Meeting Your Muse as you train for your Olympic moment

These are some of the images from the first photo shoot within the Painted Body series for my Oracle of Initiation divination deck. I woke up before dawn a year and a half ago and headed down into a graffiti strewn tunnel. It was initially the color palette and vibration of the artwork that attracted me, as well as the classic rough-hewn bricks they had been painted on; it was a lovely mix of classical and modern design. I headed out so early because this location is right off a popular hiking trail and I didn’t want to be disturbed.

I was nervous about taking the work to the next level. I had already become very comfortable being alone and nude on the land through my Earthen Body series, but somehow painting myself added another layer of vulnerability. In reality if someone came upon me down in these dark tunnels they would probably be more afraid of me than any safety or decorum issues I am might be faced with.

I carried paints and props with me, not sure how it was all going to go. I had learned a few nights before about a new setting on my camera that allowed me to take moody & evocative dream-like images in darker locations. I had no idea that over time the play of colors, lights and movement could cause the effects that have emerged in the work. But we are at the first time out here, and I truly had NO IDEA what I was getting myself into.

I am not overtly intellectual or calculating about the process. The work begins when I am attracted to certain earthly locations. It’s like meeting a potential lover-do we resonate, shall we play? When the actual painting and photography process begins there is no consistent ritual to it.  Loving and honoring that piece of land was the gateway into the work. I let the playful physicality and joyful freedom take me out of my “mind” and into what I am to meet through the dance. And it is a dance, I am moving and shifting through time, and space, and levels of awareness.

It is really a return to a pure and innocent way of just tossing yourself into what you are attracted to. I worked with children for years, and they do not premeditate their next week and a half. They meet what is before them, fling all of their little energy and might into it, and then move on. It really is being in the moment, which is so hard for many of we big ones.

Returning home from the shoot there is really no way for me to impart how amazed I was by what had transpired. The colors, shape shifting qualities, and the power that was resonating off of these images was beyond anything I had ever imagined I could do. I could do this in watercolors and collages, but to take it to the next level and embody the energies myself was incredible.

I believe this work was actually the culmination of years of study and focus and creative passion that was ready to bloom. We never actually know when, or where, or how our investments in our spiritual growth and creative juices will emerge, but if we keep following our muses and pushing beyond our fears and perceived constrictions we may be awe-struck. I read somewhere an analogy about training for the Olympics. You train, and train, and train for years and years to become the movements and the skills. You do not actually know when and where those skills may be called forth, but you still keep investing in your craft, your excellence. And then one day, you may be called out. And all of that preparation comes into practice, and you soar. So what are you thrilled about in your life that may still be in the training process? Do you put your head down and practice, continuing to hone your skills because you know you just have to do it?

I wish you great wonder and awe in some form today-be it a smile or an insect or a creative inspiration that opens you to your divine potential. It’s all there, but can we slow down and refocus enough to embrace it??

PS- all of these Notes on Facebook are actually from my blog. It would be lovely if you would post comments directly at the blog too, I believe its good for search engine positioning…many thanks and blessings

www.MelissaWeissSteele.WordPress.com

The Series aspect of the work: Sami Graffiti in The Valley of the Moon

The series aspect of the work is some of the most interesting parts of the process.  The photos above are from my Earthen Body series taken in 2007 and 2008. These particular images were taken during a break from a fantastic Sami/ Norwegian/ Norse  Shamanism workshop by Ailo Gaup through Michael Harner’s Foundation for Shamanic Studies. We were in the achingly beautiful Valley of The Moon in Sonoma, CA.  I am such an Earth Baby, and I had reached my limit of  being separated from those honey-colored rolling hills in the  September sunlight. I skipped an afternoon session and went to frolic on the land. I had a blast and got some great shots-a lovely mix of process and product. The photo below is from an algae covered stream  called “Sami Vacant.”.

I do not actually consider myself a photographer. I cannot tell you the ASA of a shot or make Gelatin Silver Prints in the darkroom. I see the camera as simply a tool to document a ritualistic process. The main goal of the work is to create communion with the Land and Spirits and get the hell out of the way. All of The Earthen Body work was done with a very small digital camera, and The Painted Body series used only a slightly bigger one; God Bless the Canon G9.

Because it really is documentation of ceremony, I take hundreds to thousands of images during each photo shoot. It actually ranges from about 300 to 4000 pictures, with extended groups of different angles and locations. It’s really interesting to look at the progressions during the process-it becomes a range of moods and reactions, a montage of human expression and engagement.

