Part One – A conversation around Art and the Sacred; the Feminine and Nature (WORK IN PROGRESS)
My friend, Bloodstone sent me a conversation regarding the process around his explorations and there was a point that specifically related to a processing around my work "Singleton’s work often requires the reader or viewer to have a certain level of understanding or knowledge of these topics to fully grasp their meaning and significance, which can make his work feel inaccessible or obscure to some." Context always enhances understanding. My goal here is to open up further context surrounding the ethos of which I connect with and also as an invitation, explained through a collection of words by others and myself.
Jessica Hundley writes in the book Plant Magick "By exploring the history of our relationship with the natural world, we find traces of our lost selves, our own stories threaded through the myths of the ancient deities once worshiped by our ancestors. And as we begin again to comprehend our deep and symbiotic connection with Mother Earth, the hope is that we will listen to and learn from her, becoming better and more gentle stewards, nurturing the environment that in turn - nurtures all life on this planet." And that's what this about. What it's all about. Nature and Nurturing. This is about feminine Mother Nature, anybody could make art about this, it’s me but I’m not claiming it as mine. It’s rooted in my identity but it’s rooted in everyone’s identity. We can all root ourselves in this.
In the book "Where is Ana Mendieta", by Jane M. Blocker, she writes "She is naturalized as earth's citizen, and the result is that, in her travels, she always carries that home with her. The earth is inescapable as identity itself, and travel, therefore, works only to concretize the meanings that have been established for it." Nature is one of art's most utilized subjects, as with the form of the female figure, we have been idealizing these concepts of beauty without a deep reverence for their essence and meaning outside of western exploitive definitions.
As put by Star Feliz “The break in our ideologies that created these disconnections stem from colonial systems. With affirming an interconnectedness, we begin to see with clarity the threads of life and our ideologies can shift on a collective scale. To be in right relationship with plants and the natural world is so important for our modern culture.”
I think about disconnections, misrepresentations and through which filters we are inheriting history and information. For example the concept of the witch dating back thousands of years; these women practiced what would be called ritual, they worked with the Earth and her resources, as healers and wise elders. In the 1400's society no longer viewed these women as healers bringing about good, and with the rise of male-centric Christianity in Europe during the Middle ages, along with the growth of capitalism, it meant that these women were now being demonized. The word "witch" became a pejorative term around 1468 when a book was published on how to hunt "witches", women it deemed to be morally corrupt. In Europe, between 1500 and 1660, local governments murdered up to 80,000 women thought to be witches.
In the words visual artist Delcy Morelos, “The witch, the woman, has always been a symbol of the type of knowledge that seeks to care for and get to know the natural world, its laws, cycles, and secrets, all powerful knowledge that the patriarchy has repressed and denigrated. The curandera knows she is taking care of herself when she takes care of her equals and her natural environment, and when she interacts with nature, as she knows she is a part of it. Feminine healing practices integrate the body with the emotions, the mind with the spirit, and they vindicate processes of self-healing and patience as ways to ally with the wisdom of the passage of time.”
Nature is embedded in the feminine and the feminine is embedded in all of us, and so much of the feminine is mistakenly defined and rejected, and in turn, a rejection of self and of nature occurs. The complimenting forces of Yin (feminine) and Yang (masculine) define "YIN" as NIGHT, COLD, MOON, CIRCULAR, PROCESS, FEELING, INTERNAL, RIGHT BRAIN, ALLOWING, SPIRITUALITY, GENTLENESS, CALM, SLOW, HEART, DEATH. Delcy Morelos continues to say, “To me, the feminine does not refer to sexual organs; it refers to a structure and a way of engaging with the world from certain specific interests: listening, nourishing, caring, the unconscious, harmony, connectivity, emotion, knowledge acquired from instinct and bodily experience. This feminine approach can be cultivated by any gender as it is, in my view, a human tendency and, furthermore, a vital one.”
