upon the edge of a dream

Intelligent thought negates itself as primary reality. Here, one is aware of the totality of creation.

November 20, 2009

The morning is still cool with thick shadow-tails flowing out of trees bushes, and buildings. The mind is so susceptible to silence and pure seeing at these times. Here as at twilight the unity of dark and light corresponds in a language of totality that permits a new kind of love and identity. The ego doesn’t die; it surrenders and expands into complete openness. Here everything explodes into the essence of everything else….rare.

INNERMOST DESIRE

My intention in my art is always to create a persona, or an ensemble of characters and their environment that are exploded in beauty out of the commonality of the conditioned mind with all its problems, addictions, and sorrows, into that rare awareness that moves as a totality of life. Here All There Is flashes forth unique and overflowing with love and wonder.

ENLIGHTENMENT

Faith means complete reliance and trust in the power and goodness of God, and absolute trust that whatever you conceive with conviction will be returned to you in this world - U.S.ANDERSON
Enlightenment is the love of God awakened in the individual mind of man. The Individual becomes the actuality of faith. Here there is a peace that is beyond faith's comprehension.

snake charmer 24x36

This is the first section of the first collaborative painting Chet and I are involved in. The two side panels of the 24x36 canvas are my contributions, The circle and center piece will be one of Chet’s unique psychological portraits. We both are extremely curious to see how this diverse styled painting works as a whole.

mortal coils

Out of the restricted coils of our physical sensations and sentiments, if one becomes still, there arises an attention that is so profound and penetrating that the whole movement of life is aware of its pure identity, it’s indivisible being. Here all sorrow and suffering end – until the next cycle of thought and a memorized center traps us in the confusion and contradiction of our own feelings. Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom.

ENCHANTED

Enchantment is the shock of beauty or love that is so outrageous that all fear and arrogance, all world weariness, all guilt and feeling of separation dissolve into the explosive realization that the lover and the beloved is one whole being!
The ultimate reality is the enchanted forest of pure energy where all forms of life overflow in their uniqueness and sacred being.
The ego is always shallow and fear ridden, it always defends its position of shallow self importance and illusion of separateness. The vast mind has no beginning or end and is enchanted in its pure identity. It is pure creation. It is pure love!
The world we are conditioned to live in today has taken a nightmare pill. It has terrorized itself out of its enchantment.

KALI: HINDU GODDESS

Associated with eternal energy, the name Kali( by folk etymology) means force of time and change. Although presented as dark and violent, more complex Tantric beliefs sometimes extend her role so far as to be the ultimate reality or Brahman. In the mystical mind total negation of the known opens up the point of power of “now”. The freedom from past and future projections by ego’s thinking, analyzing, mechanical processes is totally destroyed. Creation is always revealed as unknown, new, indestructible and sacred.

This painting is part of The Monster Show being curated by Travis Louie (July 11th) at Copro Gallery in Santa Monica. This show will include many great artists, including my son, The Great Chet.

FOR THE LOVE OF THE ART IN YOU

The painting should work on you. If the small you is working on the painting there is some unnecessary effort to do something or to get somewhere. This will leave a mark upon your mind and propagate many negative notions about your activity. Such as: this has to be a great painting for the show. Or: wait until they see this one! Or: why won’t this work?
True painting should cut through you until nothing is there except this magnificent activity.
The quality of your involvement is the painting itself. Here you will be satisfied with your effort and your mind will be free of effort after you finish. The real you is genius. To trust this real you is right action. Right action is right rest!

ZEN IN THE ART OF WALKING

After almost 50 years of the practice of “walking” some points of right practice are evident.
A. I just let my breathing establish a deep smooth rhythm.
B. I never look at anything until I have developed this rhythm.
C. After a period of time, I let my glance fall naturally on the feather tips of trees, houses, cars, colors and so forth – no content, no reflection, just this watching mind that strikes at the heart of the form, color, texture or gesture, of each point of interest.
Here the only meaning in each gesture is the total life of all there is, dancing and singing in and out of form forever!
Form, beauty, organization, intelligence and love are in just one glance. In each glance eternity is revealed. In each glance pure identity is aware of itself.

THE POINT OF LOVE, POWER, AND FREEDOM .

Om Mani Padme Hum..[http://smallanahata.com/] Taken from his essay on Honesty and Sincerity. “When I am simply present, very alert, and alive to the present moment, I am free. Each moment is total and complete within itself, lacking nothing. We are all one in the Vast River of life and in the end all rivers reach the ocean.”

When World's Collide

It was a brilliant art show put on at L’Imagerie by Debi, Hadas, Karen, and Ben. The significance of Chet and I united at this point in time to share our talent was a family high point.
A festive crowd attended and the atmosphere was jovial.
If I may be so bold I consider the art work to be stunning. Chet’s beloved monsters, with their cunning psychological insights therein and my own brand of mystical visionary art had, as one observer commented, “Real wall power”.
It seemed unanimous to the people who attended that the two diverse styles and subject matter mysteriously complimented each other.
I had so much fun, I would like this Father/Son show thing to catch hold and continue in some fashion on into the future. Chet and I would like to collaborate on some pieces the next time to see what would happen when “World’s Collide” and unify into a new hybrid species.
Thanks again to Debi and her gallery and to all those who attended.
The show runs through June 20th at L’Imagerie Gallery in North Hollywood – (818) 762-8488

PRINCESS OF PEACE

Upstairs in the vast room where the tide blows in clean from All There Is, sitting upon a throne of Pure Identity, a princess of peace sings softly into the essence of eternity. “Maybe you should tarry and sip of this stream, that’s as long as a summer’s long night as long as a lover can dream, it flows ever so light with a melodious passionate theme”.

June 3 2009

A soft pearl grey atmosphere pervades the new mornings face. The jacaranda trees are weeping soft violet tears, flooding the nearby lawns, appearing as an impressionistic pallet of purple and green. There is a gentle breeze just brushing the locks of different tree plumes about tenderly. …..There is nothing but Mind here….There is a stillness about everything that is sacred. The Way Seeking Mind is always new and unknown. The triumph of the totality of life is the ending of the known. Love is always a shock, fear is memorized patterns of sorrow, modified here and there but never transcend able. .

MONSTER SHOW

This is a sketch and the beginning of the painting that I'm creating for a monster show in July, at Copro Gallery in Santa Monica.
I haven't worked with this type of image in a long time, but Kali The Destroyer, is a fascinating theme and I'm enjoying myself immensely.
I plan on showing future images of the painting as it develops.

CURIOSITY

3.
Luminous curiosity watches things as they unfold - just as the are. All form is in flowing change! Left alone there is only pure identity.

focus

2. The laser beam of pure attention, that burns through all illusions, reinstates the self within the total unity of All There Is.

DETACHMENT.

.1.
Upstairs in the vast room sitting upon a throne of magnificent indifference, a priestess of pure being sings softly into the indestructible essence of love. Here everything is everything else!

4. TRANSCENDANCE
Form is form and I am myself! The flight of the Alone, into the Alone.

ABUNDANCE

Here, stripped of thoughts and feelings of separation and beyond the possibility of loss, all life is outrageously rich, sacred and bountiful. One owns everything because one is everything!

CITY OF DREAMS

Venice, the city of dreams: the inspiration for this painting came from Tony and Joyce Zar, who after traveling to Venice, commissioned me to accomplish this vision as a center piece for their beautiful home. It was the largest and most complex painting I have ever attempted.
Tony, Joyce and I were delighted by the results.
And this is what I've been up to the past three months.
If the picture looks blurry, click on it - the enlargement is sharper.