Goldenfish
9" x 12"
Mixed Media
on Canvas
2006

In many stories, the Golden Fish is a survivor and a granter of wishes. Usually, the person who is blessed with a gift such as a wish or great wealth squanders it either though greed or ingratitude, and the outcome ranges from a return to their former state or even death. I imagine that the lesson is to be thankful for what we have in life, and to nurture it with a good heart. Whatever gifts we have, we can develop them, let them grow, and let them sustain us and others. When we don't, we may run the risk of losing our gifts.

In our western society, we mark the New Year tonight and traditionally people make promises to themselves to be more like the person they hope to be than who they are. Resolved, we go forward and try to measure up to what we have in mind, and as is often the case, we betray our self-interest for self indulgence! Not that his is always bad. Some of the changes we want to see in ourselves may be too great a leap from where we are.

As the saying goes, reach for the moon and you'll land among the stars. So, I guess I'm saying that there's nothing wrong with being gentle with ourselves. We live in a very driven society where every expectation is very difficult to fulfill, and those who manage it, do it at the expense of something else - usually their own health or inner balance. If we don't hit the moon this year, at least let us acknowledge what we have managed to accomplish.

In essence, let's nurture ourselves. Nurture the Golden Fish inside us, the part of ourselves that makes life a banquet of riches and joy. There is much to be grateful for and much to share. There is real wealth to be found in slowing down and taking the time to be happy. For myself, I'm often driven to keep working and creating because I often feel that time is too short. For an artist, this isn't really the wisest thing I could do because I sometimes forget to to take the time I need to recharge and replenish, to put energy back into me instead of merely being a freeway for it.

I suspect that this is the same for most people.

The Golden Fish is strong and vital, and can handle a lot of pressure and difficulty, but that doesn't mean it has to! When life starts to feel dreary, to me it is a signal that I am pushing away the beautiful in my life. That's why I painted this little reminder. A more apt, but more obscure title for the piece could just as easily have been:

It's okay to slow it down. In fact, you really need to. Turn out the light, Lie down, and dream again. Slow down and dream.

A bit unwieldy. I think I'll stick with Golden Fish.

Happy New Year!

Secret Treasure
6" x 8"
Mixed Media
on Canvas
2006

Besides the Raven (with whom I am apparently obsessed lately), the Rabbit in legends has also played the role of the Trickster. Of course, this word "Trickster" was not a name given by any Indigenous tribes of North America, but was instead a Eurocentric term applied to the character of Raven, or Rabbit, or Coyote, or any other hero of strange stories.

How could the Coyote slay a monster, scatter the flesh of it and create tribes of people, but also in another story pretend to be a healer and take advantage of a family and a sick girl? Must be a Trickster.

The duality of the hero is deeper than that. In creation stories, man is almost always portrayed as being another animal in the wild. It isn't until someone intervenes (a Culture Hero, God, or Shaman) that we transform to take on our human forms. In this context, anyone who does the community an enormous good is instantly elevated to a place of prestige, honour, or worship. Of course, no one is immune to mortal frailties or weaknesses, apparently including the immortal. So when in a later story the Coyote abuses the trust of a family by disguising himself as a respected and revered member of the community, there is no puzzling logical fallacy at play.

No, what we have is a very important lesson. A warning that even those we have put on a pedestal can fall. This is not to say people shouldn't trust each other, it is instead saying that we all have the potential to betray the greatness and goodness of our selves. We don't have to, and certainly many good people never do, but we should keep in mind that it can happen, and knowing that simple truth, we can guard our hearts against self-harm.

Another aspect of the lesson is to be thoughtful to what our leaders tell us is true. It is easy to sit back and let others steer our destiny, but it does no one any harm to keep one eye at least half open.

In this little painting, I was thinking about Solstice. The rabbit has been digging for something to eat during the Long Night of winter. He is so hungry, it has been cold for so long. He thinks he has found a cache of food but instead has found the Sun! It was sleeping, lulled by the snows and the gentle moonlight, but now it will slowly rise, filling the world with warmth and a new spring.

Christmastime

I've always been ambivalent about Christmas.

I'm not a Scrooge about it. In fact, I think it's one of our few remaining Important Observances, but damn if it doesn't depress me.

I mean Depress.

Too many years of struggling to keep my head above the flood of bills, maybe. Too many suicides of dear ones gone. Too much dwelling on the needs of the poor and homeless. The beaten and abused. The lonely.

Every day of this blessed season a reminder of my shortcomings and inability to make any meaningful, longterm change.

Then again, who can?


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I was out tonight. A rare thing. One of my friends is almost becoming a career alcoholic, another is alone and baking cookies for no one but himself. But I was out. In Edmonton we have a bar called the Bank, and the Beautiful people congregate there. As I stood behind a fellow waiting for his coat to be found, he kept messaging his friends:

"I really wanna f**k someone up tonight."

He sent this mantra out again and again, a psychopath, or just too much to drink, or feeling as small as his height, I don't know. I hope his Christmas wish didn't come true.

