Glory Upon Awakening
..."Still I Rise"
|
|
Presents
The Galatea OnLine Gallery
July 1, 2020
14th Edition
"...Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise...."
- Maya Angelou
I didn't intentionally set out to do a large series of these editions pairing art with poetry. But as we struggle to emerge from this fault line of uncertainty,
the power of the spoken word
contains vessels of assurance, especially as it
encourages and reveals facets of meaning within the visual experience
.
If Blake and Milton's verse were as a volcano in the stream of history, so is Maya Angelou's poems the lava. We cross centuries to find ourselves in the same place, the nature of human nature under scrutiny.
All find themselves as both the observer and the participant
; Dr. Angelou's experience and awareness is highly personal, yet a timeless reference, and a gift to the champion and affirmation of life. She had diverse incarnations to draw upon: writer, activist, actor, dancer, professor to name only a few.
Through the difficulties of her early life, Dr. Angelou was born with a trajectory of wakefulness.
What is the first glimpse upon awakening? Is it self-awareness? Stream of consciousness? A vista of land? The sun reaches down to illuminate our senses. We stumble out of a dream. We are vacuumed into a depth of reality that we become responsible for, to give life to. We open our eyes with the realization that, as Dr. Angelou states in her poem
Alone ,
..."Nobody, But Nobody Can Make it Out Here Alone"...
Here are 7 Galatea artists' works that point to a trans-personal and introspective awareness
. Excerpts from the poetry of Maya Angelou accompany the work, reflecting the esoteric nature of hope and its crystallization of reality.
-Marjorie Kaye
|
|
Suggestions of flora criss-cross each other in patterns of an embrace. The forms are personified and are magnetized to each other in a dance of mutuality. Simplicity casts a bold collection of movement.
Agusta Agustsson,
Exotica
, Fiber and Paper, 12 x 9 inches, 2020, $200.00
TOUCHED by an ANGEL
We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.
Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of pleasure
ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
love strikes away the chains of fear
from our souls.
We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
we dare be brave
And suddenly we see
that love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
|
|
The light in this image creates the passageway to a distant horizon. The positive and negative space are in communion, and give definition to each other. This image reveals the nature of duality in the forms of appearance/disappearance, past/future, heaven/earth.
Carolyn Letvin,
Beach Path 1
, Oil Paint Monotype, 8 x 8 inches, 2019, $300.00
PASSING TIME
Your skin like dawn
Mine like musk
One paints the beginning
of a certain end.
The other, the end of a
sure beginning.
|
|
..."In my photograph, is a place I have been many times and I have never seen the same image twice. I never tire of the ocean and our city in the skyline. It's anticipated that something magical will happen and often does. I love this one because the beams of light are coming straight in my path. The ocean, rocks, calm of the sun setting...nature is truly genuine in the way it appears to us..."
-Robin MacDonald-Foley
Robin MacDonald-Foley,
Last Rays, Photograph on Aluminum, 11 x 14 inches,
2019, $300.00
ON the PULSE of MORNING
A Rock, A River, A Tree
Hosts to species long since departed,
Marked the mastodon,
The dinosaur, who left dried tokens
Of their sojourn here
On our planet floor,
Any broad alarm of their hastening doom
Is lost in the gloom of dust and ages.
But today, the Rock cries out to us, clearly, forcefully,
Come, you may stand upon my
Back and face your distant destiny,
But seek no haven in my shadow,
I will give you no hiding place down here.
You, created only a little lower than
The angels, have crouched too long in
The bruising darkness
Have lain too long
Facedown in ignorance,
Your mouths spilling words
Armed for slaughter.
The Rock cries out to us today,
You may stand upon me,
But do not hide your face.
|
|
The sky elevates from the horizon like a warrior. It emerges from solitude and takes over, promising causation where there was once only the void of silence. Iceland, alone in the vast ocean, is a vortex of geographic enigma.
