Osmanthus

Oil painting on canvas, 24x36 inches.

A flutter of activity

Grows open into the world

From an immense emptiness

Unresolved, forlorn, unfurling

Freedom from habit, 

A cicada’s shanty.

Adapted this scene from a photograph I took of an overgrown garden on Lamma Island, which led into the most quaint little teahouse with picnic benches and homemade ceramic pots, cups, and sculptures. There is a Krishnamurti saying that once you teach a child the name of a bird, the child will never see that bird again. When painting, I never try to emulate the original and copy it directly— it’s like teaching someone all the beat counts to a dance, the mechanical parts of technique, without ever listening to the song and getting its natural rhythm. The parts that are individual and unique to your taste and perception are a direct reflection of lived experience, which is why differences in personal taste are so compelling. Organic mistakes are the beauty of humanness. There are no ‘leaves’ or ‘shrubs’ painted on this canvas: only gestures which attempt to emerge and stop in interesting places…