There were warm feelings apparent among friends, but that was all. Otherwise it was the cold shoulder and everyone more cool than anyone else. I've been living in the city long enough to blend in, but really, emotionally I felt like a fish out of water. A stranger in an alien land of too much cologne, too much cleavage, and too much sad desperation disguised as substanced fueled fun and manic displays of sexuality.

Or maybe I'm just getting older and slightly more jaded. Maybe it's all people have in the city and they cling to it like a life preserver, venting their emotions and fears in a relatively safe environment, chasing after identity and a modicum of escape from every day dreariness.

Speaking of which, what a sour thing this entry is!

My intent was to write about what I found that sustained me, that gave me hope. As an artist, it is far too easy to see the bad. It's how we spot the good and cherish it like a rare and wonderful thing. Artists function best in contrast. At least, this one does.

This got me in trouble when I was younger.

I was always in some kind of trouble. I could never run for public office or anything like that. I did too many things growing up. Speaking of which, I saw Conservative MP Rahim Jaffer on the town, looking slick and handsome and young without a care in the world. How many things did I want to talk to him about? But then, everyone deserves a night off. There's a guy who probably never acted out a day in his life. A proper young man.

These days, for me, there's no acting out. I've learned to shoulder the pain and the perpetual loneliness.

I've come to terms with the fact that I will always be alone in some way, just as everyone is, really. The tough part is knowing it, and knowing why. That knowledge forces me to accept that it will never, ever change. I don't cling to the dream that one day, someone will come along who understands me.

One person did but they ended up throwing themselves off the High Level Bridge.

I remember the blood stains on the snow below, trying not to think about what it must have been like for her to know that she had killed herself, but lying there, dying slowly and painfully, no way to take it back.

Earlier that night, I had heard a voice telling me to go visit her. It spoke clearly in my ears, three times, but I didn't listen...only worrying about myself, that I was going crazy. It took years to stop blaming myself for not listening to such a clear plea, but I finally did. I do, however, still remember.


---


The real question I ask myself all the time is: what will it take for people to live in their hearts? When will people let go of their insecurities and go forth unafraid and vulnerable? We live in a time and land of enduring and incredible peace, but people are at war with one another and with themselves. People want to hurt other people just to feel vital and alive...and powerful.

What a lie that way is, isn't it?

Power over others is a hunger that is never sated. The emptiness can only grow, the travesty inflicted on one's own soul for acts of dominance only increase with every harmful action taken.

Christmas brings out the maudlin in me.


---


Maybe it's about time.

I'm a Native American artist. My father is Cree/Cherokee, my mother of Norweigian descent, and I'm painting my images, thinking that maybe, in some small way, it makes a difference.

I put my soul into it every single day of my life. Not a day goes by that I'm not thinking about it. I display it for people to judge, and hopefully someone will see what I'm trying to say.

But that doesn't mean I'm not a coward. I am.

I make up for my incalcitrant and rebellious youth by going the extreme other way. I watch what I say very carefully, I don't rock the boat. I save up my controversial ideas and images for SOME DAY....

Of course, SOME DAY never comes.

In the meantime, I still say what I want to say, but not all of it.

I some ways, this is best. I prefer the warmth of the sun to the bluster of the wind. Why use a hammer when a smile will do the same job?

I used to take anti-depressants, and they do everything they promise. The drawback is my creativity disappeared along with my sadness. My sex-drive disappeared completely, and I no longer appreciated this transient beauty that surrounds us, nor did I care about the loss. But something in me said, "Aaron...you need to paint."

I resented that voice. I was finally happy in chemical peace and prosperity.

And yet it persisted.

"Aaron...you need to paint."

Like reality intruding on a beautiful but false dream, I knew I had to forego my medicated bliss. I worried about it a lot. Isn't this what got people suffering with mental illnesses in trouble all the time? The idea that they didn't "need their medication"?

The difference is, I knew I needed it, but the voice persisted.

"Aaron...you need to paint."

So I did. So I do.

And everyone feels alone. Everyone lives alone. Everyone dies alone. But we do make connections, however brief or fleeting. And that's what it's all about. Maybe that's why we still keep Christmas, Consumption Monster that it is. We are trying to connect, giving up our social counters, our money, to instead find or grow links to each other.

Forging bonds of love.

Why is that so scary? Why do we choose so, so carefully who we will give our love to? We are a frightened people who have so much that maybe we've forgotten how to give of ourselves. Again, this is why Christmas is kept, isn't it?

We have more to give than we know.

But aren't people scared of receiving!

People distrust receiving even more than they fear offering! If you genuinely smiled at, and poured out the bounty of your love toward the men I saw at the bar tonight, chances are they would seek to destroy you! They would think you mocked them, didn't fear them, didn't respect them. They are so alone in this world that they could not trust something good, but instead would have to actively reject it in order to restore equilibrium.


---

It comes down to this:

What is the story we tell ourselves? My ancestors, on both sides, had a tradition of Oral teaching. Sacred stories that were passed down, generation to generation, instructing the young and helping them to define themselves in the world. The stories built a commonality, a community, a family. A tribe.

What stories do we tell each other now? What are the lessons of our community? Our society? Our entertainment is violence. Our solutions are violence. Our heroes are isolated and alone against all odds, where friends cannot be trusted against betrayal. This is not all. There are positives to be sure, and this is what saves us.

