The first inspiration for The Illumination of Gaia left me stumped. I knew the look I wanted for the painting, but lacked a model for Gaia herself. A few days later a Peruvian healer friend of mine dropped by the house for a visit. I had not seen her in some time, but quickly realized she would be an excellent model for my new painting. A woman of striking appearance, she carries a great earthy energy.

I asked her to pose for me and not only did she agree, but she delighted me further by not freezing up or becoming self conscious. Some people immediately turn into awkward sticks of wood, so this ease in modeling is not to be taken lightly!

That let me proceed with the painting I had visualized. I did not particularly paint a portrait of my friend, but used her features to create an image of a wild earthy goddess. I wanted her face illuminated with the strong beauty of a divine feminine vision.

I initially intended to paint the orb of the Earth with night time lights. However, I spontaneously painted the inside of the Earth instead, adding several alchemical symbols that deal with the transformative process.

The theme of this painting reflects my own contemplation of the upcoming Earth Healing Retreat February 19-23, 2011. I will be teaching an exciting new Earth Healing CCT class along with a watercolor workshop. In the watercolor workshop we apply the creative processes of Earth Healing to unleash creativity in a powerful way. More information can be found at my Art Energies site.

The painting is done in acrylics on canvas, 30" wide by 40" high. The original and limited edition prints areavailable at RiverStone Gallery.

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Here is the perfect painting for the grinch in your life! Gunslinger, the rooster, has an unmistakable attitude that would make me hesitate to meet him in a dark alley. He is a great protector indeed.

I had great fun painting this rooster study in acrylics on canvas. The piece is only 18” by 24” so it will fit nearly anywhere. At least anywhere you want a commanding presence in a small space.

My artist husband said it has about as much oomph you can get in that size painting.

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Contact RiverStone Gallery for the original painting or limited edition giclee prints.

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I had an idea brewing for a large tiger painting, so I did this quick little 20” square sketch of a painting. After I painted the eyes, I became loose and playful with the acrylics. Using two pairs of complementary colors added visual impact.

Tigers are intense predators, but gentle and playful among their family members. My intention was for the painting to carry the spirit of tiger.

To my surprise, I sold this piece before I had even cleaned my brushes. That undoubtedly means I should soon paint the large version I see in mind’s eye!

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David Sandum, an artist living in Moss, Norway, organized a Twitter Art Show to benefit the library. Since Twitter uses 140 characters in each tweet, he decided to ask 140 Twitter artists to participate. Each painting is the size of a 5″ x 7″ postcard and should produce a delightful and varied show of works from many different countries.

The backlit poppy silhouette shown here is my contribution to the show, a mixed media work. The poppy is painted in watercolor and the black and gold in acrylics. I varnished the piece to make it easier for handling when they display the works in the library.

I am happy to participate in such a worthy and interesting project!

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An Awakening Fire is a visual translation of the past two years of my life, shown in the form of a shamanic dismemberment. Actually, this may also be a visual translation of the enormous changes the Earth herself is experiencing at this time.

For those of you who have not experienced a shamanic dismemberment, it occurs during a shamanic journey when the power animals and others suddenly shred you to pieces. If received without resistance it is not painful and when you discover yourself reassembled, you have been purified in unexpected ways.

I wish I could say that the real life equivalent was as easy as a shamanic dismemberment, but that, alas, has not been the case for me or for many of the rest of you.

In fact, creating the painting was itself a drastic event, due to the powerful energies it evoked in such a highly compressed manner. Five feet wide, the painting engulfed me for weeks.

The eyes of the hawk have the intense focus of a being on a great mission. After all, delivering the fire to ignite awakening instead of burning destruction requires a precisely coordinated use of power.

The painting allows you to move backwards and forwards in time. The flaming hawk has clearly just flown through the fragmenting figure ignited into an explosion of light near the center. At the same time you can see the flaming hawk flying straight for your own heart and you know you will soon be that exploding figure yourself.

Poppies, especially Shirley poppies, for me always represent transformation at the deepest levels. Ethereal, ephemeral, and yet stubbornly enduring, they are a beautiful expression of the transformative powers of light.

