I finally finished my triptych “The Living Paintings” It is based on a dream which i had years ago. I originally painted the dream in my twenties. It was huge and the middle panel had an octangular frame and in itself was around 2 meters in diameter. When I moved from my Chicago loft to my French apartment, I had no room to display it. It was left rolled up in my warehouse for twenty years. When I started painting seriously again and I unrolled it, it was completely cracked. So I painted it again. It is still big but a little over 2 meters total.
I have written the dream at the end of the blog...
I did the left panel : One Dreamer, last year during Quarantine. I painted live on it at the streamed 2020 Anthropos Festival. My muses are my son and his partner.
The central panel was done in 2017.I painted live on it at the Equinoxe Festival here in Paris.
I started the right panel: The Journey, last year and have just finished it!
I also painted live on it at the streamed 2021 Anthropos Festival.
Here is the dream:
The university was collapsing. Large metal beams buckled in on themselves. Plaster flaked off the crumbling walls. Flaking like dried icing, falling in white sheets…
Everyone walked around as if nothing was unusual. Little groups of chattering ladies, young men with intent on their face, briskly walking… Life went on in complete oblivion.
I was stunned. Horrified. How could they not see?
I noticed a man in a corner. His head was buried in his hands and his body crumpled in empathy for the disaster on hand. I knew he would know what was happening. I approached him and he lifted his head to receive my questions. He looked at me, he looked through me, he looked carefully, interrogating my spirit and then seemingly satisfied he said “OK, I will show you.”
His name was Roc and he took me down into the bowels of the university.
We arrived at a secret room. It was circular and had very high ceilings. There were three very tall paintings on the walls: classic 19th century portraits for high brows; lots of frills but very stiff, dark and predictable.
“I will show you the hidden paintings” he told me.
The first painting’s image disappeared revealing a living painting of a Majestic Woman. Her hair was the night sky and it knew no limit. The stars sparkled precious and luminescent in the depths of the blackness. I understood instantly that I was both a part of this limitless, mysterious divinity and that it was also within me.
The second painting’s image disappeared revealing a living painting of a young man and woman. My eyes traced the man’s body bending back like a rainbow. His hat held to his head but from it came her feet and then her legs. She too was arching back like another half of a rainbow mandala.. She too had a richly colored hat which morphed into the feet of the boy. They were one circle, unbroken. I understood instantly that we are one being, one dreamer, and therefore the limitless divinity is accessible to all of us. It is not exclusive to one part, or in this case, just me.
The third painting’s image disappeared revealing a living painting of a scene from a city. In the foreground it looked like a Western with the doors of a saloon wide open, but the landscape receded into a modern city. The image looked more like a set for a theatre. Its colors were faded like tints on old hand painted postcards. A tattered flag blew in the hot dusty breeze and there was a flat static energy to the scene. I understood instantly that this world of governments and westerns is just a theatre set on a flat dimension of our infinitely dimensioned and mysterious divine Self.
When I painted the third panel it came out very differently than the dream. Instead I found myself painting dream houses. I often dream I am in a new house when I am going though a change. I painted the totem of the eagle who is know for its wholistic vision: The lucid dreamer who is transcendent and sees from beyond this one reality. This panel is called The Journey, because I see this life as in Invisible University, full of houses to learn from. But it is a dream to be woken up from. It is one theatre set in an infinite multitude of potential paradigms.
Well if you read until the end, thank you.
If you want to see more dreamy paintings, here is my website:
https://www.artwork-liba.com/