"Spirit Rose"
"Spirit Rose"
2023
Soft Pastel on Sennelier pastel board
Unframed
$2,000 + taxes and s/h
Recently I've been thinking about what "spirit" means....it seems to be used to talk about experiences and feelings beyond our physical body. It usually falls into the realm of religion but I think it's too big to be bound by churches or doctrine.
There is one branch of science tries to explain the unexplainable--quantum physics. Check out my BLOG post where I look at it in a very rudimentary and basic way. As I understand it, the bottom line is that we really don't know much.
One fabulous health care provider I work with, Margo Covington, has a fascinating perspective on being human and the spirit. She thinks that the "Big Reason" we are here is that our immortal spirit wants to experience being human and to accomplish that it uses the body but more specifically the mind, heart, and emotions.
As Margo and I talked I had the idea to build on my heart painting and create a spirit painting and a brain painting.
This painting explores the spirit which I also call our our inner voice or our purpose (culturally a white rose represents purity, spirituality, innocence, pure love, affection, and compassion) against all the intense emotions, danger, passion, and fear (symbolized by a shimming red background and dramatic lighting) that we experience in our lives.
It’s a reminder to me that no matter what is going on around us, our spirit is radiant and ever present--remove the red and the lighting and you have a elegant white rose.
The three roses are also symbolic as the small bud represents us before we know our purpose/intention, the bud that is opening represents us as we start to learn and explore our purpose, and the rose in full bloom represents us once we embrace our purpose. Personally I'm somewhere in between the middle and large rose. 😉
One song that I listed to a lot as I painted this is "Look Up" by Joy Oladokun. It reminded me to stop being distracted by the scary parts of life and lean into the beauty. Here are some of her lyrics:
Look up
Do you see the sunlight?
Look up
There's flowers in your hair
Hold on
'Cause somebody loves you
You know trouble's always gonna be there
Don't lеt it bring you to your knees
Look up