The leaf dressed in fall colors exemplifies the old falling away, a necessary part of any transformation. Another beauty and grace finds expression in the leaf.

And what shall I say of the eye? Is it the eye of the fragmenting figure, startled awake? Is it the eye of the observer, watching all that unfolds?

The Earth has been caught up in the process as well, or perhaps the Earth has caused it. After all, how can we live on a transforming planet without feeling the same impact ourselves?

A shimmering crystalline pattern descends on the left. Perhaps it is the web of life connecting all life. Perhaps it is the crystalline grid that allows change to process more rapidly and easily than our electro-magnetic systems have been able to manage.

So the golden music sings to us, opens our hearts to a greater vision, a new receptivity to divine harmony. After I finished this painting, I slept, dreaming of myriad layers of information in the painting.

I woke at 3 a.m. For the one and only time in my entire life my biological mind had stopped its incessant chatter. Suspended in an unmeasured time of divine harmony, an exquisite stillness was my only awareness. May you find your way there too.

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Artist’s Note: Contact RiverStone Gallery for information about the original acrylic painting and limited edition giclee prints.

Copyright © Lexi Sundell 2010. All Rights Reserved.

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Paintings can be complete surprises and this one certainly maxed out in that category. It started with a headache. Not an ordinary headache but a completely head-busting blinger of a headache that went on all night.

I got up in the morning and it eased slightly, but not a lot. A great white light was in the center of my head, surrounded by pain. I could see it was a major energy shift happening, but it was going far too slowly to suit me.

I wondered what would happen if I put my awareness in the white light in the center of my head instead of just watching it. When I did so, I saw this image and immediately wanted to paint it. I thought the process of painting it could move me through this latest shift more rapidly. My aching head liked that idea a lot!

I went into the studio and started hunting for a stretched canvas I could use, but none were the right height/width proportion for the image I had seen. I started sorting through a stack of panels leaned against the wall and found one that looked like the right shape. When I pulled it out and turned it around, it had one of my canvas giclees laminated on it. I had not yet gotten around to hand embellishing the print.

That poor print was doomed. I put it on the easel and painted it white with my acrylics. While it dried, I laid out tracing paper on the table and drew the outlines of the image I had seen. By the time I was done, the paint was still wet.

Annoyed, I got out the heat gun and played it across the paint. I am happy to say I did not set it on fire. The paint hastily dried and I took it to the table. A sheet of graphite paper let me trace the outline onto the canvas and I soon was painting.

My head still ached horribly, but somehow I was really enjoying painting. I kept at it like a woman possessed and the headache gradually eased. The last of it finally disappeared by 3 p.m. I finished the painting at 6 p.m. and was just cleaning my brushes when my artist husband came in the door.

I asked him to go down to the studio to see something. He assumed I was going to show him my progress on When A Flower Dreams, a painting I was in the midst of creating. When he saw this unexpected abstract on the easel his immediate response was, “Where in the hell did that come from?”

As he looked at it I explained how the painting came to be. He said I should have headaches more often and that he wished he had painted it. He likes most of my work but I have never heard him say that about any of my other paintings.

I had not told him the title was Metamorphosis. So I was delighted when he said, “If there was anywhere to put it, which there is not, but if there was and if it was me, I would paint a butterfly in it.” Abstract or not, it had clearly communicated to him.

That, along with the fact my headache was completely gone, was quite enough for me.

Copyright © Lexi Sundell 2010. All Rights Reserved.

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Beginning Anew is an apt name for the first painting I have done in months, the first painting since I became too ill to paint. It was a challenging time in which I nearly died a couple of times from an entrenched systemic infection.

That is now behind me. As my rather battered body slowly recovers strength, the other levels of my being are in a state of heightened thriving. I remained so deeply internal during this time that much of my inner landscape has changed dramatically.

It is now time for these new gifts and insights to flow out into the physical world, and this painting is the first step in that happening. By my usual standards, this is a rather small painting, 18 inches wide by 24 inches high, acrylic on canvas.