But I am deeply concerned by a culture that promotes violence above love. Where viewing death is acceptable, but physical intimacy is not. Why has sex become shameful? In making it so, we make it taboo, deviant, and the mystery and titilllation of the forbidden paves way for sad and serious abuses. It becomes dirty and unclean instead of honest and beautiful.

We need to think about what story we are forging together. What will our collective legacy be? What messages do we leave our children? Do they know what to value? We need to weave a strong tale for them. We need to make a solid fabric out of the intangible world that reflects what we hope for, not what we fear.

I have a lot of fear.

I bet you do too.

How do we get past it? I don't know. The only thing I can think of is to stop thinking so much about ourselves. Take our wants out of the equation as much as possible and remember that we are not isolated little universes, but a family. We are mortal and we are flesh.

The eyes that allow us to see are in a head of bone and blood. Our flesh is made of soil. We are temporary and just like everyone else around us!

When you see someone walking by, they are the same! They are consciousness in a body and look at you as Other as much as you do them. Their concerns are deeper than yours, more immediate, more real. You are a fiction, or a bit player, or more likely, an extra on the set.

But you are also just exactly the same.

Breathe on that for a while.

Just breathe.

Just breathe. Deeply and surely.

Just breathe.

And I'll breathe, too.

And we'll cease being alone, at least for a little while.

Old Friends

Whatever your belief about Christmas, it still affords all of us a time to reconnect with old friends, or keep a relationship strong. My thoughts right now are with all good friends, old and new, near or far.

Feed on my site

I just figured out how to update the address for my xml/rss/atom feed. Apparently it should work with all of those.

Just click on the little xml icon to the left!

Warm Honey
2006

We've had snow for about two months now. Every now and then I'll see something that I find strikingly beautiful about the winter...the way the sun sends the sky into brief spams of intense colour for the few moments before night hits full on, or the way the stars look so close, scattered by the millions across a charcoal black expanse.

But to be honest, most of the time it's just cold. Or slushy. And not just wet, slushy, but dirt slush. Everywhere.

Right now I dream of warm, long summer days, lying under a huge, leafy tree, the sun dappling my skin in soft kisses.

I conveniently forget the scorching blaze that hammers oppressively on the head, filling the house with pent up fire that emanates all through the sticky, sleepless night.

But enough of reality! This is a painting about bees, which I like. And honey, which I love. The absence of summer makes my heart grow fonder, and in my dreams it is perfect. Just like an ex-lover, summer is the one that got away.

Seasons Change
24" x 18"
Mixed Media
on Canvas
2006

At the time I began this piece, the summer was just beginning to make way for the golden hues of Fall. I had made a number of trips to Southern Alberta in the weeks before this work started and I saw a number of crows, ravens, redwing blackbirds, etc sitting on posts and trees on the roadside. Wherever I stopped, there was a corvid looking at me.

The background is taken from a spot along the Belly River. It is a lush valley in the midst of a sunbaked landscape and the trees there are usually the last to turn. The Belly River also flows though Reservation land and in my daydreaming I had a vision of a Black Bird representing the people. It made me think of those photographs and drawings of the slow creep of European paraphernalia into the dress and costume of the Native Americans at the time, and how odd and out of place those tokens seem. I wanted to accentuate that by dressing the figure like one of those pictures, retaining the nobility amidst the absurdity.

The changes were coming, and were as apparent as the changing colours in the land, but if the change was into a wintery, desolate time, then it is easy to recall that the snow gives way and spring comes again. As surely as the sun rises, the seasons change.

White Raven
Acrylic, Gold Leaf
& Mixed Media
on Canvas
18" x 24"
2006

This is the instant before the Raven takes the Sun into his mouth and he, and the world, are changed forever. Ravens represent a conduit to the supernatural, a bridge from our world to the next. In my imaginings, the Raven stole the moon and sun from the spirtual plane and brought them into our world. In the process of bringing the sun to us, he was burned black, and so is covered in soot like a cloak that gives corporeal form. Underneath that thin layer, however, still resides the white spirit, full of raw energy and power.

Morning Sigh

Last week I awoke to a misty, soft morning full of silence and surreal beauty. The crunch of the snow under my feet seemed like the whisper of a gentle confidant.

Lady
Mixed Media
5" x 7"
2006

Unexpected Thunder
36" x 48"
Mixed Media on Canvas
2006

Walking in the morning mist, a silent forest suddenly erupts with the sound of wind and thunder!

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Thanks to everyone who came out to the Bearclaw Gallery on Saturday. It was a lot of fun meeting new people and having some really great conversations. Of course, thanks to the Bearclaw Gallery for hosting.

The Bearclaw Gallery Celebrates
A Holiday Season Show
December 2nd-10th, 2006

Meet artists Jane Ash Poitras and Aaron Paquette
Dec 2 from 2-4 pm

Come on out to the show tomorrow. I popped in today and saw some really beautiful work by Jane Ash Poitras and Linus Woods. Make an afternoon of it and check in on the other galleries in the area as well!