Joos's journal

17-04-2019

Calm presence

This painting was made by me while I taught the Art of Allowing to someone else.
I enjoy her calm presence.
She teaches me the beauty of imperfection and comforts me that doing less is good enough.

 

04-03-2019

Silent knowing

 

18-02-2019

Victory

This painting is an attempt to a style of abstract expressionism.
I needed to overcome old fears before I could paint her.
That is why I gave her the name Victory.

 

22-01-2019

One plus one is more than two

What I like most about the painting process is the irrational aspect.
Why do I paint a bird on her shoulder?
Only after doing that am I aware that this painting is about the fact that the bird and the woman share the same space.
I experience how powerful this is, because of the connection.
One plus one is more than two.
That is not rational either, but we can easily sympathize with this idea.

 

23-12-2018

Halfway

Making this painting will take another year, because Shiloh planned it so.
I'm curious.
It is mysterious not to know beforehand what is going to happen, but in fact that is also true in life.
It is evidently my path to want to express this.

 

21-12-2018

The shortest day

Today the sun is farthest removed from us in the Northern Hemisphere.

I feel the darkness, both around me and inside, through my emotions.

I probably sympathize too much with the worries of my loved one and in this way I create the absence of light in myself.

My essence longs for expansion, for being present inside myself, and for feeling my body.

I allow myself to take up space and make room for renewal and for the birth of the light.

 

17-11-2018

Exploring freedom

I made this painting by freely applying a lot of diluted paint on a previously made portrait.
During the painting process I had the feeling that this would lead nowhere and I felt many control lights flickering inside me.
Yet I continued and even used a wooden spatula from the kitchen to spread the paint.
It's fun to expand boundaries and explore new possibilities.

 

12-11-2018

Leaving behind the old

Life and painting lead me in the direction of leaving behind old ways of being, and follow a deeper chord of my life instead, moving forward beyond the mind.

 

08-11-2018

Question

Sometimes I enquire about a problem and ask the big unknown for an answer.
My question was: how can I be aligned with a world that is derailed?
The inner knowing came soon:
You can only be in line with yourself, do not to hold on to the world, because then you yourself will be torn apart.
Perceive, there is more good than you know, when you are present here and now.
Oh yes, I feel it, inside ourselves lives a great power.

 

27-10-2018

Star

This is a first attempt at applying a new method: “The Art of Allowing”, with Flora Aube.
The image that arose on the canvas was full of bird-energy and it was not easy to make a coherent painting out of it, without being overwhelmed by the multitude of images.
Today, after I set my inner critic aside I recognize the energy of the girl.
It's a picture that I remember from one of the books by Amorah Quan Yin.
I had forgotten that I have this book in my bookcase.
Apparently, painting can help us to receive and to pass on information.