An Early Awakening

When I was but a toddler, my father would carry me in the early morning to the local bakery. We took a route through the back alleys behind our tenement building in Chicago. It was before my brothers and sister were born. He would hoist me atop his shoulders and I would hold on to his head. At the bakery he put me down and when the door opened, the light, warmth and sweet fragrance poured forth. On the way back one morning, a bird flew into the brick walls nearby. It is so far back in my memory . . . but I distinctly remember the fright of the beautiful winged creature. Was it blind? Or trapped? 

Why did this brief experience have such an impression on me as to last all my life? Certainly, to see a bird fly against a wall or glass, as if blind, is a jarring sight.

Now, six decades later, I drive to work and park my van in a city garage, then take my bike out and ride to my gallery. There are four parking levels. Birds come in the garage, and sometimes they fly up the stairwell and think they have reached daylight at the top level, only to smash into a big panel of glass. Often, feathers are strewn about the concrete floor. Once I found a dead bird and took it home for burial.

Birds represent freedom and are like unto spirit. In many ways they are angelic. So to see one fooled by glass and be trapped or hurt flying into a transparent barrier, reinforces the feeling that physical life is not what it seems—it also holds death. For my childhood eyes, the vision startled me, but also was an early awakening.

Indian Meeting Place Of The Universe

A life size wooden Indian faces my gallery every day. He wears a war bonnet, is dressed in buckskin and holds a tomahawk. Each morning he is dragged out of the shop called Shalako that sells old Native American Indian silver jewelry and adornments. Then he goes back inside at closing time. He stands sentinel at the door and tourists from all over the world have stopped to have their picture taken next to him.

Santa Fe is the meeting place of the universe for Indians this weekend. Indian Market is in progress. Today, a real Indian stood next to the wooden one as I took a picture. He grabbed the ax from the wooden Indian's hand and smiled while I photographed. He is from the Jicarilla Apache Nation in New Mexico, and is here among tribe people from all over the United States, including Alaska, and also some from Canada. 

Tents line every street going out from the plaza. The Indians sell their pottery, jewelry, weavings, artwork and more. Tourists come from all over. They can be seen waiting at the booth of a favorite artist for over an hour before opening time at 8 AM on Saturday morning. 

Throughout the two days, there are continual performances of native music with colorful dancing in traditional costume . . . and a spirit of happiness and excitement pervades everywhere.

My gallery is only 100 feet from the plaza. Often, downtown businesses complain that shoppers are so fixated on the Indian crafts that their businesses go into a sales slump. Last year I had the good fortune to sell a big painting during the market.

I show up with a positive attitude and am thankful for what fate brings . . . and this year some collectors came in and bought art from me; including a portrait that I had just completed. You might call it a “native” portrait. It is of an indigenous woman from South America, wearing her native costume, including a bright red felt hat.

"The Red Hat", oil on linen, 20 x 20 inches
by Steven Boone

The Geese Are Clouds

Recently I happened to meet my friend Therese at a place where the sunset views are spectacular. If a good sunset is unfolding, we both know that we may find each other at this place. I was there before her and took pictures as the fiery drama climaxed and slowly receded. As I was about to leave, Therese arrived. We hung out together for awhile and then bid farewell. I went home, but she stayed and the next day sent me some of her photos by email. 

I find being with Therese often leads me to see in new ways. She experiences a psychological phenomenon called pareidolia. It is where the mind takes familiar patterns and perceives something beyond what is apparent. For instance, a common activity among children is seeing dragons, rabbits or other phenomenon in the shapes of fleeting clouds. 

Therese has pointed out angels or faces in my paintings. If I look close enough and with active imagination, I might see what she does.

My father could not see the man in the moon.

When she sent me the photos she remarked about seeing geese in one picture of a road with dark, moving clouds in the sky. 

I asked her if I could make a painting from her photograph, and she agreed. The result is a combination of our creativity. The geese are clouds.

See more paintings from Steven Boone

Darkness and Light

The ultimate task for me is not an external goal. Rather it is gaining wisdom and inner peace. Sounds simple enough but if we understand that it may take many years to understand just one dream we have had, then we see some of the difficulty.

I had a startling epiphany during a particularly crucial time in my life. During my late teens my mother had just finished reading books by the esteemed psychologist Karen Horney (German/American, 16 September 1885 – 4 December 1952). She had gained insights and lauded them. Two hardbound volumes by Horney were on our bookshelves: Our Inner Conflicts, and The Neurotic Personality Of Our Time. I was a voracious reader and had read classic literature, so read both books—though the language was dense and sometimes almost indecipherable. 