Some of us are speaking to a future that people in the present time cannot fully comprehend and we feel abandoned in that space, and also committed to our vision. Venezuelan painter, Luchita Hurtado said it perfectly when she said “[For those who neglected my work,] I don’t feel anger. I really don’t. I feel, you know: ‘How stupid of them.’ Maybe the people who were looking at what I was doing had no eye for the future and, therefore, no eye for the present.” This is a breakdown of how the feminine is connected to nature, that by rejecting one, you are rejecting the other, and there is no separation between us and Nature, and somehow this testimony is like a tree falling alone in a forest, can anyone hear, does it exist, do I exist?
Olubode Shawn Brown writes, "As an artist you will walk a kind of death walk. These are the steps walked by the condemned when one's life is called for and the only thing that will save you is the way you walk towards the death squad. You must as an artist make of this walk a shape shifting dance with the forces that seek to obliterate you, finding spaces within you in which the eternal dwells and walk before them as though there. No shields will help, no desperate pleas, no recounting of past victories or future promises will suffice: only a fluidity of form that says: to kill me is to kill you."
“Dreaming is all things spiritual, in the dreaming mythical ancestors made epic journeys through the landscape, they handed down sacred laws and ceremonial practices. When they were done, they transformed themselves into plants, animals and landscape features such as mountains and sources of water. Some became stars. Aboriginal people today were once nomads, they followed the paths of the ancestors to sacred sites for ceremonies. Today, the creation of a painting is a ritual act performed in ceremonial time.” - Leesa Fanning
In Yorùbá the word àjé is not a direct synonym to the western understanding of the witch or witchcraft which is associated with negativity, but rather is defined using a holistic understanding that includes good intentions and benevolence. And although àjé may be considered a derogatory term to the Yorùbá, the àjé are also referred to as ìyá mí (my mother) or àwon ìyá wa (our mothers) "in recognition of their positive dimension as protective progenitors, healers...and guardians of morality, social order, and the just apportionment of power, wealth, and prestige" (Drewal and Drewal, 1990: 9).
“The perfect understanding of human biology gave birth to the concept of hysteria, which is translated as ‘sickness of the womb’ and has its root in the Greek word for womb, hysteria….. Electric clitoris; ever-in-birth and always creating; the Divine Mother radiating. Ajé in prismatic waves is the Truth….. The study of Ajé leads to the Vagina, an organ important that it is praised as Óná-Órun, the Road to the Cosmos…. Women are G-ds who create G-ds.” - Teresa N. Washington (The Architects of Existence: Ájé in Yoruba Cosmology, Ontology, and Orature)
“Mama Quilla (Quechua mama killa lit. "Mother Moon",[1] Hispanicized spelling Mama Quilla), in Inca mythology and religion, was the third power and goddess of the moon. She was the older sister and wife of Inti, daughter of Viracocha and mother of Manco Cápac and Mama Uqllu (Mama Ocllo), mythical founders of the Inca empire and culture. She was the goddess of marriage and the menstrual cycle, and considered a defender of women.”
Part Two – We breathe with plants.
Édouard Glissant writes “How to conclude. When the sidereal paths of space will open to man, what will he recognize of earth, he who will return from distant countries? Not that series of landscapes that we discover there (in us), but a single signifying expanse, where the banyan tree will shade the meadow. This is what each hopes to see: the earth emerging from the abyss and thickening before oneself. Whoever finds the earth thus suspended in space, and who will come near, will nonetheless not experience the ecstasy of the One. For other stars will join themselves as pendants to this unique ball, which will already obsess the traveler. We must exhaust our landscapes, in other words, realize them. But we must not fear discovering them endlessly: new, tempting, possibility prohibited.” In what ways are we traveling back to our own true nature? Are we allowing the unconscious psychic traces of the past to lead the pathways of our consciousness into an unknown future. Or are we coming back to ourselves, bringing the unconscious and conscious into harmony.