The four Sami Graffiti photos above represent the first graffiti images within the work. While exploring the Sonoma landscape I found a handful of large feather. I initially thought they were from a Turkey Vulture, but was later corrected by Maria Yraceburu;  They were Eagle feathers. I found the tunnel with the aerosol art  just after collecting the feathers. I took off my glasses and top, descending into the darkened tunnel, dancing with the sacred eagle gift. The final photo of the 4 is a miracle of composition and proportion. I do not see well without my glasses, and all of the images are taken VERY quickly and spontaneously.  So to have the background, feathers and my eye line up like that was only possible through Divine Intervention. That was when it really really hit me that I had somehow slipped into a co-creation with The Universe. It was so exciting and humbling at the same time. I had been kissed by the Angels.

So the series aspect of the work is really the true representation of creativity in its wild and undulating complexity. It’s not all beautiful or perfect, but if we show up we can meet the entire range of expressions that want to spill forth. And we may occasional reach excellence, with a little help from our friends…

Energetic Sparkles Surging Down My Chakra’s-How I knew I was called to Create The Oracle of Initiation

On April 6^th, 2006 I knew I was called to create my own divination deck. As I sat on my couch in Wedgewood, one of the most intense energetic experiences I have ever felt cascaded down through my Chakras*.

So, backing up… at the end of August 2005 I had a major concussion hip-hop roller skating. That initiation opened a flow of creative confidence that changed my trajectory. Living in Seattle at that time, I had been focusing on a Shamanic Healing and Divining practice. During a rare period of down-time after the concussion the Horse Spirits I had been apprenticing to flew through me, and in 2 days time I made 10 incredible horse collages. The power of those horse collages gave me the confidence to pursue my dormant dreams of a visual art career.

Along with the career shift I had also released all of the major obligations I had made over the last three years. I made space. I was claiming what I truly wanted to do, not being controlled by perceived commitments or loyalties to other people or situations. I actually believe this was the pivotal piece allowing me to receive the epiphany of the deck. Challenging ourselves to value and respect our own pathway shows the Universe you are ready to carry a larger dream.  It can be difficult to choose ourselves and our own destiny, but if we really want to fly we need to learn how to do this.

During this time I had been doing career counseling with the gifted Sonya Lea focusing on moving my art into the world. Sonya brings together a background in business and the arts as well as her own writing career and natural intuitive skills through The Tarot. We would work through all of those mediums, weaving together my desire to balance my grounded pragmatism with visionary inspirations. She now calls her coaching “Wild Work,” offering business planning for artists and entrepreneurs to envision their wild lives while creating their work. Part of why I respect Sonya is that she lives the work. She is one of my allies and sisters on this path of passionate creativity. Thank you Spirit. Her Blog link is below, and thanks to Carole Harmon for the amazing picture of Sonya from Cote Savage, Brittany. It’s even a wild sounding place!

http://workingwild.blogspot.com/.

So back to those sparkles. I have so many different skills and interests that it can be hard for me to focus. I want the smorgasbord life, and at times you do need to narrow it down to a few major projects. Sonya and I made a list of the 3 major ways I might bring my creativity into the world. She suggested going home and feeling into each of the potentials to get an idea of how they might play out.  I came up with printing my art on clothing and accessories; pursuing the gallery world; and doing the deck. Now I must say, Spirit snuck the deck in. It was not actually consciously on my radar, but it popped up when we were doing the list. The Universe works in mysterious ways. When I imagined being in the first two situations they were fine, but not a lot of juice…and its pretty clear I am a juice gal. Then I sat there ready for the deck’s impressions and it was like the top of my head was opened and cosmic faery sparkles of divine inspiration blasted down through all my Chakras and then back up to the heavens again.

I was stunned.

My all-time favorite Carolyn Myss work is her Advanced Energy Anatomy CD’s.  She explains the process of divine ideas moving through each of the archetypal issues within the 7 Chakras. It is a process of initiation on many levels to manifest powerful ideas, and the CD’s outline some of the issues and blocks one may encounter at each level of materialization. That process happened to me on an energetic level in about 15 seconds. I knew I was ready to carry this project I had quietly dreamed of for many years.  So, that was the day I started The Oracle of Initiation.

* Chakras are  7 main energy vortexes within the body that each correspond to different levels of  spiritual and emotional energetic balance and development.

Reclaiming The Erotic

In Audre Lorde’s seminal lecture from 1978, “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power” from the book Sister Outsider, she beautifully articulates the essential need to return to living within the broadest reaches of creativity, sensuality and intuition. This piece was crafted during the seventies when some Feminists had their own  ‘Backlash” again the masculine, but this piece is ultimately a call for all of us to reclaim the power and potential of embracing our connection to ourselves, our work, and others through a broader definition of The Erotic. With primal respect to Ms. Lorde and her original expression I am moving this into inclusive language….

