From the peaceful brush again

Shadowed land
(Gifted; copies available)

From the peaceful brush

The hopeful quiet
(Gifted; copies available)

From the empowered brush

Over the Sea
(for sale)

I drew this some time ago and just finished painting it. The most notable thing to me is the wisteria bush (purple flowers that look like grapes)-- it is alive on the side that she has passed by. And she, dressed in yellow, is the sun that is missing from the picture. So it's not so much about progress as it is about the life within her.

From the windswept brush

With the wind
(Sold! Copies available)

Choosing the promise that the life that springs from underneath her socked, protected feet holds, she trudges away from the edge. She knowingly smiles at the instability those tempting waves hold, and releases the bluebird from her hand, offering it opportunity. To me, there is a silence about the scene, perhaps because no words are needed.

From the ungrounded brush

Into the rush
(Gifted; copies available)

When I showed this painting to my nutritionist, H, she was struck by the faceless body diving from the boat into the deep end of the ocean. This is very much what I have been doing lately with my symptoms, focusing on my body and forgetting who I am in favor of control of the ED. The bluebird soars over the scene, narrating the crescendos with its outsider's eye.

From the morbid brush

The banks

I sketched this painting instinctively, almost deliriously, and painted it in just as detached a state of mind, though it speaks volumes about my mental state. Soaked, the girl crawls the bank of a deadened world. The water is saturated with colors, deep without ready clarity, and the burned out land proves to be just as complex; just because it is dead does not mean that it is straightforward. The bluebird draws the girl's attention to the overwhelming reaches of the tree with its tire swing, a sullen reminder of what came before: the liveliness of childhood, the color of simplicity.

From the cacophonous brush

In the din you'll hear a bird...
(Sold! Copies available)

In the roar of the wind and sea, the girl conducts the scene, pulling and rising the waves and wind to untwist the vines. In this, the bluebird is freed, singing over the busy scene and drawing attention to his distant goal of the bramble on another cliff. What else grows on that new shore is unknown, yet the bird still heads in that direction. With blind faith I fly from one tangle of life to the next, never knowing what the new will hold.

What is Good

"Hold on to what is good even if it is a handful of earth.
Hold on to what you believe even if it is a tree which stands by itself.
Hold on to what you must do even if it is a long way from here.
Hold on to life even when it is easier letting go.
Hold on to my hand even when I have gone away from you."
























(For Sale)

From the searching brush

The Blues
(Sold! Copies available)

Gathering Spring
(Sold! Copies available)

From the tortured brush

Lifelines (pulling in the darkness)
(For Sale)

The title of this one says a lot I think, as does the painting itself. The rusted blood waves threaten to swamp her as she peels back the corner of the page to reveal the darkness behind it. Though the world holds so much promise, represented by the lively background and the tender new grass beneath her feet, she still chooses the comfort of these darknesses, though not without pain. This was done for a group about self injury, meant to represent the heavy relief it brings and portray that I was knowingly choosing darkness over life.

Update:
When my aunt, visiting from CA, saw this painting, she talked about pulling in the light, how it seemed that the colorful spaces were being gathered. Never mind that I painted it when I was deeply suicidal and saw it as pulling in the darkness and being swamped and numbed by self-injurious behavior. The open space above her makes me uncomfortable, I feel like something is missing, more darkness or something to cocoon her in. This is the painting that prompted S to ask if I was held often as a baby, if open space provokes anxiety in me and makes me search for comfort (it does). How do I feel about this? The negative voice of ED tells me that people see what they want to see, so of course my aunt sees positivity in a painting so dark. The good part of me holds onto her words and hopes that she is right; I am gathering light as much as I toy with the dark.

From the insightful chalk

My eating disorder is...

mindless and destructive, like a dragon.

"There is no space."

The irony of a tiny person in a vast, overflowing bath.