"Only One Chance" at JKR Gallery

I am so excited to share with you a new piece, titled "Only One Chance” created for the group show, "All Shapes and Sizes." The prompt for this show is "tell your unique story through art." All paintings created for the show are any shape smaller than 12 x 12 inches, except a square or rectangle.

I created an oval painting on a 10-inch round canvas. The oval image of the sun coming through snow-covered pines is surrounded by a trompe l'oeil frame, made to look like a möbius strip. So why snow on pines on a mountainside? Why a möbius strip?

Möbius strips are unique structures, a seemingly 3D object with only one side. You can create one by putting a single half twist in a strip of paper and then taping it end to end to create a loop. If you take a pencil and draw a long continuous line on one side, you will notice that your pencil will cross to the "opposite side" without picking up your pencil. The object is one-sided. E.C. Escher famously played with the image, and today is the inspiration for the logo to indicate recycling.

Funny how we are continually being recycled into soil at our base biology, be it with our breath or our poop. The longer I am alive, see the turning of the seasons, watch the rise and fall of fellow terrestrials, watch movements evolve and dissolve, see children transform and parents dissolve, I see the cyclical nature of our very existence. Anything stable is just one moment, one encounter. The circumstances in that one moment will never arise, just like it again. What a gift! ...to be fully awake in that one moment and appreciate it for its unique opportunity, to appreciate life, even when it is painful.

The sun through the snowy pines on a mountain is just another example of a fleeting moment. That single moment before the sun has time to give rise to melting, to transforming like snow to water, water to grass, grass to fire, fire to soil, soil to tree, and so on. We are in a perpetual state of transforming, watching weather pass across us, change us, dissolve and create us.

I also like the image of snow on a mountain top because it reminds me of my experience as a meditator. My teacher often says, "sit as a mountain." Settle in, watch your breath, turn the light within. Who is breathing? Who is seeing? Can you grab someone in there and say," 'she' is breathing?" To sit like a mountain for me is to be the mountain and be the sky. I use my senses and experience my "weather," watch my thoughts cross my mental sky, no judgments, no preferences, no separation, just listening, pure awareness.

Along with many other artists' 2D creations, this painting will on exhibit and available for purchase at the JKR Gallery in Provo, Utah. The gallery is at 1675 N. Freedom Blvd. Bldg 7B, in Provo, Utah. The show is on display from March 5th thru the 26th. An opening reception is on March 5th, but due to COVID, you will need to reserve a time to see the show. To get your time slot, contact the gallery, email them at jkrgallery@gmail.com.