Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
In Her Image Studio
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
In Her Image Studio
A website of Visual Storytelling in Visionary and Spiritual Art Featuring Shamanic Art, Visionary Shamanic Art, Healing Shamanic Art, Spritual Shamanic Art and Jaguar Shamanic Art, as well as Goddess and Animal Totem Art, Mask, Spirit Guide and Sacred Sexuality.
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What's up with Deborah K. Tash and In Her Image Studio?
What's up with Deborah K. Tash and In Her Image Studio?
In Her Image Studio/Mestiza Dreaming...Poetry and art!
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
29MAR22 - It's been a busy time since I last posted here on my blog. Side tracked from my graphic novel, I got caught up in making collaged boxes last year after one of my friends/clients gave me a box of artisanal chocolates. The chocolates were divine! Even better still, though, the beautiful black candy box called out to me to make art! I started buying the candy so that I could get more of the boxes; small, 4 3/4" x 5", with a flip top with a plastic window so that you can see what is inside...initially candy but then art. Once friends saw the boxes and ate some of the candy, they also gave me candy and boxes. The series, called B Box Series, captured my inner child love of whimsy and playfulness which I very much needed to get through last year.
I ended up making fourteen of the collaged boxes, giving one away to a friend who suggested that I do one called Boner Box and did so. It was really fun and definitely erotic art when finished. I also made one called B Box Series/Bellybutton Box with decorated bellybuttons collaged on it and one called B Box Series/Butt Box with men's gorgeous booties collaged on it. One of the art threads that I was posting on at the time considered both to be pornographic and removed the post after the admin wrote to tell me that she considered it pornography, so I resigned from the thread. I don't consider either of these pieces pornographic and I don't appreciate censorship. I suppose the B Box/Boner Box might be considered so which Is why I have not posted it anywhere except here in my blog.
We are living in such a strange time these days with so much more sexual exploitation yet at the same time sexual repression has increased. I was shocked by the censorship I encountered but then, who knows, the thread may have originated in a more prudish area. I continue to be puzzled by the way that younger people consider any sexual references to be an opportunity to call someone a pervert. I am definitely not a fan of such thinking. Sex is a healthy expression of life and spirituality as well as art.
B Box Series/Boner Box
So at this point there are thirteen B Boxes left. The B Box Series/Beta Box was the first one. I've posted the front of each box in the Gallery on the B Box Series page. Click on the image of the Beta Box at left to go to the series page and see the front of them all or the button below it to connect to Fine Art America.
Some of the boxes are collaged on the back but I decided to only show the front/inside on my website. If they appeal to you, you can get prints of them on all kinds of surfaces from strictly prints on paper, canvas or wood to prints on pillows, cell phone covers, shopping bags, puzzles etc. by going to Fine Art America using the button on the left.
I also decided to update my business card, changing the image on the back, rounding the corners and embossing my logo on the front.
On the poetry front, I got a bit obsessed with writing Haiku this year and recently learned of a form called Haiku Sequence which brings together several Haiku with the same theme into one piece. I experimented with adding a repeating phrase:
HAIKU SEQUENCE I: On The Wing
On The Wing
Do you hear its caw
Black winged ally of magic
Flying past in fog
On the wing
Listen to their call
Swooping down past the window
Black wings glistening
On the wing
Feathers in the wind
So many birds sky flying
Dinosaurs evolved
On the wing
Avian songs sound
Their territory warnings
Bringing joy to life
On the wing
Robin red breast sings
Sitting alone on a limb
Harbinger of spring
On the wing
Ravens on the roof
Gather round open chimney
Making themselves known
On the wing
Sitting on a branch
A respite from deep sadness
Held in tree’s embrace
On the wing
Fat little brown bird
Alights on the fire escape
Sweetness in sunlight
On the wing
Chimney melody
Ravens landing on the roof
Distant thunder sounds
On the wing
Ravens soar past Look!
Spring air aloft beneath wings
Black feathers and wind
13MAR22 TASH ©
I have been actively involved in a poetry critiquing group called Poets Of The Vineyard where I have been learning about poetry forms. The critiquing of poems has taught me so much and allowed me to not only learn new forms to experiment with and explore but also how to tighten up my writing and make my poetry even more expressive. One of the members of the group, Ken Peterson, wrote a book called Not Your Teacher's Haiku, which filled in my understanding of Haiku. An excellent book.
I have also begun working on a series of paintings which include my Haiku. My lifelong love of iris has sparked the most recent one in the series, illuminated Poems Series/March Haiku. They will be included in my Illuminated Poems Series.
