Drawings of Animals, Persons and Phoenix

1 November 2019

This is a big post, mainly pictures, most of them drawings I did this year … with some story as it arose.

The sketches of endangered creatures in the Amazon rain forest were commissioned last January for a children’s book to raise awareness .  However they were not in the style which the author needed; so here they are for an airing.

The Amazon fruit bat wakes in Plato’s cave.  Can you see the snail? – (2018)

bespectacled bear comes out into the open – 2019

Doesn’t each creature tell a story of someone you know, or of yourself on this day or that?

spider monkey 2019

Here, he lets go …  Instant enlightenment is on call

poison dart frog 2019

but it isn’t quite … what the seeker expected to find?

giant amazon snail 2019

Very slow and steadily he made his way along the Path, feeling every element …

flying fruit bat 2019

until he could open his heart and fly home …

fruit bats resting 2019

… to rest upside down in the boundless with his friend.

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Now here are some family snaps:

man with cat 2018

man caving, birth 2018

my friend,  she sits like an eagle 2018

new generation: this is her dad, just back from the war. She’s in the pram  …  (2018)

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These sketches are from my earlier post with Shakti Rising:

Ramakrishna and Yantras – 2019

Sarada Devi wife of ramakrishna (1994)

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I found this on a friend’s bedroom wall when I went on a visit – I had forgotten all about it.

My father’s afternoon nap – circa 1972

peter (my father) in devon –  2019

Brave bears …

and a fox at dawn:

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Copy from Botticelli; the winds are angelic forces – birth of Aphrodite 2019

this old sketch turned up of Douglas and Catherine Harding – perhaps 1996.  They are built open for each other. They tell friends to “See” who they really, really are,  like birds on the wire.

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Hand mudras – sacred gestures 2019

I went for a walk and met a beautiful nose on four legs

Arthur Koestler 2019 – an old mentor

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Here is a story:

Celebrate Nyousha (1997-2019), 2019

In August this year, we held a wake for Nyousha. She was only 22, the cancer started when she was 17. She wrote in her diary that each day, each moment holds the potential to make a change in the world; her courageous statement of living and loving more intensely through her death.  She was a feminist and an activist; she deeply searched her soul.  This young Persian artist had to die just as she grew up and opened wide. Her radiance illumined and inspired her loved ones.  Nyousha is among us.  She is grieved; and yet she is free.

In the Phoenix Community house in North London, I have my art room. The fur of old Kabbalist visionary was removed from my room for the weekend, and replaced with the young girl’s vibrant life for her family and all their friends to come and see; her exhibition, her gallery, her soul. We hung her work also all around the house.  About 300 people feasted in the garden and there was music.  Afterwards her brother carefully put my infrastructure back where it was.  My life made room for one whose adult life only began.

Today writing this post and uploading my portrait of her, I  discover it is her birthday: 1 November.  In Scorpio’s depth today, Mercury pauses to rest on one foot before re-winding the spiral backward. Hence, I reflect further …

Zoroastrian rock phoenix

Creative work supports the soul in yet another miracle of reality.  In shock and acceptance, the phoenix turns, ascends within and sings the outrageous alchemical moment in the heart and in Sol.

On hearing it’s her birthday, I got out my colours and struck for Nyousha this coin:

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Sketch of Nyousha & a climbing stretch – 2019.

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woman running with wolf – 2019

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Here now are a few sketches of climbers – always an amusing allegory with conditions of pilgrimage, ascension, meeting our Shadow, call it what you will.  We help each other:

Momo Freehill, bouldering 2019

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Climbing at the Castle Centre 2019.  That is me, near the spectacles, belaying my daughter.

Self and dropped knee/chimneying …

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… and herons, from a small book I just completed, about an artist I met when I was 16 – there are experiential roots of Islamic and Hebrew calligraphy:

Heron 2 2019

Alif aleph yod heron 2019

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My grandfather, copied from a black and white photograph by Richard Poussette Dart which I found in a book at Kettle’s Yard.  I was deeply impressed with the way Poussette Dart portrays him as a working mystic.

