Creative Process of: Empathy

Creative Process of: Empathy 

I bought a puzzle of shoes in a closet.  I thought, in some countries, women are uneducated and the poor are shoeless.  Shoes are often symbols, referring to past locations, stages of life, and functions for work or play: “walk a mile in my shoes” and “can this candidate fill these big shoes?”  

When I saw a photo of two girls learning ballet at Tembisa, Africa.  I chose to depict their youth and quiet focus in teaching each other ballet, a dance of European origin.  I painted the dark forest and sea waters to suggest challenges.  The painted rain over the surface refers to tears of hurt and compassion.

The hope is that all girls are learning and growing in truth, regardless of origin.  The beauty of the water and colors of the shoes does not make the painting any less scary and puzzling.  The shoes are huge.  The water covers and surrounds the girls.  The painting highlights a painful and difficult life ahead. But, this is all ordained by God.  He does not intend for women to be dainty, comfortable, and frail.  Rather for women to be brave and strong and connected:  to one another and to their Savior.  Jesus was the first to support and to treat women as equals. 

Falling Crown Child's Pose-Multiplying

I sketched a figure pose I saw during exercise, because it was simultaneously a pose of prayer, surrender, and painful training. The conceptual process produced 12 sketches; only 4 were used in the painting. The head was simplified into a circle which is a symbol of a cycle and the passing of time. I repeated this circle and added a narrow diagonal. The next image had three circles and the last had four. The repeated image and increase in number of circles not only hint to the passage of time but also increase in heads or relationships. Each of the four have a different feeling formatively. I am pleased with surprises in the symbolism of the star, the sword, the open bible, prayer, evangelism, and transformation in the shape of the dark to light.

All of nature reminds me of God’s character (Romans 1:20).  I feel secure when I see God’s character and design.  Math and entropy is the basis of my Order and Chaos series of paintings.  The current painting is 7th in the series and entitled Order and Chaos Sun Lifecycles.  This painting is featured in Reimagined Poetry Invitational Art Exhibition on June 2025 at Redondo Beach Pier. Last Summer, I painted Moonshine I so the next painting had to be the Sun.  In the creative process,  I used a semi-circle formula for the pin locations.  The five row sections: from Top to Bottom are: Body Skin, Water, Botany, Blood, and Wealth.  Every section has color that describe stages from birth, growth, deterioration, and to death.  The wood pieces are arranged and glued to a substrate in the creation order of the pair, left wall matching the right wall of the corner. I started three paintings about the Sun that were unfinished. 

In the spring of 2025, my pastor taught about "life under the sun in Ecclesiastes" and about growing in hope in Jesus rather than putting hope in this life, since nothing is new in the cycle of life.  Inspired by this sermon series at Lighthouse Community Church, I had an idea how to finish my painting. I decided to show orientation and natural growth, unlike a diagonal line, more like an exponential arc. With two shapes of my custom paper stencil, I made a scalloped edge or a parabola.  This I arranged on the outer edges the painting, blending with the white of the wall.  Here the radiating warmth of the sun is God’s grace and source of natural life.  So then, I desired to do the same in the dark vertical edges in the corner. I flipped and separated the two stencils to differentiate from the outer edge.  The opened sharp edge reminded me of thorns but also of an opportunity.  The space in between left a chasm, which is bridged invisibly like a portal opened by prayer.  And I chose brown on blue, rather than black.  This darkness extends like a pattern outward from the corner and felt more like a landscape or a sky edge.  These edges finished my painting, showing a development from the corner to the edge.