So thank you for reading my blog! Spring is here and who knows what will come next in the Year Of The Tiger?
Deborah in 2021
Video:
TASH c 2021
Singles Series/Flying High
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The Gods In The Mirror Series
Warm Up Study
TASH c 2021
Masks Of The Gods Series/
Chapter Heading/Deborah
TASH c 2021
In Her Image Studio/Mestiza Dreaming...Beginning the process of illustrating my graphic novel!
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
My readers have given me their feedback on the actual written script for The Gods And The Mirror/An Erotic Adventure Tale Of Spiritual Transformation with excellent comments for editing which I have taken and done. One of my readers, who works in the film industry commented that the book is cinematic, suggesting that I consider making a movie of it. I have thought about it becoming an animated film, so I was very encouraged by his suggestion. First I have to finish illustrating it!
Now I'm working on an outline to decide how to create the comic book panels, as well as chapter heading illustrations. A new frontier for me! One of my friends who works at Expedition on Pier 39 described a line of leather bound journals that the store has begun to sell and I got so excited by his description that I just had to have one as the prototype for the project. The dark leather is beautiful with embossing on the front and back, as well as a row of gems for the seven chakras embedded on the front cover. The paper is thick and will be perfect for both ink and paint. It reminds me of a cowboy book of shadows; a large format!
Working with the characters, I realized that I wanted to have them be multiracial. I have done pieces for the Black Madonna in the past and decided that the Goddess character in the novel should be a strong black woman. The two protagonists, Deborah and Dancer, are Native American and White respectively. I am looking forward to working these themes into the illustrations starting with the Goddess pictured below.
The Gods In The Mirror Series/Chapter Heading The Goddess
TASH c 2021
And lastly, the video slideshow from the last show for Soft Power/Reclaiming The Sacred Cunt Project which went from November 2019 to January 2020 is completed! You can see it above at the beginning of this blog post.
SAMPLE OF DESTROYED AND
STOLEN ART:
The Golden Mean Project/Table Commission TASH c
ORIGINAL DESTROYED
The Shallows Series/Shallows X
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ORIGINAL STOLEN
Journal Sketches and Hidden Voices Series/She Dreams
TASH c
ORIGINAL STOLEN
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ORIGINAL STOLEN
Masks Of The Gods Series/
Alien Mask
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ORIGINAL STOLEN
The Shallows Series/Vessel V
TASH c
ORIGINAL STOLEN
In Her Image Studio/Mestiza Dreaming...Thoughts On Art Destroyed And Stolen...
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
I awoke in the middle of the night last night in an anxiety attack that lasted for an hour. It started because I was thinking of including the detail of The Golden Mean Project painting (the original was destroyed) that I have used to create prints in the past, here on my website and making future prints available on my Fine Art America site, as well. It continued with feelings of grief about all of the art that was stolen from me in 2014 when I was using Public Storage to store my work. I had three storage units at the time and two of them were vandalized, one twice. The thieves literally kicked in the rolling metal doors and took many of my best works. So, I am writing this as a way to be with the grief and anxiety which I have tried to ignore in the past.
I painted the Golden Mean Project piece on a table as a commission several years ago. The person who commissioned it, after a couple of years, spitefully decided to have the painting destroyed by having someone else paint over it. Because of unrelated disagreements, I was not consulted or even told that it was being done. I found out accidentally and was heartbroken by the incident.
For all of you who read this who are also artists, you need to know that this was an illegal act. If this happens to you there are laws against people vandalizing, deliberately damaging, destroying or altering your work even after purchase or paid commission. I could have taken legal action against the persons involved but after researching the legal ramifications and considering the emotional costs it would entail, I decided that I was not willing to expend the energy and or get involved in the bad blood to pursue it. Let Kharma take its toll.
The Golden Mean Project/DETAIL Table Commission TASH c
I had to find a new studio and get my things out of Public Storage which took a couple of years. When I was offered a space in the basement of the herchurch building here in San Francisco, I was overjoyed. I continue to make art and will work through any of the residual emotional trauma now that it is so evident.
When it first happened, people asked me all the time if I knew who had done it. They wanted to know so many things about who and why and when. These were all questions I had no answers for myself. One friend said that at least the thieves had good taste since they stole my art. Sigh. Not quite compensation enough. Some folks suggested that I should remake all the pieces that were stolen. Not something I would have the heart to do, especially since I want each piece I make to be original and individual. In the long run I hope to resolve the feelings of loss and allow my new work to compensate for the losses. I certainly won't stop making art and my hope is that as I alchemize the emotional fallout it will enrich my new work.
