July is the month of my birthday and my birthday inevitably the day I look back at the year and feel ambivalent. It turned out to be a good drive to think more about this feeling instead of ignoring it like I usually do.
Years ago I started painting with black watercolour as a careful extension of my graphite pencil work. I remember when I saw someone do that and it blew my mind. Somehow it had never occurred to me that you don’t necessarily have to paint with colour. You can paint with just black. It solved the conflict I felt towards painting at the time; I wanted to paint but needed simplicity because I was working a stressful job.
I painted a work that I still love more than anything I’ve ever painted today. It was from a screenshot of a DVD from Star Trek TNG. The episode is called “The Inner Light”. It’s an episode that confused me when I was younger and so I would always skip it when I got the DVD’s.
It’s an episode that you understand the gravity of when you grow older. It wasn’t about morals, ethics or futuristic dilemmas. No space battles or life threatening alien attacks either. It’s about a man who encounters a device that knocks him unconscious. While his shipmates are trying to wake him up, his mind lives someone else’s entire life. He’s a young man, he falls in love, he struggles, he has kids and grandkids. And he learns how to play the flute. Then he wakes up on his ship, having been unconscious for only a few minutes. He doesn’t just remember everything but he carries the life and memories of someone else in his soul. It changes him fundamentally. He can also play the flute. Jay Chattaway composed the iconic music for this episode. You can listen to the version of the Sinfonische Blasorchester Wendel or the official orchestral version.
The quote from that episode that I like to share decided on the theme for this month. It is this quote:
“Make now always the most precious time. Now will never come again.“
As we think of the past and plan for the future, we move through the now. I suppose you could say that the present accompanies us always, unlike it’s siblings. The past grows and our future in turn becomes smaller. But now always stays the same, even though circumstances might make us feel different. The difference between “I wish this day would end alright” and “oh I wish this day would never end!” is vast and yet, it is both now.
When I think of now, I think of being unobstructed, free. Not thinking about the past and the future eliminates the should-haves and have-tos. It will be an interesting thing to explore and I – as always – invite you to come along. I always enjoy and appreciate any thoughts or experiences you wish to share in the comments.
Last month’s work: “Embrace”
‘Embrace’ turned out be a wonderful theme for the past month. Not because I enjoy embracing things so much, but because it forced its way into my life and I couldn’t do anything but face it. I mean, you can’t announce a theme and then ignore it right?
While I was working on this I soon realised that I was taking on a bit too much perhaps. Then my viewers starting seeing people, trees and a random cat where I hadn’t intended them. For a moment, I attributed that to my own failings but then…yeah…ugh, I embraced it. Someone did a paint over of what they saw where and it was amazing. Someone else pointed out a cat from an Instagram account that they saw and I painted it in.
Embracing turned out to be a different way to connect and it gave me a lot to think about. So thank you for that. 🙂 I chose not to finish my work and leave it as it is.
This month’s schedule, livestreams and Zoom meetings
Here’s this month schedule with the links to all the livestreams and my Zoom room below. If you’d like last minute reminders when these start, make sure to join my Instagram channel. I always post there half an hour before we start.
All the links you need
All livestreams and Zoom meetings are at 8 PM CET!
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