Jim Ede from a photograph by Richard Poussette Dart 2019

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More of the climbing companions.  This oak tree grew out of a sheer gritstone rock face in Yorkshire.

climbing on Agdon Rocher 2019

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Tom on the  slabs

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Back home, my Rilke gallery begins to grow!

Rilke 3

Lou Salome and Rainer Maria Rilke 2019 

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Procession – 2018

And: my journal today. I want to say again (not didactically) that when I am deeply reflective, it appears to me that we humans are within a genetic matrix which is creating a new Aquarian symbiosis. The animal kingdom is under threat of extinction by the present human imbalance.  Yet, looking at the countless small initiatives to protect and conserve a species and restore it to its habitat, I see the birth of a kind of care which did not exist when the beasts and birds were our plentiful hunting ground or amusement.  Against the ravages still being made against nature, human conscience in her depth strata expands the palette, embracing our shadows with the dawn.

Care and respect for the animals includes “the soft animal of our body” and  soul within us, in all its beauty.

My daughter Marisa with her cat when he wasn’t well

For me, Gaia is not the earth-being alone – for we are not separate.  Gaia is our conscious human-earth relationship: to care.  The breakthrough comes where hope seems to be lost.  The condition is unbearably painful before I agree to pause, turn and evolve – individually as collectively. Nothing can prevent the evolutionary cosmos in the DNA.  The evolution proceeds at all levels interwoven: spiritual through psychological to the instinctual body and her seasons; the plant, mineral and subatomic universe.

A phoenix rises from the ashes to our call: transfiguration.

As the sun rises over the horizon it throws long sharp shadows across the field.  These confront us in our world at present.  Pluto’s movement through Capricorn de-constructs old institutions to make room for new birth.  Watching life in the cauldron, as hologram, I observe these basic principles time and time again through the chaos.  Since 2012 particularly, we are required to embody the ageless wisdom and to get real: our boots on the ground.  As the linear convention of time changes its nature, so emerges in both men and women the feminine, the unconditional rejoicing creature within us who flowers and gives birth.

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Sleeping swan (1988). Her nose is where she flies

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My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom. See also Aquariel

All art and creative writing in this blog is copyright © Janeadamsart 2012-2019. May not be used for commercial purposes. May be used and shared for non-commercial means with credit to Jane Adams and a link to the web address https://janeadamsart.wordpress.com/

Castling for Old-Timers

Climbers on the rope – 1964 – a left-handed belay!

Early this year I took a few climbing lessons at the age of 69 – inspired by family developments.  I used to be a fair tree-climber and sea-cliff scrambler; I dislike any form of mechanical or competitive exercise. At Swiss Cottage climbing centre in London I learned to manage the rope and belay a climber safely, and to climb a wall and to abseil down it.  I felt scared but each time I came away with a stretch of freedom in my spine – like a cat.  I was hooked.  Recently I started at the Castle climbing centre at Manor House near Finsbury Park.  I go alone, to practice bouldering and to watch.

The Castle is an old pumping station, built as a huge Victorian folly with turrets and three towers – a handsome building.  Some 20 years ago it was leased from English Heritage and turned into reputably the most varied indoor climbing centre in the land.  It stands in an acre of organic garden; all the food is home grown and the place is run on self-sustaining lines.

I would like to be at the Castle all day, take some good reading and find a nook between scrambles, like writing in a coffee shop.  I could alternate climb-stretch exertions and scribing.  Yesterday I kept getting bored and tired and then caught up in it again.  Perhaps I want someone to do it with.  A brand-new bouldering room is about to be opened.

And … why not sketch?  … from life!  I just did these from photos.  Keep practicing.

How odd that I was so snooty about the climbing centre my niece took me to, many years ago – somewhere in the east end.  She and her man monkeyed sleekly up and down fierce looking walls.  When I had a go I hated it.  There was no sea-breeze cliff or moorland view to lift or inspire my dragging body weight, no rock for fingers to love, just dead cement and coloured toy holds.  I felt like a stone.  I was amazed at the guys climbing along the ceiling like spiders.  I thought they were fanatics.

These two “boulders” on the 1st floor at the Castle are called Lust and Envy. They are great. I spend a lot of time on those – but not between them!