That's me in a Selfie from 2020! Keep On Trucking!
Totem Series/Mestiza Moon Shield I 2021 TASH c
Totem Series/Mestiza Moon Shield II 2021 TASH c
Totem Series/Mestiza Moon Shield IV 2021 TASH c
Childhood TASH c
In Her Image Studio/Mestiza Dreaming...Creating New Connections To My Heritage In My Art.
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
In other news, I entered submissions in two anthologies and one datebook; both visual art and poetry. One of the anthologies for Write Now! Essential Truths: The Bay Area In Color accepted my poem, Bruja Halfbreed, and my mixed media watercolor painting, In The Shadow Of Childhood, in that publication. I will be taking part in a reading of the poem at the San Francisco Public Library in June of this year!
I am also signing up for another round of Rafael Martinez's Art Transmission Course. I originally took the course in 2017 with the intention of learning to convey sensuality and sexual energy in my painting. The piece that I completed for the course was a stretch and I am not sure that it actually accomplished what I set out to do but I am still pleased with it as a start. Titled, Awaken To The Goddess Series/She Is Here, it was a new level of working with painting and collage together.
Awaken To The Goddess Series/She Is Here 2017 TASH c
Here is the poem that will be included in the anthology:
Bruja Halfbreed
I have never tried to pass for white
Submerged in the confusion of assimilation
As my mother impugned
“Don’t tell people you are Mexican!”
Her pride that people joked about me as a child
“Where’d you steal the big Swede from?”
Her black black hair in contrast
To my blonde blonde curls
Bruja Halfbreed
When Swedes and Norwegians spoke to me
Their language incomprehensible
I always explained my heritage
Claiming my otherness
Not like my mother who told people
She was Italian rather than Mexican
While demanding I learn Spanish
Because Abuela refused to speak English
Bruja Halfbreed
I never tried to pass for white
Though others assumed me to be
I coped by thinking myself incognito
But always spoke up to claim my heritage
Bearing the legacy of my mother’s self-hatred
In never feeling good enough
Not just because of polio and sexual abuse
But also because I always felt an outsider
Bruja Halfbreed
I searched for a way to answer my blood
The reverberations of the land calling
Echoing in the ways of the natives of the plains
And once again assumed to be a white woman
When I went to powwow and gatherings
Still I claimed myself Mestiza
Determined to claim all of my heritage
Regardless of blue eyes, fair skin, blonde hair
Bruja Halfbreed
Such a disappointment to my mother
Schooled in internalized racism
Purify the race by marrying a white man
While I longed to understand my blood
Dancing beneath the moon in a staghorn circle
Teasing her because my brother looked like Cochise
Refusing to fully assimilate and pass for white
Though others assumed I was
Bruja Halfbreed
Now I write at 2:30 in the dark of night
Unable to sleep because once again
I am accused of passing for white
And my soul demands I take note
To set the record straight
That I am a Bruja Halfbreed
And my blood roars in protest
To claim all that I am
10DEC20 TASH ©
In Her Image Studio/What Will 2021 Bring? Mestiza Dreaming...
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
In my own personal journey I have been discovering more about my identity as an artist and a Mestiza. I started doing research for a new painting titled, In The Shadow Of Childhood. The piece will feature a blonde girl child holding a candle wearing a pink dress and white ruffled apron and dark brown orthopedic shoes with a leg brace attached to the right one. I have been exploring how to deal with my continuing disability as a result of childhood polio in a series called the Leg Project, but it has been on hold with all of the SIP issues and not being in studio. This piece will address more of my interactions with shadow aspects. In the background to the right will be a Yaqui Indian inspired mask, possibly a Deer Dancer mask and on the left in the background will be a shrieking shadow of a black jaguar, not a black panther of Africa.
I started looking for images of both black panthers roaring, and feeling guided, decided to look for images of Yaqui masks as well. I didn't expect to find any as I was ignorant of Yaqui ritual culture. Imagine my surprise when I found hundreds of images including Deer Dancer mask images during my internet search! Because I was raised to be assimilated with an inculcation of internalized racism (which I have only recently begun to fully uncover and deal with) I had no idea of the richness of this part of my heritage. My mother carried her internalized racism out front; telling me as a child that she was taught to "purify" the race by marrying someone of European descent. My father (with his English, Irish, Scots ancestry) and I were the only people in our families with blonde hair and blue eyes. She warned me not to tell people I was Mexican. And, she was openly racist about Native Americans either from the US or Mexico.
