Life Cycle

The Story of This Painting

I based this painting on “learning to walk”, which can also be seen as a ‘creative process’.

I have observed in my life with many things I do, like learning a new job, or creating a new habit, or dropping an old one, that it’s very much an internal process. This process is quite fundamental to our lives and begins in childhood when we are literally learning to walk. We take a step and fall down, and get back up and fall down, and we continue taking as many steps as we can until we have mastered the task.

As adults we often forget that things take time and take a process of standing up and falling down and standing up and falling down, and standing up, and we want instant results, and often we give up before we have walked the process and task into mastery, thinking because we have failed a few (or a lot of) times that it will never happen. That is why this scene is set within an environment of water. Because water to me represents forgiveness, in particular SELF FORGIVENESS. The ability to allow yourself to make mistakes, and forgive and continue on. This process we can walk in a very personal and individual dimension, though like anything, it exists on a larger, worldly, and existential level as well. I broke this process down into 6 steps represented by the figures in the painting.

The beginning is where you are on top and so is the blue figure sitting on top of the world. Here things are going smoothly, things are working, but then the doubts creep in and you dip your toe in the water of self doubt and defeat and you begin the descent which is the second figure flanking to the right who is descending down. The third figure is the ‘rock bottom’ figure on the lower right. Here you have reached the bottom, you tell yourself “your a failure”, and “I can’t do it”  “whats the point” “its too hard” “life is against me” you want to and try to blame others and life but you know you can’t. You know you have only YOU who is responsible for you, and within this realization you begin to support yourself  to get back up, and you forgive. The yellow figure on the left drenched in water/self forgiveness is beginning the process of getting back up, and you pull yourself up, you dust yourself off and get back to your purpose and self development, you find solutions, you take responsibility, you stop blaming yourself and others, and you climb back up and then you are back up LIVING and Participating which is the figure flanking on the upper left who has climbed back into position arm and arm with their full potential.

The black figure with arms open in the foreground (dark/black representing emptiness, stability, internal quiet) is the completion figure. It is the figure you become as the master of your task and yourself. You may have to walk the “learning to walk” process many times of falling and getting back up  until you get it right, until you master it, and then that process is complete, and your goal is achieved, you become that which you set out to become.

I find as human beings we are walking many of these processes at once. Some are easy and some are deeply challenging and stem back into generations and require more effort. This painting even went through a few of these evolution processes before I got to this one final realized image.

That is the story of this painting and where it came from.