field studies

new paintings at spalding nix fine art

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At the half-way point of a 16 month study of Hawaii which began with a trip to Maui in January, Katherine Sandoz offers 24 postcard size paintings that feature the landscape and flora of Hawaii. The series name is (pono).

(pono) red ti no. 1, 2022, water-based media on recycled felt paper, 6” x 4”

As with the Hawaiian language - delicate, layered and complex - pono communicates several meanings and, in one word, describes the cosmology and philosophy of the Hawaii oiwi (native Hawaiian of Polynesian descent) ethos. Pono means goodness, righteousness, correctness, excellence, well-being. The word is synonymous with prosperity, benefit, duty, morality and speaks to resources, assets, needs, purposes and plans. When something is pono, it is considered to have the qualities of what is correct and just.

In Mary Kawena Puku and Samuel Hoyt Elbert’s Hawaiian dictionary, it is written, “It is something to authentically aspire to rather than to fully attain, mostly because pono means more than doing the right thing in a given situation, but rather living life with balance, harmony and integrity, seeking to improve the surrounding world.” When something is pono, it is considered to have the qualities of what is correct and just. It partners with nature, its resources, its plants, its people. Without pono, nature, its resources, and the people are endangered physically, intellectually and existentially.

Pono mirrors another essential phrase in the Hawaiian language, thought and culture: aloha ʻāina or ‘love of the land’. One does not simply love the land, humans are borne of, spring up and grow from the land. The land is the first genealogical ancestor of its people. Aloha ʻāina integrates science, society and spirituality in a type of nationalism or patriotism.

The (pono) series celebrates and honors the botanical diversity and complexity of the nation of Hawaii. Each substrate has served as a paint palette and then is interpreted, read and painted upon again. There is a history and a density to the object that is the painting.

In the spirit of pono and aloha ʻāina, each work in the (pono) series is priced at $414 (as a nod to the 14th Amendment). Today we are called to guarantee the 14th; that citizens’ rights and privileges not be abridged by law. To engender both pono and Aloha ʻāina, we must also protect each person’s fundamental rights and liberties.

Spalding Nix Fine Art and Katherine Sandoz will donate 33% of all proceeds of these paintings to the ACLU-GA in support of reproductive health care.

AURORA: new series

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(AURORA)

february - may 2020

in january 2020, i made an outline for the development of three new series of paintings.  they would examine the idea of locus amoenus, a literary tool which describes a idealized, safe place,  a place containing trees, grass, water. 

locus amoenus is at once a green world, a feminine place, an expression of a universal spirituality that is nature.  similarly, a hortus conclucus, or enclosed garden, is also a paradox in that nature is not, can not be, enclosed or walled.  the paintings work to create a locus amoenus and they also notify and remind us of the artifice of the picture plane, of the contained garden, of the idea of safety.  they highlight our attempts to contain both nature, our fears, and passions as well as our desire to contain life, beauty, whatever perceptions of demesne or dominion we might hold.

at the time, i wrote aurora, sequoia and tryst as the titles of the series.  i would overlay a structure of trees, grass and sky as well as work with the chinese philosophy of the entirety of the world made up of the three stations:  heaven (spiritual), human (relationships), earth (the land).

aurora heaven sky

tryst human grass

sequoia earth tree

by the end of march 2020, i had made considerable headway in creating both the tryst and the aurora series. 

tryst is a series of 20 paintings that reveal wild, fauvist gardens created from the chaos of a painter’s previously used palette.  references were pulled from photographs sent by friends in 2020.

the aurora series offers seemingly idyllic land and waterscapes, a place where the spirit may partner with the earth.  when we search for the human element in the painting, we find these absent bodies are hiding under the foliage.  they swim behind waves that have reversed their tides and patterns. they are dwarfed by plants from distant lands that have washed ashore. night swimmers approach a fragmented, lit island that reveals itself to be more aquatic plant than terra firma.  

this terra infirma, full of contradiction and the unknown, is where we find ourselves in light of 2020’s pandemic and the rising protests against social injustice - the great paradox of so much beauty and so much despair.  

as artists all, may we re-weave, re-tell, re-paint and re-sing, re-present the models for building contemporary civilization. the art is quietly, sometimes loudly, commenting, asking and telling about our past, present and future - hopefully, in helpful ways.  the art we make, display, hold dear is both contained and wild, coarse and delicate, bold and timid - thousands of mirrors in which to peer, innumerable reflections of which we may be a part.

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NOTES:

  1. the pandemic and the rising protests against the social injustice woven into the fabric of our civilization especially here in the united states. 

  2. never have artists not written, painted, sung, shared their work during the world’s greatest crises, wars, the many pandemics that have come before.

  3. it is my hope that these instruments might be be used to offer beauty and to offer models that could lead to small changes in our understanding of how to better our relationship with one another and with mother nature.  

  4. as with the literary use locus amoenus, the space created by paintings, art might be not so much an idyll, but a model to assist in achieving balance, seeking refuge, and finding a sense of rejuvenation.

  5. the word aurora (dawn) and corona (crown), in science, have been closely associated as the spectrum of aurora and those of the corona show some physical correspondence.

  6. sequoia:  may we be neither hunter, nor hunted, but conservator of the forest (as metaphor for world)

(aurora) nightswim, 2020, water-based media on canvas, 30” x 30”

(aurora) nightswim, 2020, water-based media on canvas, 30” x 30”

thistle symbolism

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The layered symbolism that has developed surrounding the thistle flower begins with its spine-like stems and spiky blossom connected with the crown chakra or third eye. The color purple (named from this predatory mollusk!)has long been associated with royalty, good judgment and spiritual enlightenment. You can read more about additional connections that have been drawn throughout time and by varying cultures here.

Or you might recall or rediscover your own experience of the thistle through this painting.  

(flora) thistle, 24" x 24", water-based media on panel, 2015-2016 available via spalding nix fine art

(flora) thistle, 24" x 24", water-based media on panel, 2015-2016 available via spalding nix fine art

azalea + bee painting meaning

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Azaleas are known as symbols of abundance, fragile passion and from the Chinese, "thinking of home" as well as a representation of wealth. If you place azaleas, very toxic if prepared properly, in a black vase, this constitutes a death threat. A flour made from the dried flower and mixed in a carrier acts as a pesticide and medical research suggests that parts of the Chinese azalea can treat varying respiratory and rheumatic illnesses.

The bee's important role in our ecology is echoed throughout time in myth and in presentations of contemporary culture. While they are often symbols of royalty, power, vision and creativity, they are also considered symbols of Cupid's "sting" as well as of love, courtship and marriage. In Chinese works of art, if the bee appears on the flower, there is a suggestion of fruitfulness within the marriage or partnership. Within Hindu symbolism, a pairing with the lotus means reincarnation, on the forehead says transformation. Six is the sacred number of Venus the goddess of love and bees work in sixes - that is to say, hexagons. Numerologists believe 6 represents love as is multiplies odd and even (2,3) but is highly stable, symmetrical and balanced. Six energy is creative, conciliatory and nurturing. (Azaleas often offer six petals at the base of the flower.) Color associated with six is red and indigo.

katherine sandoz, (suwi1516) azalea, 3 5/8" x 5 3/4", water-based media on panel, 2015-2016

katherine sandoz, (suwi1516) azalea, 3 5/8" x 5 3/4", water-based media on panel, 2015-2016