MOTHER

Quiet Fierceness Of Light Oil on linen 90 x 180 cm

Today has been Mothers' Day in Australia. A beautiful autumn day in Brisbane. Families out and about, breakfasting, lunching, out to dinner, picnics in the park. A great day. I have had a wonderul day, with breakfast out with my children, lovely presents, a heated discussion about someone's homework, an old school friend and her mate over for a drink. I phoned my own Mother this morning and had a long chat.

Regular readers will know that I often depict a figure of a woman in my paintings. She has been variously; Eve, Mother Earth, Mother Nature, the young bride in the landscape, me and you. I would suggest that in all cases she has actually been the personification of Spirit, the Sacred Feminine. As such, she is neither male nor female, but the essence of life which exists within us all, man and woman.

As Spirit or the Sacred Feminine, the female figure is illuminatory...she casts light at the same time as attracting it. She lights the way, but the journey also finds her. As she attracts the light it fills her, penetrating the intimate spaces of her soul, as she sheds light for humanity's guidance. As Light she is also Knowledge. For indeed, illumination reveals information, in its never-ending detail as well as in its broad glimpses of horizons beyond. These perspectives add to our knowledge of the world and us...and the universe/multiverse. It propels us. Please check out Colour of Knowledge for more of my thoughts. The painting Colour Of Knowledge is also below.

In this post I have uploaded some images of paintings where light and the female figure, representing her various incarnatons, 'speak' of the sacred feminine.

Please also check out my website 'Gallery' My Women 1990-Present

Seeking The Light Oil on linen 36 x 36 cm

 In The Garden Of Eden Oil on linen 50 x 94 cm

"She was not made out of his head to surpass him, nor from his feet to be trampled on, but from his side to be equal to him, and near his heart to be dear to him." [Jamieson-Fausset Brown Bible Commentary] Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm

 The Colour Of Knowledge Oil on linen 62 x 82 cm

 Finding The Light oil on linen 100 x 70 cm

Cheers,
Kathryn
www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

QUIVER

Mother Nature Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm

My exhibition PARADISE at Purgatory Artspace in Melbourne finished last Saturday. Great feedback from the gallery and visitors. I am very happy and am planning another exhibition for early 2013.

I will admit to being somewhat exhausted though. Having an exhibition is both physically and emotionally draining, not only leading up to the event, but also while it is on.
However, after a number of failed attempts to paint...yes lots of tearing up paper and over painting...I feel I'm now back in a creative flow. I've been painting with gouache on paper, plus I have prepared three canvases, which are sitting in my sudio [aka garage] willing me to spill out the images in my head.

INSPIRATION
Let's just say that whilst it is frustrating when the creative flow seems impeded, the ripping up and over painting become a kind of 'play'...and that's a good thing. I let it happen. Out of this 'play' some ideas started to gel in my mind and flowed onto the paper.

I've been wanting to explore more ideas of beauty. As regular readers know I have written about beauty before. For me, beauty is a reminder of what we lose if we do not nurture our planet and all its living creatures, including us. Beauty is not ignorant or simple, as its underlying pathos is an understanding of the existence of ugliness, which it consciously elides. The conscious elision is the element which differentiates beauty from mere prettiness. However, I think that many confuse prettiness with beauty, and in doing so skim across the surface of potential. The cult of celebrity, the fickleness of fashion and the vacuuous drama of reality shows seem to me to perpetuate the slippery slopes of superficiality, resulting in a tourist-like experience of life, rather than an absorption in life.

Beauty has a capacity to touch our hearts deep inside us, triggering resonances that quiver with the past and the future, reminding us at a core, or DNA, level of life's purpose. In these new works on paper I found myself taken to places within and compelled to explore the quiver, the resonance.

Quiver Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm

The body of a woman is present in these four new works. She is the conduit of life, the essence of life revelling in life. She is not a separate entity placed outside the 'scape'. She, is absorbed into the patterns of life, she is part of the pattern, the rhythm. I use the word 'scape' to encompass all environments from those bound to Earth, to those deep within the human psyche, to those in the outer reaches of the cosmos, as well as those that 'speak' of history, past, present and future.

