Tonight I'm sharing a work in progress with you Red Riding Hood, not little anymore. ... as part of our Color of Woman journey we each are to do a painting of our Legendary Self... this is one of the painting sessions that has challenged me greatly, and took me a long while to get from its beginnings.. to the middle stage that is pictured below. I am sharing it because, it already has given me such joy by its sheer existance, it's showing me a strength and grace that I admire very much and I guess I seek to embody... it's somewhat empowering to and for me... to see qualities emerging in a painting that I want to embody in myself.. this is an intrinsic piece of the alchemy that I have been witnessing in this Visionary painting method I have been learning... and will soon be teaching. She has messages for me.. and one of her totem animals seems to be the Heron.. Strength and Grace are central characteristics and the 'little red riding hood' reference goes back a long way, and probably has several meanings. One of the memories my Dad recalls having is of me as a young girl; I was wearing a hooded red rain coat and riding on the back of my sisters bike "you looked just like Little Red Riding Hood" he always says. My view of my Dad has been tainted by many years of stuff, so having small cherishable memories like that, is precious to me. I also never liked the feeling that Little Red Riding hood seemed helpless to the trickery of that wolf, so now she has grown up, she carries her own damn axe and is not beholden to any wood-cutter to come and rescue her. I feel empowered when I look at this painting, and so.. with a deep breath.. I'm sharing it here. Oh... I had my 45th birthday on Saturday, wow!! that was fun too, I went to Noosa National park and swam!!! got spoiled by my husband and daugther for the weekend, went to a fancy dress party with a friend who shares my birthday! might share some pics tomorrow or this week sometime... oh.. and pressies... two new tea cups with Klmpt art on them.. ooohw, LOVE those... they will feature in new little tea pics soon. I really love when people offer specials when it's their birthday.. if you've been eyeing off a print let me know and I'll see what kind of birthday discount I can offer you. with love,
Denise. Hello creative one, I have been mentioning the idea of 'Visionary Painting' a little more of late... and so I wanted to share a new painting I just did this week, using this visionary painting method. I had a canvas that I'd covered in pictures creating a vision board back in 2009.. most if came true in the following 12-18 month time period. (yes, imagine that, amazing!) So... I painted over it and dripped paint, stenciled did a bunch of playing.. then set it aside deciding... uuuhm.. I've kindof ruined that, may as well throw it out.. but in true artist form... put it in a stack of 'wtf-do-i-do-with-these-canvas' against the wall in the corner of my studio. So.. when I was given a video series in my Color of Woman course by Shiloh.. I thought .. hey.. I'll give that a whirl.. and voila this gorgeous lady appeared... I'm jazzed about her because.. the intention I wrote in behind the layers of paint was for her to find me gorgeous venues to hold my painting workshops, I am gearing up to be teaching this beautiful method of painting and it would be ever so helpful for me to find just the right spaces in which to welcome you if you would like to come paint with me and a circle of women. "You must give from the overflow" I rarely use glitter... but this Lady of the Divine Spark asked for some! She has a sparkling candle, rose and magical tea is pouring from her teapot into those cups.. and the overflow onto the saucer - reminding me of a valuable lesson... You must give from your overflow, so that you're not depleted all the time. Fill yourself up with the things that strengthen you and keep you grounded, fueled, inspired, feeling loved.. THEN... you have so much more to give. Secret wish... I'm sharing with you ... I have a desire to travel to New Zealand once or twice a year and teach a workshop or two.. and visit my Mum & Dad on the Kapiti Coast ... so... I'm putting that out there, with this Lady of the Divine Spark watching over top... that we will be welcomed to just the right places, meet just the people who are calling out to be able to paint a visionary painting with me... and be in circle with a red thread ceremony. Christchurch is on the horizon for May 2014 with a friend of mine who is also a teacher of this painting method.
