To Deliberately Paint, or Accidentally Paint - that is the question ...

The conscious mind and the subconscious mind work very differently from one another. The conscious mind tends to work more linearly, logically, analysing things through verbal language and it processes things very sequentially. The subconscious mind, on the other hand, tends more toward intuition, imagery, creativity and storing memory. It is more holistic in its processing, always including the body in its outworkings.

In our colonial cultures, we tend to have historically given more weight to the former and only the 'woo woo' and ‘quacky’ people have leaned into the latter. But now, in the modern colonial day, we are beginning to understand that the subconscious is very informative, can be trusted and when the two versions of processing work together, they can be very powerful indeed.

I want to tell you a personal story about some art I did, and how it helped me process some concepts and help me stay physically and mentally healthy (because the two are never separate). First, the painting of the boy and the rosemary.

I began this painting with pure emotion. But not the kind of emotion you can’t put your finger on. It was very clearly labelled.

I was angry.

I was angry because the whole concept of Patriarchy had finally sunk in, and the ramifications of it were suddenly all around me. It was like seeing a Honda Jazz around every corner when you’ve just bought a Honda Jazz.

I consciously thought to myself, “I am angry. I am going to paint that anger.”

And I did.

As I painted colour and shape, I followed my conscious thoughts:

“I am angry! Angry! Angry!” [exploding red and black splodges]

“My boys!! (I have two sons and a daughter) I am so sad for my boys!" (at the time I could see Patriarchy affecting them in a more destructive way than my daughter) [blue and yellow stripes opposing the red and black splodges]

“And this has been going on for SO LONG and I can’t see an end to it anytime soon!” [the infinity sign goes between the ‘anger splodges’ and the ‘sadness stripes’].

“F*#@!n MEN! (thinking specifically of wanker/selfish/backboneless/’it’s all for me’ men)”: [some music entitled, ‘Smiling Through’ gets collaged on the ‘angry splodges’].

Pleased, I realised the music was meant for a male choir, and so it has ‘male voices’ written under the title of the piece. Now it appears to read, ‘Smiling through male voices’ and I am outrageously pleased.

Then Life happened and I got too busy to paint.

When I finally came back to it, my anger had been expressed. I felt calmer. But something wasn’t right. I clearly hadn’t finished. I began thinking about my anger and how unhelpful it was. Ah! That’s why my expression wasn’t complete.  It didn’t sit with my values. I had simply created an image of ‘complaining with no solution’. I asked myself more specifically about my anger, about my boys.

I began painting the image of a boy’s face on the right side of the canvas as I thought and worried.

I wondered what the solution might be, but every solution I came to was “Women leading. Women leading. Women leading.” But I knew that wasn’t enough. It doesn’t make a difference which sex leads if the system hasn’t changed, if the lens hasn’t changed, if the problem solving hasn’t changed.

A thought crossed my mind, that the change might have to come via an 'earth centred' approach.

Suddenly it felt like I had remembered something important. I painted the rosemary. I placed the rosemary garland around the head of the boy, hoping he remembered too.

I looked at the painting now and I felt hopeful.

And it all happened through conscious, linear thought (obviously there would have been a level of subconscious involved as we actually can never get away from it, but I digress).

Now onto the subconscious! The 'accidental' processing!

This painting ended up being entitled, 'The Way We Were'.

This painting began from an artist’s mentality (opposed to a problem, per se).

My thoughts had nothing to do with anything deep and meaningful – no emotions to be processed - until halfway through the piece.

When I began this piece, I was simply curious to see if I could paint a face without a reference picture!

As I painted, the textures from the painting that had previously been on the canvas began emerging. Then I accidentally brushed a dark colour over those textures. An image that reminded me of a tree showed up. I turned the canvas sideways to explore the emerging tree. When I turned it back the right way up, I saw the figure of a woman. So I painted her in more clearly. She seemed connected to the face by the roots (or perhaps branches?) of the ‘tree’ I had seen previously.  As I made her connections more obvious and touched up this part and that part, I let my mind wander over the thoughts that this image was bringing up. My thoughts went something like this as I tweaked the painting:

“She’s dancing away from that big, worried face. Oh no, she’s still connected. She’s dancing away but she’s still connected. She doesn’t hate who she used to be. She needs to love who she used to be because it is who she used to be that made her who she is now. And she loves who she is now. Maybe she will dance away from who she is now as well? I used to be very consumed by worry of this and that. Now I love who I am and the life I lead. I’m not ashamed of who I used to be. I will remain lovingly connected to who I used to be.”

I felt content. Proud. Excited.

Can you see how, simply by doing the art, realised there were things that needed to be said outloud?

One painting,, deliberately and linearly processing some big things. The other, born of curiosity of skill, intuitively and by accessing old memory, in a far more round about way, processing some big things.

Now it’s your turn. Go back to the newsletter and try the activity! Feel free to let me know how you go.

And as always - notice, notice, notice, tweak, tweak, tweak.