be.
"It's good to leave each day behind,
Like flowing water, Free of sadness.
Yesterday is gone and it's tale told.
Today new seeds are growing."
- Jalaluddin Rumi