I love to be outside: to lay under trees, next to a pond, or lay with closed eyes and listen to the invisible energy of wind, insects, and bird songs. To listen to how Nature interacts with us.

These four paintings, Pond, Grove, Willow, and Field, have all been created at the George Lorimer Preserve, an Open Land Conservancy in Chester County, PA.

Each piece starts with a simple acknowledgment to the Land: Hello, thanks for allowing me to be here and to connect with you—how would you like your energy expressed?

The first layer of each piece is done plein air, while sitting on the grass. This is where I begin a dialogue with the Land —which is a call and response.

Once the conversation has started I continue the painting in the studio, where I go through different iterations of dialogue. And, just like memory, impressions surface, get covered over, and gems are excavated. The multiple layers express the fluidity of this dialogue, inviting the energy of wildness to flow through each piece.

I'm asking Land to show me its true nature. Land has an entirely different understanding of Self that doesn't fit our Tree, Water, Bird, and Weed labels. Those labels help humans have a common language but also limit our curiosity and contain Nature's wild energy in a nice box called other.

I invite you to suspend trying to understand these paintings: to open your senses to let the energy in each painting resonate with a body memory inside you. Meeting wildness to wildness.

Damini Celebre, November 2023

 

This soundscape was co-created with the Land of the George Lorimer Preserve, using a device developed to translate the electromagnetic impulse of the plants into melodies.  (www.musicoftheplants.com)