You know … in rock climbing for senior moments, don’t just try to complete a traverse or a wall;  be inventive with the holds and their funny shapes, seek out different things with them, stay on the spot, find out what my toes can do.   That pleasing tingling ache in my hands develops finger strength – the same delicate dexterity for playing the piano.  Blood flow increases and differentiates the tendons.  Walk tall!   Feet strengthen also.  Can stand tippy-toes better than before, I think.  Body core – gravity centre – I was aware of this many times yesterday when moving laterally.  I picked up some tips while watching rock climbing videos online.  Sooner or later I will strike up a friendship or join a rope or get myself a lesson with one of the helpful staff.  Wait and see.  Right now my whole body is delighted to be doing this.  I like the chalky smell there, and sometimes they play cool sounds.   In the 2nd-floor cafe is excellent coffee and restorative peanut bars to eat while watching high and daring ascents with rope and pitons  Nearby is a kid’s wall which I scramble up and down.   I love watching the kids; they come with their teacher and scamper all over the sheer slabs – I never grew up!

We older folk are sensitive or rugged individual types … the sweetness of the solitude on distant fells comes to this place, to keep in trim.

What do my molecules, cells, nerve fibres and enzymes of the Great Change feel about it?  I am a stretchy amoeba pattern of trillions of stars.  That’s nice – try to recall that, next time!  I would like my climbing to be contemplative as the technique slowly enters  my bones.  Yesterday it felt like stepping back.  At Swiss Cottage wall earlier this year, they said when you are learning you progress for a couple of sessions and then it seems you slip back and that’s natural because next time it is suddenly easier.  The oscillation moves forward and back, like when hung on a difficult place.  New agilities being built take time.  The muscle while developing is young, hard and unwieldy.  It needs to loosen into itself and become flexible, for the flexibility and grace is power.  These are lessons for life.

Line dance, 1988. When I drew these, I felt wonderful afterwards.  It flowed and danced up the street within me.  There is nothing like “creating energy” by taking a line for a walk to see where it might go.  As far as I remember, I drew these slowly, consciously, on the edge of exploration; that is what released their energy.

It is the same principle my David talked about, re any kind of physical exercise: don’t do it every day, take days off in between for the agility to develop as a whole.  While at rest, it sinks in to build new cells.

The same principle guides the inner work. The Spirit is in charge.  Awaken to it!  Advise and entice my stellar amoeba over the playground; then rest.  I guess as I cultivate my slow and dainty deliberation, the technique will come, because rock climbing isn’t with brute strength but with coordination.  Coordination is the core.  The core gets blissed out when she is filled with the inner star.   The beautiful lesson of Life:  Core Strength, let go and watch her reach and swing and flow.   Surprise!  Delight!

Click to access 55th-genekey-prelude.pdf

Hey, Gene Key 55!   Richard Rudd’s talk of molecules and blood circulation in the music of change brought to my mind a  starfish.  “The human being is nothing more than a symphony of interwoven rhythms, tempos and sounds.”   A robin calls outside: and Clive who loves Richard Jeffries, records vibrant birdsongs on his website Art in Nature.  DNA is structured in triplets.  All our relationships are triadic.  Musical form is ABA with C.  Abac-us.

I like my primary-coloured abacus and its beads.   The magus – my inner teacher –  is getting interested and encourages me with the climbing.

You know it is such a chance for magic – the inner plane – to river into embodiment and to fill flesh, bone and sinew with stars and to know and respect the tired crystals in our blood: the imagination illumines.

She is the beginning, and out of her unbounded oceanic “confusion” the male arises to differentiate and gather it into a distaff – Siva’s still point within the centre of each wheel within wheels.  The feminine Sakti movement giving birth to and generated through the stillness, plays on the loom of numberless threads.

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View from Near Hope gill, Lake district

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom. See also Aquariel

All art and creative writing in this blog is copyright © Janeadamsart 2012-2018. May not be used for commercial purposes. May be used and shared for non-commercial means with credit to Jane Adams and a link to the web address https://janeadamsart.wordpress.com/