Through reading, I grasped that neurotic people identify themselves with an idealized image and will go to great lengths to maintain an unreal position. Their pain is unconsciously knowing they are not the idealized vision. The gap is unbearable. 

I realized I had been doing the same by blocking out undesirable aspects of my "hidden" self in favor of a superior.

I entered a trial period of just letting thoughts and emotions float to the surface without judgement. Even nasty stuff appeared but I did not bury it. Rather, I accepted and witnessed without judgement. Although difficult, this process lifted me to greater strength. I breathed deeper. 

At that time, I had also delved into religion and enjoyed the ideals in the Baha'i Faith. Furthermore, great emphasis was on unity, freedom from prejudice, purity—away from materialism and towards spirituality.

As I continued my experiment, I remember coming to a crossroads. The difficult emotions and feelings continued arising and I wondered if I could go forward in life feeling such dark forces yet being a person of light. I wondered if I could live with the dichotomy. Should I block the gate and keep the devils locked away, concentrating on adhering to a religious and pure way of being? Or continue withholding nothing and feeling like I was in a Hieronymous Bosch painting of The Last Judgement with depictions of rebellious devils led by Lucifer, or Garden of Earthly Delights.
At this particularly sensitive time in my development, I chose to block the uncomfortable dark feelings and urges. Instead, I would concentrate on immersing myself in religion as a way of evolution and salvation.
I would adopt thinking similar to what Emanuel Swedenborg, (Swedish, 29 January 1688; died 29 March 1772) wrote: The amount of goodness we receive from God can only equal the amount of evil we remove from ourselves as if by our own power, which is done by both working on ourselves and putting faith in the Lord. 

This fateful decision led me into a colossal war of light and dark forces. The more I sought to dispel the anger, frustration, pain and malevolence within me, the more it insisted on knocking at the door of my consciousness. No amount of praying, being with religious people or studying holy texts could slay the monstrous beast terrorizing the kingdom of my being. My light side hated my dark side. I was divided and suffering. 

My family history is an interesting study in light and dark. My mother came from a disturbed upbringing. She lived in foster homes at times. Her mother went from husband to husband; eventually going through ten of them. Mom was beautiful and hardscrabble when she met my father in Chicago. My father grew up the son of doctor and a sensitive Jewish mother, was brilliant and entered the University of Chicago at the age of fifteen. He finished graduate school with a degree in criminology. Human darkness fascinated him and he was a problem solver. He went on to an illustrious career in social engineering, implementing great changes in American society.

Perhaps it was fate that I would be a problem to myself and have to unify my original archetypes.

These days I find myself embracing non-conflict. I have come again to allowing all feelings, memories, thoughts and perceptions. They come and go without a fight. I am a changed person. I continue in my religion and gain great inspiration from it, as well as from other sources of the same Divine light.

A few days ago, I wrote in my journal:

Essentially, I will stay in a state of peace. If my pristine and calm being is tested by unruly ego or illusion of duality, I can override the challenge. It is as if I am at last taking the throne of command to my own kingdom. No longer driven by intractable and wayward passions..

Thank you Lord for giving me what I ask for.

So I embrace all and realize that all is necessary. Nothing drives me but the urge to understand the puzzle of life and be near God.

The darkness and light inform each other. Any great work of art must have them both.

Among Skeletons

I found her among skeletons, ravens, and a very odd assortment of other characters. She wears a cute blue dress and stands in a yard under a cloudy drab sky, holding a black balloon that bobs above her head. Her huge blue eyes stare blankly into mine, and are accentuated by pink mascara that goes with her flaming pink hair. Her tiny mouth is decorated with the same color.


Standing in a booth at Spanish Market here in Santa Fe this weekend, I asked the artist who made her about the price and when he replied with a small sum, I said I would take her. I thought she would fit in with the eclectic menagerie on my kitchen windowsill.


A couple weeks ago, my previous purchase was at the International Folk Art Market from an  artisan from Chile. He made skeleton figures doing normal things. I bought a skeleton with long black hair—singing and playing a red cello. I brought him home and placed him with a bony couple holding a basket of bread and playing a guitar.

The latin cultures have a way of celebrating death and making it part of life.


Now I can move my little skeleton figures around as I choose and let them tell stories. They go with my ceramic rabbit, clay figurine ballet dancers, doll with angel wings, bust of Thomas Jefferson, and flying nude girl with arms outstretched and a star on her toes. The circus grows steadily.

Hey Fat Man!

From my perch atop the wood fence behind my tenement apartment in Chicago, Illinois, if I spied the delivery man driving through the alley I gave him a shout out: Hey fat man! The big negro would smile, wave through the open window and respond with a cry, Hey skinny boy!  It became a game for both of us. I was four years old.