Nora Charney Rosenbaum, Lake Myvatn, Oil on Copper, 12 x 36 inches, 2020, $1,800.00
ALONE
Lying, thinking
Last night
How to find my soul a home
Where water is not thirsty
And bread loaf is not stone
I came up with one thing
And I don’t believe I’m wrong
That nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.
Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.
There are some millionaires
With money they can't use
Their wives run round like banshees
Their children sing the blues
They've got expensive doctors
To cure their hearts of stone.
But nobody
No, nobody
Can make it out here alone.
Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.
Now if you listen closely
I'll tell you what I know
Storm clouds are gathering
The wind is gonna blow
The race of man is suffering
And I can hear the moan,
'Cause nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.
Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.
|
|
The first sound one hears is the gull calling the morning. It has been a long work day, and it seemingly was never over. The dawn calls to duty, to awaken to
doing-ness, sleep and rest a dim memory. But the day is a blessing, a legacy to generations past and future.
Niva Shrestha,
Lobster Co-Op in Stonington
, Oil, 9 x 13 inches, 2015, $900.00
Excerpts from A PLAGUED JOURNEY
...My mind, formerly quiescent
in its snug encasement, is strained
to look upon their rapturous visages,
to let them enter even into me.
I am forced
outside myself to
mount the light and ride joined with Hope.
Through all the bright hours
I cling to expectation, until
darkness comes to reclaim me
as its own. Hope fades, day is gone
into its irredeemable place
and I am thrown back into the familiar
bonds of disconsolation...
|
|
The sea of sleep is encased in ice waiting for the light of dawn to melt the consciousness and the awareness of the self's being. Stories have been told of the parental personification of the seasons, and we their children, awakening happily into a dream.
Carol Wontkowski,
End of the Dream, Just Before Dawn
, Photograph, 13 x 14 inches,
2020, $325.00
Excerpt from CALIFORNIA PRODIGAL
..."Antiquitous faces,
Used to the gelid breath
Of old manors, glare disdainfully
Over breached time.
Around and through these
Cold phantasmatalities,
He walks, insisting
To the languid air,
Activity, music,
A generosity of graces."...
|
|
The tree appears as the materializtion of a phantom. After wandering in a haze of uncertain sleep, wakefulness comes in the form of the familiar. At least the present is accounted for, but what is beyond this collection of archetypes? Matter floats into a miasma of the unknown only to be reformed in self-awareness.
Jay Wu,
Apple Tree at Maple Cottage
, Oil Painting, 7 x 9 inches, 2019, $1,200.00
More Excerpts from CALIFORNIA PRODIGAL
..."Star Jasmine and old vines
Lay claim upon the ghosted land,
Then quiet pools whisper
Private childhood secrets. ...
...His lupin fields spurn old
Deceit and agile poppies dance
In golden riot. Each day is
Fulminant, exploding brightly
Under the gaze of his exquisite
Sires, frozen in the famed paint
Of dead masters. Audacious
Sunlight casts defiance
At their feet."
|
|
As galleries have begun to reinstate their schedules
, they are re-making them concurrently. Galatea, along with other galleries affected not only by Covid-19, but by devastating flooding, must navigate a "long and winding road" back to some semblance of normality. As it has been said, the old normal no longer exists. We make new paths and consider the future an exploration.
When the coast is clear, you can be sure that we will be there continuing our lively exhibition schedule, and we will keep you updated.
Again,
we appreciate
all the support and love that you have shared with us over the last decade and look forward to moving beyond this with you.
We are happy to work with you
on a purchase of artwork shown here, or answer any questions you might have. In this time when artists of all genres are struggling to keep their practice going,
your support is especially valued.
For sales inquiries
, please contact Marjorie Kaye at
[email protected]
. Our artists will be happy to ship the work to you at a cost to be determined.
To all
, and in particular the SOWA community, artists of all kinds, and those that support us, we are strong and will survive. May all blessings, health, happiness, strength, wisdom, art and love be our gift.
|
|
|
|
Hours: Wed-Sun, 12-5pm
and by appointment
Contact: Marjorie Kaye
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
