Artist's Statement



I'm not really sure just how I do what I do as I create. As I write or sculpt or paint, play an instrument or sing, I disappear, becoming whatever it is that is being creatively born. It is only in a sort of shimmering aftermath that I realize I have been absent, and like a whale emerging from the depths suddenly 'I am' once more.
I am sitting in a room. There is a window beside me, softened at its edges by curtains, and a breeze pulls through. There is a floor beneath my feet. Where have I been?

Then I look and see that the paper beneath my hands is no longer blank, or the room resonates with the music that has flown forth from the guitar I am holding. Words have crowded onto the page of my notebook like a gathering of gleeful old friends. Something I cannot fully explain, whose origins are a complete mystery, exists, where before it did not.


While I do not know how I do what I do, I deeply know why. Much of the world is in pain, and those of us in it feel, in various ways, the dissonance, as the pain reverberates through. Something is wrong with the way we regard the Earth. Something is broken as we treat each other so poorly, as we stagnate in hate, and as we are absorbed by fear. Something needs to change, as we are so bad to ourselves, as we succumb to doubt, isolation and anger.

As I disappear, I think I must be seeking a solution to some of these challenges, issues, and difficulties. What I bring back with me, in words or images or music, responds to the friction, loneliness, misunderstanding and hurt in the world. It questions the way things are, and suggests kindness, symbiosis, awareness and playfulness. It acknowledges what we may lose if we cannot change from our present course, but never fully deviates from the joy and brightness that is still possible.


- Jorie Jenkins



Tuesday, June 21, 2016

The Hummingbird



The Bird Folk of Ta'galan


An old Ta'galan legend told in the Lands of Mirico is that of Feathabee, the son of Glynmarra the Patchwork Bird. Feathabee befriended the sun and the moons even before they had learned to fly. In his own way, and with his own feathers, it is said that he gave the sun and the moon a way to stay and light the world. 

"In the age of giants, when fire walked freely upon the Earth, and the stones hurled themselves about in a dance of smoke, and before the Trees had taught their words to the wise, there was, among those who moved, a great bird, born, some say, of the Earth itself. As broad as mountains, with wisps of cloud in his wing and starlight in his eye. First Earth child of the First Cosmic Child, he was dreamwalker and smokespeaker - his footprints were lakes, his shoulders his fingers the creeks, his arms the rivers. And he rose up joyous, calling out in one of the first Voices." 

- Ta'galan Tales



As you travel from here to there in the Lands of Mirico you'll see depictions of the kind and gentle Feathabee on village flags, in simple wood etchings, on household pottery and in even in ancient cave carvings. In the spirit of Feathabee's giving and sympathetic nature, all creatures in Mirico try to live in the ways of peace and friendship. Being the ancestors of Feathabee, the Bird Ambassadors are flightless, and so they're often fascinated by anything that has retained the ability to flit about. 

This illustration is 18x24, matted to 22x28

$550

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