My father was finishing his studies for a master degree in criminology at the University of Chicago. On the side, he worked two jobs to support his young family. We were poor, but I did not know it. My mother stayed at home, minding me and two younger brothers.

I had a tricycle that I rode on the pavement behind the apartment. One day a woman was hanging wash on a line and I accidentally bumped my bike into her pail of clean clothes. Oh my, did she lash out scolding me. It was the first instance of human rage I ever experienced. I began crying loudly. My mother came outside, gathered me safely in her arms and apologized to the neighbor. I remember mother was embarrassed—another new feeling to me. Thus the beginning of learning about differentiation.

I played at a nursery school in the afternoons. It was a big place in Hyde Park for the children of poor families. We had guided play, meals, nap time on cots, and recess where we ran outdoors on a concrete playground that had a stagecoach in the corner. My first playmate was Darnell. He was black and I am white but neither of us knew. We did not know how to differentiate. I can still remember the love between us and pure joy of innocent comradeship. We were soulmates!

Our building was heated in the winter by a furnace in the basement that burned coal. During the cold months, a huge mound of black rock was piled out back. The building janitor was responsible for keeping coal in the furnace. He became friends of ours and one night my father took me to see him shoveling coal into the furnace. In the darkened room, the fiery furnace sounded with roaring flames. The iron doors opened. I stood at my father's side, reaching to hold his hand. The fire was at my eye level just feet away. I felt the warmth and saw the dancing light—like magic. Then the doors shut with a clang and we went upstairs. I could feel the love of my father and the janitor. They too witnessed the simple beauty of the moment; made special through my first experience of it.

I always slept with my brother Wade. One Sunday morning when I woke up, he was not beside me. I went to my parents and asked where he was. He could not be found. We looked all over. My mother was so frantic she looked under the living room couch although it only had an inch of space. In despair, the janitor was called upstairs to help us. I went in the darkened closet near my bed. Lifting up a pile of dirty laundry on the floor, there was Wade—fast asleep. Everyone gave out a cry of relief and some laughter followed. 

I will never forget my mother getting down on her knees and looking under the couch.

The World Comes To Me

I abandoned my art gallery today and joined a procession of pilgrims.

This weekend Santa Fe hosts the International Folk Art Market. It is hugely popular—a once yearly event that draws people near and far like a magnet. This Saturday in the afternoon, I joined the masses of people taking shuttle buses up to the Folk Art Museum where the festival takes place.

My main two interests were to photograph the amazing display of humans from around the globe, from 140 different countries all dressed in native garb amidst their handcrafts, and also to buy a hat. The colorful skullcaps I have purchased in the past wore out from plentiful wear.

Fate smiled on my aspirations for I took plenty of pictures of beautiful people—and found my hand embroidered hat, made by a native of Uzbekistan. Her name is Gulnora Odilova.

I also bought this little sculpture . . . the artist is Claudio Jimenez from Chile

I have traveled thousands of miles and been around the world twice, visiting many places, but once a year in Santa Fe, the world comes to me. I so enjoy it!

The world is one country, and mankind its citizens. -Baha'u'llah


Other articles I wrote about the International Folk Art Market:
A Gem In The Crown

The Human Family

 

Window Shopping

Almost everyone has known the pleasure of gazing in glass store windows. There is a name for it: “window shopping”. The allure is in tasting the eye candy without having to buy. It is a treat to just look and then move on. 

My art gallery is in a pedestrian mall on the central plaza in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Santa Fe is a major tourist destination in the USA. It is rich in history, is tri-cultural including Anglo, Hispanic and Native American people, is free of pollution and sits among mountains, is the state capitol, and a famous art center. 

Boone Gallery advertises my artwork in a glass display case that is in front of the building on the street bordering the plaza. It is lit all the time and can be seen round the clock whenever anyone stops to look.

The other day, July 5^th, was the anniversary of my daughter's death. My assistant worked half the day. I was supposed to go in the afternoon, but did not have the will to go open up and meet the public. Late in the afternoon my phone rang. I noticed the phone number was from Virginia and thought it was an advertiser so did not answer. The next day I saw that the caller had left a message. Turns out that someone had been “window shopping”, and wanted to make an appointment to see my artwork. When I called back, we had a nice chat and I learned that he liked my art and wanted to see more.

I met the man and his wife at my gallery and they narrowed their choices down to four paintings. The woman left and the man stayed with his friend—deciding. He had a budget and so I offered him a discount for buying more than one. In the end, he bought three.

