Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Muffling, Shuffling & Chafing...Free, free at last!

A few weeks ago, a friend sent me an email with the opening caption - "I’m bored. Let’s go!" - and invited me to an event, Meet Your Guides & Angels.

We arrived at a beautiful house and was ushered into the ‘parlour’ and sat amongst other guests. I think about 30 minutes into it we began – with a smudge (burning of sage leaves) to clear negative energies, then a quick rundown from the hostess, where she advised us to simply close our eyes and observe what unfolded – we started meditating.  

I was no stranger to meditation and so fell easily into my pose. Instantly on closing my eyes, I began experiencing unusual physical and visual stimulations against my closed eyes, if this makes sense to you. I won’t go into details on the experiences but suffice to say, I received the awareness that the path I had set myself a few months ago was the right way, that the choices I had made was what was needed.  

I left the event feeling lighter, less burdened and even more focused on what I needed to accomplish and was looking forward to facing it all.  

In the following weeks to come, I felt an immense sense of connection, almost like an electric current running just beneath my skin. Doors began opening – my creativity expanded, contracted and filled me whole.  

And what came out was this sketch below…painting to follow - “Freeing Eden” – a piece I will be doing for Twitter Exhibit. The idea came from an earlier drawing I did called “Broken Eden”. I wanted to speak on the idea of 'Eden' and what it may truly represent.  

Freeing Eden
"Freeing Eden" (Initial Pre-Paint Sketch)
 

I sense that with “Freeing Eden” heralds my awakening of sorts, my first of first, where the quiet, unused parts of myself was slowly being freed. [*Huh…just occurred to me as I am write this blog that maybe subconsciously it’s about me -- A moment of...EUREKA!]  

Was this all happening because of that one event I went to? I like to think so. A moment of connection with the Universe, and I was FREED.

T








Sunday, November 4, 2012

“Say wh-aaat? Condoms you say…?”


A couple of months back, a friend sent me a link for an art competition in Vancouver – he thought it might be perfect for me. It was.

The contest asked for an art piece to be used in conjunction for an upcoming safe-sex campaign, it had to be ‘sex-positive’ and use religious imagery.

Tall order. And...I love new challenges, and aside for the paintings, I wanted to try out new art forms – I decided to go digital with this.

And this past weekend, October 31, I received an email at 2am…

“…Dear Tina,
Congratulations, your entry has placed THIRD in the YVR Sisters Art Contest! We thank you very much for your entry, and are thrilled to have your art on the covers of our upcoming condom packages... “

What an incredible feeling! Not only did my digital piece placed 3rd but it will be used in their condom packages as part of the “We Care Red Ribbon World AIDS Day Celebration.

Totally Godsmacked… :)

So, below is the 3rd winning digital design. 

Many of the images used has specific and particular meanings. Before you scroll down pass the image, to continue reading what I meant it to be - what does the below image mean to you? What does it say to you? Just a fun, cheeky poster, or something with  deeper meaning?
COME DRESSED TO THE PARTY
"Come Dressed For The Party" (Digital)



Besides the obvious imagery and text you see, the center cherry contains a very subtle, loosely based 'sacred heart' with a bite-shaped as it 'bleeds' a cross to mimic the shadow cast by the condom hanging off the cherry stem - and in the middle, a question mark.  

Aside from creating a 'fun sex-positive' design, I wanted to convey a very important statement, safe-sex SHOULD over-shadow any religion dogma, and not vice versa.

Okay. Putting some serious away for now....... 

HEY, I'm gonna be on a condom package yo'!