Painting at the Artists' Retreat

The artist retreat was a wonderful time to sit down and paint. Though I was sketching what I saw in the outdoors, I find I often use my sketches (in combination with journaling) as a sort of interactive prayer, and this weekend was particularly inspiring, for a number of reasons.

First, I had to go through all my art supplies. I've done some loose sketching outdoors before, but I've (and I'm somewhat surprised to say this) never really painted outdoors. I was inspired by a few blog posts I found, including this outdoor painting tutorial and this entry by James Gurney. (I highly recommend his blog by the way.)

So I distilled my art supplies into a surprisingly small bag, and started my first endeavor into outdoor painting/drawing. (I actually chose to use a mixture of ink pens, ink wash, and watercolor, so I'm not sure if it's better described as painting or drawing. I'll use the two terms interchangeably until further advised.)

[My drawings.]

[Photo's of what I was painting from.]

I'll quote from my journal here to explain what I was thinking about as I drew these:

In the morning I felt the need to climb something. Somehow my drawing required something more, something difficult. I ascended a steep hill. I walked past many things worthy of being drawn. I asked myself "at what point is it time to stop? Which scene will I paint?"

I kept moving. Something drove me on. A destination perhaps? Would fatigue stop me? I am not sure. It's as if I needed to earn or prove something. At last I settled upon a spot, a downward spiraling path. The painting went better than i would have hoped.

On the way back I thought it strange to walk uphill so much to paint a downhill scene. I thought how hard it was to ascend, but how easy it is to descend....I began thinking about how normally we think it hard to ascend up to God, how much work it is to "get to heaven", or "see God", or "be good", etc. I'm reminded of the painting "The Heavenly Ladder of Saint John Climacus" with pious souls climbing the ladder to God and flying demons knocking them off.

[The Heavenly Ladder of Saint John Climacus, 12th Century]

Even Christian from the Pilgrim's Progress is reminiscent of this mountain climbing theme. But ascension is not where I am at. Like Dante, I am descending. And descent is hard. It's hard to see myself as I am, and it's hard to receive love as I am. Perhaps this mirror's Christ's pattern, his "descent" from Gethsemane to the Cross to the Belly of the Earth was hard. Clearly. But his ascent to glory at the Father's side was, in a sense, easy. Descent and death are hard. Ascent and glory are easy. I tried to paint these things, but instead only struggled with ascending. As if work ascending might make descending easier, or more meaningful, or less painful.

What I'm saying is I found this amusing flip: ascending is difficult if it's a physical mountain, but easy if it is spiritual glory. Descending is easy while hiking, but descending into the soul is perhaps the hardest work we could ever do. It amazes me how often I try to ascend on my own under my own power to try and earn acceptance and love. Or how often I sit around and pray and wait for God to raise me up with his power so I can be accepted and loved by others. But the reality is, I need to go down. I need to descend.

The funny thing is, I don't see God at the top of a ladder. I don't see God in the heavens or standing upon a mountain. I see Him in my heart, in the deep waters, and it is to these deep waters that I hear Him inviting me. It is while I descend that I have my closest most meaningful moments with God. It is as I descend that I am most terrified. I've been throwing things into the basement of my soul for a long time, and it's become somewhat of a garbage pit. I really don't know what I'm going to find down there anymore. Except, as I mentioned, a God who is waiting for me.

(A proviso: when I say "deep waters" I am referring to the more hidden portions of our hearts, as described in Proverbs 20:5, not some sort of "deep thinking" or intellectual high-ground. I say this rather sloppily, but the strict rational mind has proven to me to be quite perilous when dealing with the deep waters, which are filled with emotions and feelings and beliefs and desires and a great many things that do not necessarily follow rhyme or reason.)

Artists' Retreat 11/16-18/07

Through a series of somewhat random events I found myself googling around about Catalina Island. Catalina is an island off the coast of Southern California, and through the course of my web surfing came across an InterVarsity Camp that was hosting an Artists' Retreat. We made arrangements to attend, and became very excited about it.

Arriving at the island required no small effort, and the camp itself is only accessible by boat. We drove to the docks, parked, and then boarded a ferry that transported us to the island's main city Avalon. From there we switched from the larger ferry to a smaller motorboat, which took us to the camp. It was night by the time we approached, the boat bouncing rather strongly in the waves as we traveled around the island. The darkness, the cold salty air, the turbulent boat ride, this last leg of the journey served to strip away the city from which we came and reset our senses for the duration of our stay. It was, perhaps, the best part. When we arrived, we had already been transformed.

[On the ferry, waiting to travel to Catalina Island.]


[On the motorboat.]

[Long Beach, where we parked our car.]

[The island, as seen in the sunlight, the next day.]

This "transformation" is perhaps best described by the fact that each morning we got up to watch the sunrise. This really surprised me, and for all you who know me, this should surprise you too. I am not known for being a morning person, but I couldn't keep myself away. Before I knew what had happened I was up watching the waves and the sunrise and these crazy birds dive into the water.

[Despite getting up early both mornings, the sunrises were actually pretty gray and foggy.]

We were placed in a lovely cabin beside the ocean. We had an ocean-view window. We could hear the waves at night. It was marvelous.

[We stayed on the beach.]

The retreat itself was beautifully structured. We arrived Friday evening. We met for a while on Friday so we could all introduce ourselves to each other. There were about 20 or so of us in total. Saturday we met after breakfast for a short while, then had the entire day to paint or draw. In the evening we met to share what we had created. Sunday morning we met after breakfast to conclude the retreat. The free-time-to-meeting-time ratio was not something I've ever experience on any Christian retreat before. It was a wonderful way to have an artists' retreat. I'll post my sketches separately.

[Normally around this time of year I would be deer hunting with my Dad and brothers. They did quite well this year without me, and as I was hiking around I saw this guy a few times.]