Be Led by Your Dreams

Standing on the bare ground,–my head bathed by the blithe air and uplifted into infinite space,–all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eyeball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or parcel of God. – Ralph Waldo Emerson Nature holds a myriad of …

Crescendo – A poem

Coursing through the piquant breeze, swirls of blood orange lifesparks Scrape across the saffron sands like delicate arpeggios. The tranquil fullness of life’s dulcet allegro Bolsters sagging courage with promises of paradise. Once buoyant blooms, long since faded, Lie in tangled heaps across the hallowed fields. The spirit, filled with tangy ripeness, Willfully begins the …

Express Gratitude and Grace

Throughout this life, you can never be certain of living long enough to take another breath. – Zen Master HuangBo This is my Four Hundredth Post – 400!!! I started this blog to rekindle long-smoldering artful fires, and to hurl positive thunderbolts into the gaping void of antagonism and mistrust roiling the world. We all …

Art and Imperfection

Art is the imposing of a pattern on experience, and our aesthetic enjoyment is recognition of the pattern. – Alfred North Whitehead Two mighty sentinel walnut trees guard the front yard of my childhood home. One tree is straight as a telephone pole. The other tree’s trunk bends about ten feet off the ground. One …

What is Enough?

I have nature and art and poetry, and if that is not enough, what is enough? – Vincent Van Gogh We live in a time of great material abundance. But the haves and the have nots stand on opposite sides of a deep chasm of inequality. Many people focus on the holes in their lives …

Street Photography in China

Everything that is visible hides something that is invisible. – Renee Magritte I have been sorting through my photographs of China from 2003-2019. My first visit to China, I went to Beijing in July, 2003 – just after the WHO cleared the city for international travel after SARS. I want to share a few of …

Life from Art

It’s the sides of the mountain which sustain life, not the top. – Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance I have opened a store in Etsy to sell my art called “Life from Art”. I only sell and ship to the US for now. The first name I chose had been taken …

Your Personal Renaissance

An artist must have his measuring tools not in the hand, but in the eye. – Michelangelo According to the dictionary, a freehand drawing is “done by hand without the use of instruments, measurements, etc”. You use your hand and observational skills. All children know how to do this, and some remember how after they …

The Soul of the Brush

The painter has the Universe in his eyes and hands. – Leonardo da Vinci Humans have been painting with brushes for over 16,000 years. Ancient people created brushes from feathers and hair attached to sticks. Chinese brushes originated over 6,000 years ago and are still used throughout Asia. As with the creation of any tool, …

Art and Artifice

Art blazes from the soul. You are an artist. You express your art within your life. Your life’s work flows from the art of balancing creative, passionate anxiety. Art is not exclusive to artists, rather art is the creative expression of life. Living is an art. Art is life. Art is a lie that makes …