My internet research uncovered some startling information. The proud Yaqui heritage of that indigenous native people who populated the land named Sonora and parts of Durango in Mexico has opened new questions for me about my identity. The legacy of mask making sheds light on my work as a mask maker. And are these people possibly my ancestors? My grandparents both looked like images of the Yaqui I was finding in my online search. My maternal grandparents were from Mexico; my abuela from Sonora and my abuelo from Durango.
I will definitely be doing more research into all this, working with my guides for deeper understanding and allowing my art to be even more of a blend of my dual heritage of Celtic and Yaqui influence. I look forward to getting a 23 AND ME ancestry test in the near future. And I plan on rereading all of the Carlos Castaneda books which have sat on my shelf for nearly forty years.
I still haven't been to the In Her Image Studio/Art Grotto in quite a while, due mostly to the state of my back and legs, but plan on returning in the near future. I have continued with my daily writing practice and have become a member of a writer's group called The Writer's Life having just submitted poems and art for the upcoming Spring anthology for the group. I also continue to be a member of Story At Home; reading both stories and poetry. I have been loving continuing to be part of the community as we meet bi-monthly on Thursday evenings via Zoom. And I look forward to continuing to participate in the Zoom meetings of Sacred Grounds more regularly as a forum for reading my poetry, as well.
I am continuing to make art and work on getting my books published. Harvesting The Moon is now available on Amazon.com! The fourth book, Soft Power/Reclaiming The Sacred Cunt Project, is on my publishers work bench and hopefully will be out and available in the near future. I'm excited to share the Soft Power book with the world! Soon, so stay tuned! Here is a new poem for today:
Daughter Of A Deer Hunter
The jaguar’s purr stirs in my blood
I feel the incendiary nature of my cells
In their dance of mingling biologies
Spirits of Celtic warriors and Yaqui ancestors
Shamans of conquered lands
Across oceans and distances
Whisper secrets in my mixed heritage
Defining my otherness for me
Giving me the missing parts
To solve the puzzle of my identity
Because I had no other guidance
Isolated in a family of insanity without adults
After my father had gone
05DEC20 TASH ©
Now that www.inherimagestudio is published and online, I am loving this fresh start.
Thank you for your support and reading my blog. I hope you are finding solace and creativity in your life during these transitional times!
Illuminated Poems Series/Mestiza Dreaming TASH c
In Her Image Studio/Productive In The Midst Of Crisis In 2020
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
I still haven't been to the In Her Image Studio/Art Grotto in quite a while, due mostly to the state of my back and legs, but plan on returning in the near future. This week I wrote a five minute erotica short story titled, Into The Dark, which I read for Thursday's Story At Home. I have been loving continuing to be part of the community as we meet bi-monthly on Thursday evenings via Zoom and participating in the Zoom meetings of Sacred Grounds has given me a regular forum for reading my poetry.
I am continuing to make art and work on getting my books published. My publisher is almost done with the work on the third book, Harvesting The Moon. I have also written another essay to add in to the fourth book, Soft Power/Reclaiming The Sacred Cunt Project, which will also have a new poem and painting, as well. I'm excited to share the Soft Power book with the world! Soon, so stay tuned!
I am working on this website and hope to publish it in the very near future for In Her Image Studio. A fresh start.
Thank you for your support and reading my blog. I hope you are finding solace and creativity in your life during these bizarre times!
Here is a new collage piece completed recently:
For more new work go to NEW WORK in the GALLERY.
Illuminated Poems Series/Out Of The Rubble 22AUG20 TASH c
After Curating The March 1, 2020
ARISE GALLERY SHOW
After Curating The March 1, 2020
ARISE GALLERY SHOW
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
08MAY20 - Hello, hello, hello from Sheltered In Place land, San Francisco! The show at ARISE GALLERY on Sunday, March 1st which I curated for Elaine Chan Scherer was the last show at the gallery before the Shelter In Place took effect. It has been many weeks now since I was last in my studio at herchurch, not only because of the SIP but also because I didn't want to be the only one in that huge building while Stacy was on vacation in Africa. Once she finally got back home after a bit of a perilous journey with threats of quarantine etc. I realized that I still needed to limit the amount of stair climbing I was doing until I could get back to regular weekly therapy sessions for my back and legs. Going to the studio requires going up and down five flights of stairs total twice for each visit, so I am being self-nurturing instead. I look forward to returning to the drawing board and painting easel in the near future.