“We have come to distrust that power which rises from our deepest and nonrational knowledge….We have been taught to suspect this resource, vilified, abused, and devalued in western society. But The Erotic offers a well of replenishing and provocative force to the person who does not fear its revelation….The Erotic is a measure between the beginning of our sense of self and the chaos of our strongest feelings.…It is not a question only of what we do; it is a question of how acutely and fully we can feel in the doing…We have been raised to fear the yes within ourselves, our deepest cravings.”

My work is Erotic. It is also a political act to live from deep within a radical and simple return to each of our authentic knowing.

When I began my self-portrait photography it was a way to explore my own sense of power and identity through the camera lens. I was still in the resurrection process after my husband’s death from cancer, and most of my ideas about life, stability, trust, safety, justice, hope, faith, and love had been blown apart.  The initial Earthen Body photographs were my search for who this woman was now that she had been thrust out of the castle. I had been ensconced in the Princess/Knight “white-picket-fence” paradigm, and now had been released to find my own truths.

I used the ritualistic photographic process to claim who I was beyond external opinions or expectations. Because I was alone, I was able to really open up and release most of the self-consciousness I can be controlled by. This new woman was much fiercer and more intense than I had previously recognized.

What I really came into contact with during my work was my own internal sense of The Erotic. By being nude and exposed on the land I remembered a deep knowing of my place within the earth. I was the soil and the raven and the stream; my boundaries became permeable and I returned to the oneness of all that is.

I gratefully “lost” the sense of self that can be constricting and became a wild and free dervish on the land. It was a place where I can meet the “chaos of my strongest feelings” in a non-linear, visceral, primal way that allows movement and integration from those unconscious and hidden realms.

I also reenter the sacred place of joy and union that is constantly available through stepping deeply into anything that makes us really alive. I stepped into The Erotic.

This blossoming into my passionate  creativity opened the doorways for The Painted Body images here in New Mexico that have been some of the richest work I have done to date. When we open to our larger potentials, we never know what may magically and blessedly materialize. My emergence into my Erotic Self has transformed every aspect of my life from dancing to dreaming, to loving and grieving. I am awake, and it’s not always easy, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. This is a blessed journey we are on, and I want to experience all the twists and turns.

This is Eroticism lived.

Sacred Adornment-The Altar-ing of Self

In my Painted Body photography series for The Oracle of Initiation deck, sacred adornment is a central part of the process.  The talismanic jewels and natural objects I decorate myself with are as altar-ing as the painting itself. The feathers, scarves, crystals & bones all carry an energy and power that radiates beyond their physical existence. In welcoming them into a ceremonial process, they reveal their true essence, offering a glimpse into the inner-glow that everything possesses but we rarely notice. We see that things we perceived as lifeless are actually filled with a sparkling grace.

In Norse mythology, Freya, the Goddess of beauty and love {Scandinavians version of Aphrodite & Oshun} wears a gleaming golden necklace named Brisingamen. It is said to be the most beautiful piece of jewelry in the world. To receive this treasure she spends a night of “love” with each of the four dwarves who crafted the necklace. One of the interpretations of the dwarves is as the four directions of Earth, Air, Fire and Water. I also view them as the richness available within the underworld; the darker inner-places where complexity and contradiction nurture great creativity and visions. Freya returned to her primal elemental connections to claim her true radiance.  I descend into tunnels and caves to see the glow of my own amber abundance.

I too decorate the temple of my body during the photographic process. I become naked & vulnerable, as well as bejeweled & majestic. This is the paradox of the work- getting muddy and becoming a Queen. Offering ones self to the dwarves for the most beautiful necklace in the world. What shadows in your life could be the contrast illuminating your most glorious gifts?

The Locations-how in the world did I get there?

I can’t talk about the Painted Body series locations without bringing in the Earthen Body series first. Over time I will revisit certain pivotal shoots from the Earthen Body series, but for now we shall just share their profound impact on my sense of power, trust and joy.

The Earthen Body series began in Texas after a particularly successful 5 day retreat  Kate Vigneron and I taught at her ranch with women and horses. I had found an incredible bone mask, and took some shots that blew me away-so much so that I hid them for 4 months. My sense of trust in my artistic process and the Universe at large was a little  shaky at that time so I was not sure if the energy that came through the photos was a fluke.