                                    Threshold of Time Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm

Regular readers will identify my much loved transcultural/religious tree-of-life motif. The tree just keeps inspiring me! In these paintings it seems indivisible from the female figures as it erupts from their limbs and hearts, connecting to the distance beyond and within.

Firmament Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm

Here are some links to previous posts where I write about beauty:

http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2010/03/beauty.html [I write about beauty at the end of the blog post]

http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2011/03/beauty-as-portal.html

http://www.youtube.com/user/kabrimblecombe?feature=mhee#p/a/u/1/8J_zL8ALnJo This is a short segment from a recent 1 1/2 hour presentation I gave for the C.J Jung Soc of Queensland. In this segment I talk about beauty.

GOOD NEWS!

My entry for the BLAKE PRIZE http://www.blakeprize.com.au/ whilst not getting into the finalists was apparently in the group considered for the finals. AND, from that group the directors select works for what's called the DIRECTORS' CUT EXHIBITION. And, my entry COMPASSION is in it! http://kathrynbrimblecombeart.blogspot.com/2010/07/compassion.html

This link will take you to where you can see the list of selected artists. http://www.blakeprize.com.au/news/2011-directors-cut-artists-announced

The DIRECTORS' CUT is an online exhibition and the images are live from 26 October - 23 January. I'll keep you informed!

WEBSITE

Please check out my website www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com where I have online 'galleries'. Details such as prices etc can be found there.

Cheers,

Kathryn

QUESTIONS

I Am A Tree Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm

I have been watching the world lately...as I am sure you have too. So much seems to be happening, so much that causes concern, disquiet and worry. Yet, from what I can discern, questions we may not have previously thought to ask, or be game to ask, are now being asked. Finally questions about the world's economic situation are probing underlying and exhausted paradigms, rather than only external symptoms eg: the S&P downgrade of the US has forced the navel gazers to look up. The dreadful riots in the UK have seen newspaper commentators, politicians and others analyse the 'sacredness' of welfare and the contigent erosion of self respect and responsibility...for all involved parties. Environmental issues are now world issues, where questions of responsibility for the future, and not just the foreseeable one, are part of the dialogue. And, so on.

Underlying all of this, I sense, are very deep questions about our identity as human beings. We are, in a way, asking ourselves, who are we? We are astonished by the UK rioters' behaviour, aghast at the greed of those who create ponzi schemes, bewildered by the inability of politicians to make statesman-like decisions, incredulous about environmental destruction for profit without scientific assurance of sustainability and so on.

As structures erode it forces us to question. When events happen, seemingly out of the blue [eg: UK riots, GFC] posthumous questions reveal that many of these events were inevitable. But, the questions also infer an underlying scramble to understand the human condition and ask, 'Who are we and where is compassion?' I hope we have the attention span required to ponder these questions deeply! Maybe art can help!

I Am A Tree

This is a short paragraph I previously wrote about this painting:

This next painting 'I Am A Tree' places the female figure at the centre. She is the site of all growth. She is the land, the sea, the sky. She is connected to everything, the Universe or Multiverse. She folds duality so that it is no longer recognisable as such. She embraces the vastness with intimate strokes of love and compassion. She is the horizon, as well as being that which exists beyond it...and this horizon may be within us. She is the landscape in its universal entirity, as well as its co-existing metaphor, the landscape of soul.

She is me, she is you, she is the feminine power that exists within us all...male and female.

And, regular readers will know of my thoughts on beauty, and its agency as a generator and holder of hope. Here's a short video where I speak about beauty. It is a segment from my recent talk at the C.J Jung Society of Queensland.

PARADISE
Countdown to my exhibition Paradise @ Purgatory Artspace, Melbourne!
The show dates are 8 Sept- 8 Oct.
Opening night is Friday 9 Sept 6-8 pm.
First Floor, 170 Abbotsford St, North Melbourne.

Check out http://www.artabase.net/exhibition/3275-paradise for more details and artist's statement.
Also check out my online gallery
 http://www.visualartist.info/visualartist/artist/subpage.asp?ex=gallery&I=1690&sub=5777&artistId=1292&PageId=1690

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com