Where Memory Softly Falls
The final, breathtakingly beautiful drive down the Columbia River Gorge with my sister Toren in the late autumn of 2023, just days after our last visit with our soon-departed sister Cheryl, became the emotional and visual genesis of this series. The landscape, drenched in the hues of fall, echoed the raw, unresolved feelings of impending loss.
It seemed impossible that we should lose a beloved sibling, especially one as immersed in the Great Mystery of art and the wild as Cheryl. It seemed then like a dream. The entire journey continues to be a mystic road. In this series, I am exploring what it feels like to grasp at memories already slipping away, the shocked feeling of absence. I feel her spirit ascend even as her body descends. This is the season of departure for Cheryl, and transition for we who are left behind.
Her journey ends and a new one begins for us. In the wake of her passing, I often move in a dreamlike state. My feelings are both painfully sharp and unclear, as if I myself moved between worlds. In this series, you will encounter the moon, raven and fox, cougar and cat, shadows of birds, butterflies, and half images of a woman walking away.
These animals have always been part of our mutual life, acknowledged as those who live their lives in the Great Mystery, as do our own souls. For this series, I am recreating the brilliant abundance of autumn leaves or spring flowers in composite photographs—layering images to reflect fragmented memories and evolving perspectives. These are printed on thin, ephemeral Kozo or Japanese mulberry paper, which feels like the veil between the living and the dead to me. Many of these also incorporate watercolor and torn tissue paper from my expressive art journal.
The print on Kozo paper is gilded on the back in gold, copper, or silver, which to me is the gleam of spirit or of a lingering presence shining through. I finish the piece with a very thin, cold wax glaze to further create that sense of the Mystery. This is an evolving series, and I'm exploring these themes as the ebb and flow of dream and memory continues to shape my experience.
In remembrance of Cheryl and her passion for the light of spirit as it enters the world through all beings, a portion of each sale from this series will be donated to the Manna Fund in her name.