Four months later, on my birthday, I decided to revisit the process at my father’s cabin on The Olympic Peninsula. It is an incredible place, one of 6 cabins grandfathered into the National Forest there. It is perched above the coastal beach, and can only be reached through locked logging roads. I set out barefoot for Seafield Creek, not knowing what I might encounter. As I climbed down a fern covered embankment my Spirits told me, “this is your work.” That second series at the creek also blew me away, and spent the next year taking the photos whenever I could.

Part of why this process was so life-changing was that I uses to carry a lot of fear and anxiety. For me to be naked, alone on the land was HUGE. The other transformational part of the journey was how I was lead to locations. It really was a form of enchantment. I love the Earth; I am a happy pagan- just let me loose  in nature and watch me glow. So I would come upon places that were so beautiful or interesting that I just HAD TO play. And play I did. It got to the point where I would just get in my car and be lead to amazing locations. I learned to trust in my safety, and the wisdom of this guiding force that knew when and where to co-create this incredible ritualistic process.

I took the Earthen Body photos throughout the Pacific coast, The Southwest, and magical magical New Zealand. I never encountered another person during a shoot until New Zealand. I feel like a container, a “field,” was created around the process so I would be left in peace.

So the Painted Body series came directly out of this trust and confidence in the journey and my relationship to the Earth and Unseen Guidance that I was able to step into.

There have been five main locations here in New Mexico where The Painted Body work has been done. Some are graffiti covered tunnels, some arroyos, some mesas and caves. I have taken the photos 27 times myself, once with another. Other than the collaborative shoot I am always alone {earth-plane beings at least}. There are almost 30,ooo photos in this series alone.  As you see in the photos above, I have even stood in rushing water to get my images.

So I continue to be open to delightful and sacred places that draw me to this work, and the emergence of The Oracle of Initiation deck- boy have I manifested well!!

Pushing the envelope-immediate release of New photographs

OK, so this is really big for me. I have had mixed feelings about being “seen” in this lifetime. I have cloistered myself and my work, and that time of exile is OVER. I did the work above yesterday. Very very few people have ever seen my images so quickly. I am heading into a new era where I release my work and let it flow into its own destiny.

I had a dream about dropping two earthen pucks of soil into a river channel where many pathways were meeting. After I tossed them in I wanted to retrieve the two discs, but realized it might be difficult since they probably melted back into the flow. I considered getting the farmer who owned these irrigation ditches to block the flow so I could scoop back up the two potentials I had offered to the Water Spirits. I then realized it was all OK and I would let them go, it was all good. It would be what it would be. So this is my version of letting those destinies merge with the greater river and be in peace.

My good friend and inspiration, The Word Shaman Sonya Lea says when the work is ready  she likes to turn it around quickly so it does not become stagnant. I really heard that when we were doing her transformative Wild Work coaching together and have taken it to heart. {more on Sonya’s important role in the beginning of The Oracle of Initiation divination deck later…}

So today I have turned over a new, vibrant, glowing cottonwood leaf …here is work I just finished, bless it all and thank you to all my Ancestors and Spirits, and this sacred, sacred New Mexico land that calls me and my creative Spirit. Mille Grazie Kwahu Abeja

Roger Ballen’s Startling and Unsettling Visions

Roger Ballen’s work is one of my great inspirations.  He has created a fascinating & shadowy universe through photographing the impoverished whites in their rural South African villages. Since the 1980’s American expatriate and former geologist Ballen turned his camera lens onto the insular world of these Shadow Land people. The images feel like walking into a 1920’s mental ward and becoming a part of their reality. The subjects look like they left this world long ago, or never actually landed, retreating into their own childlike reality.  His palette is a gritty range of grays and blacks punctuated by fascinating arrangements between the models and their surreal world. The rooms feel barren, but may contain naive graffiti scrawled across the cold cement walls, or puzzling still-lives within this irrational world of make-believe and artifice. His shadowy vignettes are the visual equivalent of a Hans Christian Anderson fairy-tale, where everything is not always pretty & bright, and strange things happens in veiled places.

This challenging work has mesmerized me because Ballen has captured some of the central hues of my childhood. My German grandparents were very old school and clannish. They lived in town, but it felt like the old-country because they only had a wood stove until the late 1980’s. They would send me to school with warmed stones from the firebox wrapped in greasy rags-now tell me that’s not a fairy-tale!! Having survived two world wars, and the period of wild inflation in Germany when you could buy an apartment building for a ham, my Grandfather would save old nails, screws, and even craft new handles for broken hammers. Everything was patched, mended or reworked to extend its purpose. You never knew when scarcity would resurface.