Visionary Painting Workshops are coming... I'm hoping to offer one in Buderim in September.. and another in October ... this kind of painting above can be created in a one day workshop, if you have a group who already gather and you'd like to hold a red thread ceremony / visionary painting workshop with my facilitation, do contact me. art@denisedaffara.com.au. That's about it for the minute... and I'm sorry I'm not a prolific... organised... same time same place blogger... I do write on a whim a lot of the time... that may or may not change.. and I had thought I'd share a whole lot more of my CoW journey here... but truth is... it's been really full on.... a lot of inner work has been required, and I have been tending toward going within and not writing out here all that much about it... it needed to settle in me first. And.. I had my trip to California, which just blew me away, heart and soul so uplifted and loved up, truly amazing ... I don't think I've even written much about that here either? see... intermittant at best... sigh... if ever you have questions about this journey of mine.. you can ask.. and I'll do my best to answer.
with love Denise xo I am hereby naming this patch of my studio 'My Magic Wall'... I use it to put reminders and also WISHES... e.g.. several months ago I had a little post-it note saying... Bali - Flora Retreat...with the dates... and also California - Color of Woman weekend.. and the dates for that... and I just left them there and carried on with my life. Both of those things have come to HAPPEN... I enjoyed an amazing week in Bali learning about being Bold and fearless from Flora Bowley (May 2013)... and I've just returned from an OUTSTANDING visit to California... where all manner of mystical, and magic and WONDERFUL things happened ... and this is what I had on a slip of paper.. in preparation for this trip... I put it up only a few weeks ago.. a matter of days before leaving ... One of the reasons I'm sharing this with you is I've just read Danielle Laporte's most recent newsletter and she is encouraging us to share our GOOD news stories.. happenings, experiences etc. So... I thought.. why not.. it's not to sound like a complete wanker... it's really in celeberation and gratitude and sharing an idea that might just work for you too. Yes... I do write the words "learning and loving, and being loved and seen" because one of my unhelpful patterns or limiting beliefs is one of 'being invisible" so.. the counter point to that is being SEEN! ... ask and you shall receive. :) ... and treat others as you'd like to be treated.. works so well too. I did something I've never done before.. and that's travel across to the other side of the world without having booked all of my accommodation.. and left a couple of nights in the hands of my Muse to help me find a place to stay. It turns out those nights were with an amazing woman who is also doing the Color of Woman teacher training. ... and when i asked for "yummy seats"... would you believe... I had a late flight that was cancelled, so the check-in guy at San Francisco just kindly changed my booking to another flight so I would meet my connecting flight in LA... got there.. a Virgin Au lady was looking for me.. 'I've been tracking you since 5.30pm she said" ... all good... then I go through to the boarding gate and WOAH.. I hear my name over the loud speaker... so I go up there and that guy has also been looking for me.. and so they're all happy.. they found their lost passenger... and.. since I had his undivided attention I said... "ummm, the seat I've been given is a window... I really usually prefer an aisle.. but I can try it out and see if it works out... " ... he looks on his computer and says these MOST AMAZING, GORGEOUS, THANK GOD, AND ALL THE ANGELS IN HEAVEN FOR EVERMORE... "there are no others in that row" ... my jaw dropped... and I touched his hand and said THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH, YOU HAVE MADE MY WEEK! and GLORY BE if I didn't have 3 whole seats TO MYSELF for an almost 14 hour flight!!! It honestly felt like business class to me... and I'd been imagining myself in business class (I played a game with myself... my daughter is learning to drive, so each time she drove us to Brisbane - 1 hour+ drive, I would sit in the back and pretend I was travelling in business class) ... hehe... crazy shit like that works... I'm telling you. :)
While shopping in Haight Street (oh my gosh, check out google images)... I was asking my muse for some lace clothing... I'd tried Maceys and I'd tryed lots of times in Au... well... I found a shop... and bought about 5 lace items.. and they were all $27 each! whaaat? yep. true. A bunch of my paintings sold just before I left so there was plenty of spending money.. I'll do my best to get around to blogging some pics from my trip... ugh... I'm really trying to spend less time on the computer these days... I really got that message loud and clear while I was away from home... I reeeaaaalllly want to be creating and painting more than I'm on the computer... it's IMPERATIVE for my sanity and growth as an artist. (if you follow me on fb i put a few on there already) bye for now, love Denise xo |
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Books I Love“There are very few human beings who receive the truth, complete and staggering, by instant illumination. Most of them acquire it fragment by fragment, on a small scale, by successive developments, cellularly, like a laborious mosaic.”
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