Ring of Fire: Welcome 2013

"The Messenger", 60cm x 80cm, acrylic on canvas. The painting is influenced by my occassional jogs through the forests and woods in Belgium, running there was my yoga I felt grounded. I would stop and listen to the birds there and admire the beauty and awe of the woods in fall and winter. No trees perse are depicted but the subject is surrounded by a ring of fire, suggesting her environment is up in an enferno, the enferno was my new life and role in a foreign country. Although that constructed paper mache world was burning around me, the fire I would later realize is a positive thing. Fire represents destruction but also regeneration, purification and transformation. The hands symbolize her connection to self, to source, when all else cannot be trusted, your heart or your head the one thing you should always listen to according to Einstein is your intuition. The figures right hand rests on her stomach and holds the plumes of the mythical phoenix bird that is speaking into her ear. The Phoenix is described as a bird with colorful plumage and a tail of gold and scarlet. It has a 500 to 1000 year life cycle, near the end of which it builds itself a nest of twigs that then ignites; both nest and bird burn fiercely and are reduced to ashes, from which a new, young phoenix rises, reborn anew to live again. The new phoenix is destined to live as long as its old self. The Phoenix's ability to be reborn from its own ashes implies that it is immortal.  I look forward to leaving all those things that did not serve me in 2012 behind and I express gratitude for all the wonderful things that I experienced that year. Here is wishing you all better positive energy for the new year, a year filled with being surrounded by good honest people and energy and the ability to listen and trust your intuition.