We had the front of the house, which was brighter and more welcoming, and then the back of the home was more mysterious. It contained many secret thresholds. It was chilly and stagnant in those cloistered rooms, with enough blankets on each bed to smother a small child. I remember feeling both constricted and held in those weighty sleep chambers. Because of my Grandparent’s upbringing I can smell Ballen’s environments; the musty odors of old work clothes and hoarding, the boiled meat & potatoes these kinfolk eat, the smell of fear and instability. Having grown up with this complexity lurking below the surface, it helps me to understand why I am able to do such intense artistic work myself. I am drawn to the other-worldliness of darker places, the underworld, the power of deep archetypal energies.  I apprenticed to subtext and subterfuge, learning how to navigate the dark while retaining my light. Wonderful training for a mystic.

A fabulous post on Ballen’s Portland, Oregon show

http://www.oregonlive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2008/04/roger_ballen_at_quality_pictur.html

considers the critics who say he is an “artistic mercenary, exploiting his poverty-stricken, post-apartheid white subjects by photographing them in peculiar, unsettling  tableaux that made bizarre theater out of their outsider status and appearance. They might as well have been the hillbillies from “Deliverance.”

Ballen addresses this by saying “ There was something that attracted me to these people, and it wasn’t political or social. It was something about myself.”

What do we see about ourselves in these gateways between vision and madness, the intricate shadows we each carry from our lineages, some darker than others.

Jupiter Arts Center Painted Body photography show

The art show Saturday October 10th was a love-fest!!! Bless all 21 people who drove 160 miles round trip to represent at the opening. And Thanks to Robert Tomlinson the director of Jupiter Arts Center & Gallery in Centralia, Washington for creating great  shows and all the local folks who supported the event as well. One of the fellow artists in the show, Tamara Stephas was also there-she was cool-wish I had more time to bond with her. The work looked amazing and the gallery is a gift to the community there.

Holla to all attending:

Beegee, David, Poppa, Sonja, Ray, Mama, The Ron Man, Darrell, Roberta, Sonya Lea, Cyndi, William, Lisa, Veronica, Mary Beth, Frank, Lindsay, Bruce, Virgiania, Stacey & Ken. profound LOVE to you all!! xoxxx Abeja

Returning to Cascadia and Belonging

Returning home. Where is home?  Do you belong to the land you were birthed on, or to your ancestral heritage, or to the past-life influences that weave throughout this incarnation? How can we reclaim our multidimensionality, belonging again to everything as we once knew?

I ponder belonging a lot.  I am genetically Scandinavian & German, have an extended Japanese family, and feel deeply drawn to a variety of other cultures. Belonging to me is a sense of home. A resting place where you have such peace that you are truly able to sink into it and feel supported. Where your heart is filled with a quiet comfort and knowing. I have found this level of connection within nature & my sacred practices, my artistic creations & adventure travels, and through the dream-time & certain spiritual communities.

I have returned to the land of my birth, Cascadia, for an art show and am pondering where I belong.

I actually feel many of us have been searching for a sense of belonging our whole lives. We have carried a deep sense of isolation at times, remembering enough to know have lived in other ways. We have known connection & cooperation, we have lived our passions, we have been in balance with ourselves and the natural world. I believe we are on the cusp of a profound remembrance. We are on the verge of the 5^th world of harmony and peace that the Hopi prophesized. Just as Homeopathic medicine works, sometimes things get  worse before they become better. That’s where we are now. So hang on, and look for the kinship that reveals itself, and keep the faith through the fatigue and disillusionment because WE ARE THE VISION CARRIERS- do not forget this, and remind each other when we do. We have come here to shift the paradigms, and we all matter.

A HOPI ELDER SPEAKS

“You have been telling the people that this is the Eleventh Hour, now you must go back and tell the people that this is THE HOUR.

And there are things to be considered…

Where are you living?

What are you doing?

What are your relationships?

Are you in right relation?

Where is your water?

Know your garden.

It is time to speak your Truth.

Create your community.

Be good to each other.

And do not look outside yourself for the leader.

Then he clasped his hands together, smiled, and said, “This could be a good time! There is a river flowing now very fast. It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid. They will try to hold on to the shore. They will feel they are being torn apart and will suffer greatly. Know the river has its destination. The elders say we must let go of the shore, push off into the middle of the river, keep our eyes open, and our heads above the water. And I say, see who is in there with you and celebrate.

At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally. Least of all, ourselves. For the moment that we do, our spiritual growth and journey comes to a halt.

The time of the lone wolf is over. Gather yourselves! Banish the word struggle from your attitude and your vocabulary. All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration.

We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.

Oraibi, Arizona Hopi Nation

So know that I am here, one of the tribe, who is paddling down the river with you.

Blessings, Kwahu  Abeja