Window shopping started it all.

Thinking Of Lions

I fell asleep thinking of lions. They prowled the area of Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania, Africa where my tent was pitched near the rim. In the dead of the night I woke to the sound of something massively heavy crushing and pulling the grass just steps away. On my cot listening, I briefly fantasized being pulverized into the earth, and then fell back asleep.

A water buffalo had come into camp.

In the morning chill and fog, as we made our way down to the flat crater plain, I encountered a couple young Masai men. The others in the small group of safari travelers shied away from the native africans, but I always was drawn to engage with them. This morning we met as they were stepping from the mysterious  shrouded bush and I was just waking from my dreams—and the water buffalo and lions.

I took some photos and now treasure the images as reminders of wildness, Africa, and the wonderful Masai who I chanced to meet.

Khaos

The ancient Greeks believed Chaos was the first thing to exist from which the primordial deities came; including Gaia, the ancestral mother of all life, Eros, a god involved in the birth of the cosmos, and Tartarus, both a deity and a place in the underworld—also the unbounded first-existing entity from which the Light and the cosmos are born.

The word khaos means "gap" or "chasm" being the space between heaven and earth.

Chaos has always been a partner to me in life. During early childhood, it was a natural part of magical life and development. Yet like everyone else, I was trained away from it in favor of order. Then it felt like waging war between good and evil.

When this happened a deep division came into my life. From then on I felt as though walking a tightrope. To fall was to descend into the chasm of chaos.

I remember being with other teenagers and driving out on the town one night. When the music was being changed between channels, static came on and I said "leave it there." Everyone laughed but I preferred it for awhile;  the little interval of chaos.

Shortly thereafter, I became afraid of dark forces in the universe and in myself, and turned against chaos. I suffered. Part of the equation of existence is that in life, mistakes happen, surprises occur, plans are upset, the unexpected happens. Chaos is in everything to some degree.


The "chasm" between heaven and earth is a fertile place. I believe, as did the Greeks, it is where creativity begins.

I have become stubborn about leaving space for it.

In my artwork, some of the best results come when there are "happy accidents". The mind comes to an impasse and sort of collapses into "unknowing" . . .  a place is messed or destroyed on the canvas yet in the destruction the hint of something with great beauty and clarity arises like a phoenix. It could only come about through destruction.

When I am out on the streets photographing, I often stop to study and take pictures of random textures and forms that seemingly come from chaos. Sometimes they are quite beautiful—the scrapings across metal, leaves floating in streams, random blazing clouds at sunset, or many other chance interchanges that leave marks upon nature.

I have learned in myself too, to make room for surprise. It is necessary.

Know Thyself

Know Thyself. 
- Socrates

True loss is for him whose days have been spent in utter ignorance of his self. -Baha'u'llah


I went to see my long time psychologist recently. We have met off and on for many years. It has been the nature of my adult life to be in many predicaments leading to moments of truth. I am a risk taker. I have always learned by doing and experiencing consequences. My father thrived on problem solving his entire life, and I have that tendency too.

The therapist I see is renowned, an author and lecturer. In the past he has traded with me for art.

When I arrived for the recent session, I took a few minutes sitting quietly in a waiting room. I reflected on what I wanted to say, glanced at recent journal passages, prayed that the discussions would be enlightened and bring the highest good. Then I thought of what to talk about. Essentially, I try to be on the path of "heart"; strong and open, feeling truth and mystery, having equanimity and fullness. Knowing joy and pain and being fluid in both.
I chose to talk about feeling stuck in some ways . . . and decided to mention a couple dreams I had had about a year ago that seemed to explain much but I could not decipher all the symbols within them.

Comfortably seated in the office, the two of us made great headway with the dreams in our hour of conversation. He knows me so well, I could refer to childhood memories he knew about. With his help and adept questioning, I gained new inspirations and insights that are helping to unlock closed passages that are essential for me to travel in.

As I drove home, reflecting on realizations, I saw people walking about, and noticed how they held themselves and how they dressed. I could "see" the psychological being that formed the outer picture.  Then I felt compassion because it is not easy being human and everyone tries.


Observe all men; thy self most. - Benjamin Franklin

Charity is in the heart of man, and righteousness in the path of men. Pity the man who has lost his path and does not follow it and who has lost his heart and does not know how to recover it. When people's dogs and chicks are lost they go out and look for them and yet the people who have lost their hearts do not go out and look for them. The principle of self-cultivation consists in nothing but trying to look for the lost heart. - Mencius (4th century B.C.)

Some people say they haven't yet found themselves. But the self is not something one finds; it is something one creates.- Thomas Szasz