“Celestial Art” is Born

It’s funny where life leads you. One day you are playing gongs for people, the next day you are creating amazing posters from your photos a year ago. Before you know it, you’ve sold a poster and feel inspired to do that some more!

I’ve been a poet since about 6 years old. My first poem was titled “Piggy Piggy.” I have a digital folder with literally hundreds of poems in it. Not only that, I have taught college level poetry to high schoolers in the US, S. Korea, and Hong Kong. I’ve even held teacher writer workshops. But have I published any poetry? Not really. I’ve published some poems in high school literary magazines and I did publish a lovely collection of poetry for my family a few years ago called “Wearing Fifty.”

Poetry flowed from me during the COVID years. I’ve got a lovely series called “Dear COVID” in which I periodically address COVID with phrases like “You rave, rage, ravage, suffocate, / Infect by the millions / Kill by the hundreds of thousands.” Then poetry lay dormant for awhile. I poured my energy into writing blogs, self-care articles and inspirational books. Until a few days ago. (But I’ll come back to that in a moment.)

Photography has been in my genes; my mom took photos at every family event growing up. She faithfully bought the latest version of a camera, printed prints, and put together album after album. I followed suit, getting my first camera when I was in sixth grade and snapping my first real photos on a “school crossing guards” trip to Washington, DC. Fast forward many years later when I’ve taken images of the beautiful and amazing landscapes and cultures from North America, Europe, Eastern Europe, and Asia. Just this week I would have filled up several rolls of film just snapping shots of the sunrises and sunsets from our new home on the Bay in Suamico; luckily photography is all digital now, so I can go crazy!

During our final 100 days in Hong Kong I decided to blog every day in a series I called, “Thank You, Asia.” In those posts I finally found a home for photos I’d been taking during the previous decade. I blended prose and photos, sometimes under titles like “Korea’s Azeleas and Cherry Blossoms” and “Yellow Things” and “Silly Signage.” Occasionally, I’d post a poem I’d written along with perfect accompanying images. (But I’ll come back to that in a moment.)

So, this semester I decided to join Life Long Learning through UW-GB. It’s an opportunity for older adults to continue learning all kinds of things. So far I’ve learned diverse skills from archery to how to cook like a chef. This brings me to the threshold of “Celestial Art.” The day before walking into Art Bootcamp I received a message from the instructor explaining how we will work on our own projects. “Bring your own supplies.”

“Hmmm. . . I don’t have any art supplies,” I thought. But then I remembered a project that had been on my mind for a year. Ever since my trip to Italy last October with my husband, I’d wanted to create a poster of Italian doorknobs. You see, when we were in Italy on a two week tour I got the idea to take photos of interesting doors and doorknobs. I’d come home and immediately created a poster in Shutterfly, honing 72 door pictures down to sixteen! I faithfully sorted them, placed the options here, then there, then there. Inserting some and removing others to get the poster to look “just right” in its colors, textures, eras, styles. I proudly bought, framed, and hung my poster. End of story until that email triggered that itch. “Create your Italian doorknob poster,” the little voice whispered.

And I did! I went through the same process of choosing images, colors, forms, styles, brightening this and muting that. Placement and design came naturally now. And I was proud to show off the final product to my fellow Life Long Learners. Little did I know one of them would want to buy her own copy! What?

Celestial Art is almost, but not quite, born. Hang with me.

About the same time period I attended another class which combined learning about Chakra Energies with poetry.

“Are you kidding me? There’s a class for that? Count me in,” I had thought.

And so the poet within was again awakened. In one two-hour class we all drafted chakra poem after chakra poem. We shared what we wrote. The class responded favorably to my poetry, so I was pleased. I went home and stayed up all night writing, revising, and refining my poems until they shone.

Now let’s return to Art Bootcamp and the projects.

Having completed and ordered my Italian Doorknob poster, titled cleverly “Italian Doorknobs” in Italian (that’s the very sexy looking “maniglie delle porte d’italia”), I brought it to the next art class with a new idea in my back pocket. What if my next project were to combine my chakra poetry with some of my own photographs? I have amazing photos with the vibrant reds, oranges, yellows, greens, blues, indigos, and whites needed for such an endeavor. I’d been using Canva to create my own website and ads for Celestial Sound for four years; I could do this! I could create amazing images that featured both my poetry and my photography.

Celestial Art has arrived!

Expect a whole new area of my website to develop where you can order posters and other products that feature these passions and talents that have been quietly ripening in the background for decades.

And, believe it or not, Mary DID buy a poster as well as three of my books. Thank you, Mary!