"leaf art"
"the crossing"
escaped the enmeshing and are crossing over the bridge towards new worlds...
fragments of the old order veils scattered to the wind behind the four crossing
Pressed Australian leaves
sewn onto purple veil fabric with coloured thread
Nature collage
finished artwork 255 x 335cm
The final piece in this set
‘The Crossed’
This final piece of ‘Leaf Art’, in this series, is about joy, about a journey with others, about sailing through a landscape of wonderment. All were once leaves, serving in vital roles on trees, somewhere in the physical world.
'Now, after the leaves have experienced separation and a second birth they find themselves, still in the physical realm, but moving in landscapes they have never experienced before. Their feet walk on the earth but their very being exists in heaven’.
‘They have all crossed over a bridge that they can not return on. As their feet still move on the earth they find themselves moving through a world made anew, a world made of spirit. They are all still leaves but are now serving in new ways. All have found what God had designed uniquely for them to do on this journey and all draw down the power from the Holy Spirit as they serve humanity.
"On earth as it is in heaven..."
The theme of thread is very powerful in this piece once more. Its application is not only to show the relationship between the two realms of spirit and the material but it now also depicts the crossing. The use of the crossed thread is about this powerful stage that humanity has now entered
‘a bridge that we shall not return on’stated by the Universal House of Justice.
The stage of the crossed.
The purple fabric has been rent as under and the leaves are not veiled. The realm the leaves are now living in has been forged between two other worlds, which are still veiled.
The little pieces of fabric, sewn within this ‘between world’ are only remnants to keep the individuals, who have crossed over, reminded not to go back to being veiled back to sleep.
‘Leaving thoughts’
The leaves I use in these pieces of ‘Leaf Art’ are symbols of themselves and my humble attempt to show some of the ways I see Bahá’u’lláh describing them in his sacred texts. If I sit here and create pieces of ‘Leaf Art’ for the rest of my life I will never exhaust this theme.
The leaves I collect are mainly from native Australian trees, which I have grown up with in Perth, Western Australia. As a young child I was allowed to play and befriend entire forests. Forests that God had planted and that had been growing in this landscape for centuries. The spirit of these trees and the land and the rocks completely encapsulated me and until I was 35, I actually believed I was a tree.
When I found Bahá’u’lláh’s writings a few years later I was so over flowing with love and joy to have found His sacred words. Can you imagine what I felt like when I found the sacred words that said all humans were ‘like unto a tree’. The spirit from these Australian native forests kept my ‘spirit ember’ burning until I found the source of that spirit , Bahá’u’lláh.
The leaves of Australian trees are like leather and I press them to preserve their subtle beauty. Most of the leaves I collect and use in my work are one’s that have just fallen to the ground or have just turned yellow, red or orange hues on the trees and are about to fall. This is the Australian tree’s equivalent to the European tree’s dropping their leaves in autumn.
The Australian native trees only let a few leaves drop gradually over the entire year. These trees have adapted to grow in very poor soils so they have to feed themselves by dropping their own parts gradually over an entire year. These parts that gently drop to the ground all year long are leaves, flower caps, flower petals, twigs and nuts. Most people who come and live in Australia from all corners of the earth don’t understand these unique trees systems of adaptation and call them ‘messy’. Very little of this native Australian forest remains today in the developed and suburban areas or farm lands.
There has been more of these forests and heath lands cleared here in Western Australia in my own live time,over the past 40 years,than was cleared by the first European settlers who arrived here in 1826.
The leaves that I collect are symbolic of me. When I collect the leaves it is how I see my own life’s journey when God picked me up as I was falling.
He preserved me and gave me another life another chance, I maybe still a human and an artist but nothing in my life today is anything like my life was back then. God gave me another chance another shot at life. I collect the leaves and give them another chance another role, a sacred role.
When each leaf is about to fall from it’s immature stage of uniformity and is forced to go through the second birth stage. I pick them up, as God did with me, from this immature station, preserve their essence and when they are changed and transformed they are given a new purpose to serve, to be worked and woven and sewn into a new sacred role of expression.
