A leaf holds a single drop of dew
Morning contained in its reflection
With a forest of change
To focus the lens of time

Dew drops like magic orbs
Rise as the sun warms the trees
Slowly evaporating into the light
To nourish the air

One single moment melts into another
Linking the passage of time into eternity
While the focus continually shifts
To discover the source of dreams

16DEC11     TASH   c

SERENITY FALL 2011

Deborah K. Tash, Annekarin Glass, Paola Coda, Clay Vajgrt, Sevilla Granger, Chuck Drees, Barbara Landis

OCT 14, 2011 – JAN 11, 2012

Meet the Artists: Wednesday, November 2 5:30 – 7:30pm RSVP

Sponsored by the UCSF National Center of Excellence in Women’s Health, each part in the series invites Bay Area artists to present a body of work that interprets the idea of ‘serenity’ in order to inspire relaxation, well-being and calm.
Begun in 2007 and featuring artwork exhibited on five floors, the ‘Serenity’ series is the San Francisco Bay Area’s largest continuous exhibit focused on positive, healing and uplifting artwork open to all 2D and wall hung 3D media.
Curator: Matt McKinley

venue: UCSF Women’s Health
2356 Sutter St. (x. Divisadero) SF, CA
Floors 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

Cloudscape Design/Years Gone By 2010 TASH c

I am often reminded of the day in college when I was talking with another student about what we each were studying.  How blithely she remarked, that as an art student I must be having nothing but unrelieved fun with my studies.  Little did she know that in order to counteract my lack of hand/eye coordination, I was taking three drawing classes a day and going home each night to cry myself to sleep after the failures of yet another day.  I was well aware that my drawings, once pinned up on the critique board next to everyone else’s, were the worst in class.  Only encouragements such as “There really isn’t any such thing as talent, only desire!” given by my teachers kept me going back for another round of personal torment and insecurity when the sun came up again.  Ah, yes…what fun!  But truly it was desire and the constant inner drive of what I have come to think of as the Muse that kept me on the path of art.

Since those days, how often have I continued to hear the echoes of that same opinion as I’ve struggled to continue working as an artist?  I’ve read that the most difficult and important challenge an artist must meet is to continue making art in the face of all the disappointments, struggles, pain and fear that beset the calling of art.  The insecurity of a calling that rarely pays, without an inordinate amount of non-related work on marketing, in a society that only seems to value making money, where landlords are quick to evict and clients question the price of the work that includes so much personal investment of time, emotion and commitment in the interest of getting a discount on the stated price.  It is often a terrifying and brutal calling. In a social, political and financial climate where art is commodified, artists have to spend a great deal of their energy and creativity figuring out how to brand themselves and their work, as well as learn how to market it, when the real desire is to be in the studio giving form to intuition and inspiration to satisfy the Muse.

But despite such obstacles and challenges, there is always the calling of the Muse.  There is the morning when one rises from sleep with a vision of ceramic vessels that won’t quiet until they have begun to take shape in the studio, even though sculpture has always held more interest than making bowels or vases.  And even after the vessels have begun to become reality, their finished form continues to beckon during a day filled with the mundane considerations of daily life.  They become an obsession underlined by the Muse’s promptings.  When color begins to startle and demand attention, it is clear that the other dimension of the Muse is at work, making it imperative to return to palette and brush; canvas longing for form and color in paint.  It is a state of being that rivals any other; the drive seems to emerge from some unknowable landscape and whisper unrelentingly until the vision materializes as the Muse seeks expression.

Sometimes the vision takes years to reach fruition, until the necessary skills or understanding have been attained, but once the process has begun it must be completed.  In the last couple of years I finally finished four pieces that each took twenty years to complete.  Each one sat in my consciousness and reminded me it had not reached its place of autonomy.  I would take the individual pieces out of storage and look at them over and over without knowing how to proceed.  It took that long for me to grow enough to understand how to bring each piece to its final form.  Some work is so compelling that it is only days from idea to vision to a distinct object with its own life.  When that happens the Muse seems to smile somewhere deep inside before calling for the next one. In that moment all the hardships of living in a world that does not fully comprehend what it means to be involved in the art process become meaningless.

The shallow depressions
Carved by the pull and crash
Of the ocean’s constant tides
Sparkle with the tears
That luminesce in the moonlight

Is it simply the waters of life
Salt to flavor the inexorable change
Or the mystery of ebb and flow
That balances out the breath
Of an expanding palette of stars?

Connection in the space of loss
Renews the heart’s knowledge
Of unfailing Divine Love
Gathering up the shells and stones
Washed ashore in Poseidon’s wake

17 JUN 11     TASH   c

Crossing The Bridge

The water slips between the spaces
Which link my imagination with
The secret knowledge of spirit

Intention molds me to a subtle container
My humanity shaped to its purpose
Colored with the earth’s sparkling blood

Every time I cross the bridge
That links me to my quiet foundation
The water flows on either side

The vehicle of transit crowded
With aimless complaints and incomprehension
Still no match for that liquid knowing

Alone in my material partnership
My body carries me forward
Loyal and present as the passage of time

Silken liquid depths support my journey
As I pass between the sentries
Another dimension of wholeness entered

22 AUG 10 TASH c

Return Of The Summer Theme

The soft golden skin of grasses has
Matured from greening leaves
To a harvest of gentle undulation
Fingers and spaces between the earth and
A crashing summer seascape

Rounded sensualities lay spread open
As the air condenses to a caress of fog
Seeping between the edges
The promise of liquid dissipating
At the crest of a familiar hill

The heated pavement settles
All boundaries meted out
With the smallest of signs
The way one county is demarcated
Only as the blacktop turns to dust

Those conversations driven by the past
Delineate the newest generations trapped
In airless rooms of denial
The secrets of groomed girls
Oozing from their wounds

So epidemic the passing of broken trust
That attempts at protection
Prove vain as hushed cries
Evaluation of a man’s intentions
Swept away in the silence

The golden hills endure in that silent witness
As women take the blame
Turning from themselves
To escape into long dark tunnels
Of drugs, depression and despair

One word at a time
I speak volumes
To break the pattern
If only by the act of disclosure
As I travel through golden hills

26 JUL 10 TASH c