In the meantime, after working on it for 14 years, I have finally finished writing the story of my graphic novel, The Gods In The Mirror/An Erotic Adventure Tale Of Spiritual Transformation and am working on editing and tightening up the writing in preparation for beginning the drawings and "comic book" cells and illustration when I do return to the studio. It has been quite an odyssey learning how to move a graphic novel story forward without using violence which is a standard way to move plots forward in comic books! I got stuck several times and had to put the writing aside until I could figure out the plot development. Instead of violence I used erotica. I wrote in restaurants and in the last couple of years did a lot of the writing sitting in ARISE GALLERY waiting for patrons to arrive. The silver lining of SIP for me has been the time to first mellow out and then get to the projects that I haven't had the time and focus to complete! I have a select group of friends reading the galley proof and am waiting to hear back from them all for feedback. So far, it's been very well received.
The Gods In The Mirror/Monolith Study 04APR14 TASH c
The other exciting news is that when I was working with my friend and IT guy, David, to take care of the formatting of the finished writing for the graphic novel, he told me that he and his wife have a publishing company now...Fumbled Book Press...and that they could publish my books. We came up with a plan and so far, Inspired By The Tides is now a published coffee table book and for sale on Amazon.com.
I have had a dream of having all of my chapbooks, which I have compiled for several years and saved in my files, all published and available on Amazon.com. I have always loved going there and finding groups of books by one author all available and lined up by covers, so I am especially pleased to be in the process now of setting up each of mine as art books, coffee table books and books of poetry. The process is both engaging and creative. I had no idea setting up a book and then working with a publisher could be so much fun.
With encouragement from friends, I made the second book from Voice Of The Poet In Troubled Times postings on my monthly newsletter with added photos and poems. The third book, Harvesting The Moon is in the process of being published. It is an expansion of one of the first chapbooks I made in the mid-2000s. Then on to the fourth book: Soft Power/Reclaiming The Sacred Cunt Project which will have my story, a new essay, poem and painting with other expanded art and poetry, as well. Fifth is Journal Sketches And Hidden Voices. Which as it turns out is a very large coffee table book with sixty plus pages. I am currently working on another art book for Illuminated Poems; number six, then on to the poetry books. All will be published in due time, so stay tuned!
What's New At In Her Image Studio? Gearing Up For 2020!
What's New At In Her Image Studio? Gearing Up For 2020!
Deborah K. Tash/White Wolf Woman
15DEC19 – Sun in Sagittarius/Moon in Leo – Sunday
Most of my writing about In Her Image Studio for the past almost two years has been shown in my MailChimp newsletter emails, but for those of you who are not in that database, I am going to start writing again here, as well. I have many balls in the air these days!
My show, Soft Power/Reclaiming The Sacred Cunt Project, is still exhibiting at ARISE GALLERY with an extended date ’til January 12, 2020. Oh, my Goddess! 2020 is just around the corner! While that is available I continue to work on Spirit Voices Of Light/Totem Animal Allies project and have only nine masks left to pull out of the forty that are part of the project. I was planning to not start the actual mask paintings until after all of the masks were pulled, but I just had to start with BUTTERFLY.
I spent three months making photocopies of butterflies for the Soft Power Series/The Opening #5 Monarch Prayer, cutting each one out as I made prayers for the Monarch butterflies and ended up with several extra ones after the piece was completed. So, I just had to start with the BUTTERFLY mixed media mask painting. The mask was pulled from Colleen Rosby’s face.
Spirit Voices Of Light/Totem Animal Allies BUTTERFLY TASH c
Here is the poem that began the process for the Totem BUTTERFLY:
Ally Of The Dreamtime VI
Playing with the breeze
Your fragile wings dance
Fluttering without a sound
Ephemeral loveliness manifest after ordeal
You harbinger of blossoms and spring
Alighting for the briefest moment
On leaf or bud to suckle
Sweet nectar your due
You mimic the wings of faeries
Reminder of grace and whimsy
After a season held captive
In a cocoon of transformation
Melted down to your essential need to fly
Your tribe gathers
Covering whole walls
In a swarm of desire
Sweet wingéd messenger
You are not just a simple pleasure
Meant to delight and entertain
Pretty and meaningless
No, not you my guide
You are a gentle beacon of beauty
A reminder of strength in adversity
And the everlasting truth of the soul
29NOV14 TASH ©
The Spirit Voices Of Light/Totem Animal Allies Project began with forty of my poems dedicated to forty totem animals and expanded into a community project working with the faces of volunteers who choose a totem animal ally from one of the forty. I then lead each volunteer on a Shamanic journey to meet the totem animal of their choice. Using plaster impregnated gauze to create a mask.