"leaf art"
"the crossing"
escaped the enmeshing and are crossing over the bridge towards new worlds...
fragments of the old order veils scattered to the wind behind the four crossing
Pressed Australian leaves
sewn onto purple veil fabric with coloured thread
Nature collage
finished artwork 255 x 335cm
The final piece in this set
‘The Crossed’
This final piece of ‘Leaf Art’, in this series, is about joy, about a journey with others, about sailing through a landscape of wonderment. All were once leaves, serving in vital roles on trees, somewhere in the physical world.
'Now, after the leaves have experienced separation and a second birth they find themselves, still in the physical realm, but moving in landscapes they have never experienced before. Their feet walk on the earth but their very being exists in heaven’.
‘They have all crossed over a bridge that they can not return on. As their feet still move on the earth they find themselves moving through a world made anew, a world made of spirit. They are all still leaves but are now serving in new ways. All have found what God had designed uniquely for them to do on this journey and all draw down the power from the Holy Spirit as they serve humanity.
"On earth as it is in heaven..."
The theme of thread is very powerful in this piece once more. Its application is not only to show the relationship between the two realms of spirit and the material but it now also depicts the crossing. The use of the crossed thread is about this powerful stage that humanity has now entered
‘a bridge that we shall not return on’stated by the Universal House of Justice.
The stage of the crossed.
The purple fabric has been rent as under and the leaves are not veiled. The realm the leaves are now living in has been forged between two other worlds, which are still veiled.
The little pieces of fabric, sewn within this ‘between world’ are only remnants to keep the individuals, who have crossed over, reminded not to go back to being veiled back to sleep.
‘Leaving thoughts’
The leaves I use in these pieces of ‘Leaf Art’ are symbols of themselves and my humble attempt to show some of the ways I see Bahá’u’lláh describing them in his sacred texts. If I sit here and create pieces of ‘Leaf Art’ for the rest of my life I will never exhaust this theme.
The leaves I collect are mainly from native Australian trees, which I have grown up with in Perth, Western Australia. As a young child I was allowed to play and befriend entire forests. Forests that God had planted and that had been growing in this landscape for centuries. The spirit of these trees and the land and the rocks completely encapsulated me and until I was 35, I actually believed I was a tree.
When I found Bahá’u’lláh’s writings a few years later I was so over flowing with love and joy to have found His sacred words. Can you imagine what I felt like when I found the sacred words that said all humans were ‘like unto a tree’. The spirit from these Australian native forests kept my ‘spirit ember’ burning until I found the source of that spirit , Bahá’u’lláh.
The leaves of Australian trees are like leather and I press them to preserve their subtle beauty. Most of the leaves I collect and use in my work are one’s that have just fallen to the ground or have just turned yellow, red or orange hues on the trees and are about to fall. This is the Australian tree’s equivalent to the European tree’s dropping their leaves in autumn.
The Australian native trees only let a few leaves drop gradually over the entire year. These trees have adapted to grow in very poor soils so they have to feed themselves by dropping their own parts gradually over an entire year. These parts that gently drop to the ground all year long are leaves, flower caps, flower petals, twigs and nuts. Most people who come and live in Australia from all corners of the earth don’t understand these unique trees systems of adaptation and call them ‘messy’. Very little of this native Australian forest remains today in the developed and suburban areas or farm lands.
There has been more of these forests and heath lands cleared here in Western Australia in my own live time,over the past 40 years,than was cleared by the first European settlers who arrived here in 1826.
The leaves that I collect are symbolic of me. When I collect the leaves it is how I see my own life’s journey when God picked me up as I was falling.
He preserved me and gave me another life another chance, I maybe still a human and an artist but nothing in my life today is anything like my life was back then. God gave me another chance another shot at life. I collect the leaves and give them another chance another role, a sacred role.
When each leaf is about to fall from it’s immature stage of uniformity and is forced to go through the second birth stage. I pick them up, as God did with me, from this immature station, preserve their essence and when they are changed and transformed they are given a new purpose to serve, to be worked and woven and sewn into a new sacred role of expression.