Tom Overcasher offers the third in our series of images from Ken Krafchek's "Creating from the Heart" workshop. Tom's piece brings together images from two sayings of Jesus: one about the plank and the mote, and another from Jesus's many pastoral sayings. These two paintings were combined in collaborative discussion in the studio—call it communal intuition! The sheep simply needed to stand in counterpoint to the eye, to the plank/mote which contains its own layers of symbolism.
I'll let Tom add his own post to share about his process, but until then please consider what this image has to say. Do the parts come together to create a more powerful symbol than they would individually?
What about the corporate participation in creating this sketch? Was it presumptuous of us to tell Tom what we thought he should do with his images, and the combination in which we wanted him to present them, or was it a true reflection of the Body, working as a whole?
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I love, love LOVE this piece! it's very *big brother is watching* to me. It invokes a vulnerability in me...sheep being watched. People being watched. Love it! ~Dells
ReplyDeleteI think we are strengthened by the process of working together -- I do not think it is presumptious at all. I'm glad there is just one eye -- it is thought provoking this way. It speaks to me of God as the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. The God who sees and knows all things.
ReplyDeleteInteresting about the Alpha and the Omega. I can't ignore the "Demon Hunter" logo in the eye, which presents a different feel for me.
ReplyDeleteAh, I didn't realize it was a Demon Hunter logo, and I had been pondering this all week and trying to decide what I thought/think about it all. I saw the devil in the eye, so I see where Adella thought about Big Brother. I prefer the thought of God watching over all of his sheep, but the devil in the eye was scary to me. Since I wasn't there, I probably don't have too much room to say anything about process, but to me art is very individual, and that probably would not have worked for me to have people determining the "best" way to present it. However, having said that, the image is much more powerful with the two together. Certainly the size of the eye in comparison to the sheep invokes and "all-seeing eye" concept, with God being the most benign idea. The devil-looking plank (which makes sense, too about the devil helping us be unable to see the plank in our own eye yet be so quick to see the mote in another's eye), though, also gives me the sense of the devil going about "as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour", looking about with his big eye. So all in all, it was a disturbing piece for me with the two pieces put together, because sheep are usually seen as such gentle creatures and they seem quite vulnerable here...much like we.
ReplyDeleteHm...If you look at it long enough, it starts looking back!!! ~Dells
ReplyDeleteGood thoughts, Lynn. I enjoyed the collaborative aspect of what we did in this workshop. I think it was easier for me because we knew from the get go that we would be bringing our pieces together. Also, investing 5 minutes in a piece before the cut-and-pasting begins makes it a little easier to let go. Of course, it was really easy for me to work with Tom's piece! It wouldn't have been nearly so easy to have others readjusting my own work. Not nearly!
ReplyDeleteEven so, I felt that I needed Tom's permission to play with his sheep yesterday (see new sheep image on blog).
It really worked for me that Tom's "plank" was a demon head. With my own interpretation of that passage I had a hard time embodying plank and mote. I think that maybe I need to go back to that passage and explore. Maybe migraine blindness (from "first person" point of view). I'm thinking that for me it's not so much about the mote/plank as about the blindness, and that I missed it in my own piece. Hmmmm.
...also cool that Tom put the demon head over the pupil, where light enters the eye. Good symbolism on so many levels.
ReplyDeleteI really like with you did with the sheep in that new piece!!!
ReplyDeleteWas that the "checkerboard" piece, Lynn? Tom was very gracious to let me play with his images. I started with one idea in my head, and it took its own direction, of course. It wasn't until I had posted it with his words about "no time to count sheep" that I realized that I had put together counted and countable sheep!
ReplyDeleteSigh. That's why I'm an artist and not an accountant.