Within the space of unification, we come to understand that WE are our environments, there is no separation between humans and nature. "Transcorporeality", explained by Stacy Alaimo, “the belief that human beings are completely inseparable from the natural world, from the food we consume to the very air that we breathe and exhale. Humans do not necessarily live in a particular environment, so much as our bodies quite literally represent that environment”. This respect for the interconnectedness we share is a necessary vibrational shift.
Pam Montgomery, scholar, ecologist and author talks about “Our breath consists of an inhalation of oxygen and an exhalation of carbon dioxide. All the oxygen on the planet comes from trees and plants both of the land and sea. All the oxygen we breathe is directly from the green world of trees and plants. What a miracle of symbiosis exists between plants and people through this exchange of breath.”
Suhaly Bautista-Carolina, artist and herbalist writes “The teachings of the plant world also have an immense impact and influence over my work and practice in the arts. From them I learn about intentional collaboration and interdependence, the necessity of care and nourishment in our pursuit of growth and evolution, and the true blessing of existing in this world.” I relate this to multiple exposure photography and the relinquishing of process to chance and the nature of things. The same with ceramics and the ways the glaze will unexpectedly interact with the fire to produce something in the way nature will have it. There’s a release of control. In feminist literature, Starhawk writes about matriarchal power not as possessive or controlling, but rather harmonious with nature.
The word “wa” (和) is a multifaceted term in Japanese culture that can be understood in various contexts. Wa encompasses ideas of harmony, peace, co-existence. Wa embraces harmony with nature, with the community around us, the seasons. It’s a very zen concept that emphasizes the importance of maintaining a harmonious balance encouraging cooperation, respect and consideration for others and the Nature.
“[Carl Jung] classified ‘archetypes’ as aspects of the human condition. Jung felt that the human psyche was ‘by nature religious,’ and what set humans apart from other species was their search for meaning in both life and death. He theorized that the psyche individuated (or separated) itself from its soul in search of its unique purpose in life. Yet during this quest for purpose, the psyche ultimately longed to return home to the soul and feel whole. As a result of his work, Jung saw trees as the archetype of the psyche.” – Laural Virtues Wauters
“The first act of violence that patriarchy demands of males is not violence toward women. Instead patriarchy demands of all males that they engage in acts of psychic self-mutilation, that they kill off the emotional parts of themselves. If an individual is not successful in emotionally crippling himself, he can count on patriarchal men to enact rituals of power that will assault his self-esteem.” – bell hooks
Matriarchy is not defined by mirroring patriarchy, it is a completely different formation of thought.
When we think of words like vulnerable which is defined as danger, being exposed, at risk, we have to rescue this vocabulary so that it aligns with a new (ancient) paradigm. Shifting language from oppressive terms into an expansive space. The same goes the “divine feminine” which has been co-opted and reduced by mainstream leaving out the true essence which is about how the feminine is deeply embedded in nature and we are all nature and a rejection of the feminine is a rejection of nature and in turn ourselves. As said by Thích Nhất Hạnh, “Words sometimes get sick and we have to heal them.”
Cont. to Part Three →→→→→→→→→→→→→→→→
na·cre
noun
1. mother-of-pearl.
(Fibonacci / Golden Ratio)
Part Three – Sacred Geometry
Sacred geometry and the concept of beauty are interconnected through the intrinsic relationship between form, proportion, and harmony. Sacred geometry is a system that explores the underlying geometric patterns and mathematical ratios found in nature, art, and architecture, which are believed to have spiritual or symbolic significance.
IE: a Flowers petals structure
“A possibly related Aramaic term means to burst forth or to bloom, which is in turn related to the Arabic “wadu’a,” to become beautiful, as well as “ward-un” (rose or blossom), and “warada” (blossoming tree)... The beauty of what blossoms or flits is time bound, but it is also an implication of paradise… The search for extraordinary objects is a quest for innocence: not really for the flower’s innocence, but an innocence of eye that beholds them, the desire to draw something pure from the well of perception.” - Six Names of Beauty by Crispin Sartwell