Tapestry, constructed April 2021

Welcome to my world of art. If I’m lucky, I gather a cohort each season and we immerse ourselves in a process we have coined Tapestry. We organize at a local park with a range of earthiness: dry pineland, soupy marsh, sandy beach, and lush wet creek.

I welcome the guests. We introduce ourselves and a favorite aspect of the season, the season here and now. We range from six months to seventy-six years old. We are ivory, beige, umber, and bronze.

I warm us up, reaching for the sky in a rapid motion. Then we drift, slowly swaying near our midline, side to side.

We drop to the ground and steadily explore. I explain what is about to happen; we just did it after all. We are there to celebrate nuances and continuums inspired by nature itself. Ourselves – part of nature, we are reminded.

Here is what we do: set a beginner’s mindset – see this point in time, this landscape – as if for the first time (go forth as often as possible, with that same spice to life).

Here is what we do next: make your mark, noticing the way a piece of scrappy cloth or paper kisses the earth. Notice the difference if you engage material in wet, dryer, driest ground. Notice the impermanence we wish to have to preserve natural flow after we leave, our wake. Notice the way we may engage with our fellow natural world – the freedom in neither naming things (merely joining in partnership) nor thinking, “What could this wet thing we call ‘river’ do for me?”

Here is how we move forward: reimagine our relationship to oneself, one another, and the natural world. We construct a symbolic tapestry from individual markings – and we marvel. We marvel, just as things situate, aiming to make more beauty (threading different parts together into a new whole).