However, it carries the energy of the vision behind it. Beginning Anew speaks to the process of personal rebirth as well as the powerful transformations occurring here on this beautiful planet we inhabit.

At any given moment, certain cycles are always ending and new ones beginning. This is the natural flow of life. The ability to release the old with trust and joy opens doors for undreamed new possibilities to surprise and delight us on our journeys.

The meditation that goes with this painting can be heard here, where you can also read about the giclee print of the painting and the Star Songs subscription. Lexi Sundell’s original painting is available at RiverStone Gallery.

Copyright © Lexi Sundell 2009. All Rights Reserved.

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Awakened is the latest of my recent paintings. The subject matter is a red poppy with stars rising in a blue mist from the center. Characteristic of this series, the backdrop is starry space, this time also featuring a small moon.

The poppy is lush and sensual, bathed in divine light, and holds a great energy. In this work, the poppy itself represents the awakened goddess. Her petals are partially transparent, showing the stars beyond the flower.

The blue mist of radiant stars rising from the poppy evoke memories of the creation of our souls, a song of joy rising in the vast expanse of both outer and inner space. If we were to directly witness the creation of souls, we would hardly be able to contain the incredible sound of joy that brings them into existence.

From the upper right corner comes a beam of violet light that awakened the goddess. The colors in this painting are particularly rich with blues, purples, and reds.

Lexi Sundell’s acrylic painting Awakened, 48″ high by 46″ wide with painted gallery wrap edges, and limited edition prints are available at RiverStone Gallery.

Copyright © Lexi Sundell 2009. All Rights Reserved.

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Night Lightning

Our souls walk the night skies in our dreams. If we are fortunate, we may wake and catch the vision of those magnificent starry expanses inviting us to merge with our souls.

An apt symbol for the passion of the soul as it flows through time and space is the horse, which often has been used to represent human passion. Great swirling energies dance in the mane of the horse, electric colors of lightning enlivening our beings when we least expect it.

The head and neck of the horse hold a profound stillness, the signal of the void. The void is not a space of nothingness, but instead contains the full potential of everything, all possibilities not yet brought into form. The void glitters with a quiet aliveness that awaits myriad creative choices.

After the lightning of the soul strikes our hearts in the night, we move into this void where we discover our own new potentials. If we rest in deep stillness, we will emerge restored and refreshed, suddenly inspired with dreams newly discovered.

Then let us touch our lives and create those dreams from the lightning inspirations of our souls.

Lexi Sundell’s painting Night Lightning and limited edition prints are available at RiverStone Gallery.

Copyright © Lexi Sundell 2008. All Rights Reserved.

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Starwings, 48"w x 36"h

Doesn’t everyone yearn to be loved into magnificence? Isn’t love what sustains a caterpillar as it goes through the unimaginably strange process of dissolving its bazillion legs, indeed, its very identity, into an unknown goo with the potential of one day flying?

What caterpillar ever dreamed of flying as it happily strolled along leaves, selecting the tastiest parts to bite and consume? How solidly anchored to earth do all those legs make a caterpillar anyway?

As the stirrings of change disturb the caterpillar, it retreats into a chrysalis, seeking safety and comfort. Safety it may find there, but comfort quickly flees as the stirrings of change become a full fledged assault on the caterpillar’s very being.

So how would love sustain a caterpillar through the transition from the known to the utterly unknown? The chrysalis in its shimmering colors holds the world away from the chaos within it. Seeking love from the world outside the chrysalis is not really an option.

As always, love first arises from within the self. Love directs the myriad processes of transformation, creating amazing and unanticipated beauty from humble beginnings. So it is for the caterpillar, as it becomes something it never even dreamed for its future.

Eventually the goo has morphed into a new form, still unable to fly. The new being is folded, crumpled, and crammed into the tight confines of the chrysalis. Eventually the claustrophobia is too much and this new being breaks out of the coffin of the caterpillar.

The miracle of transformation continues as the wings slowly unfold like a flower gently opening in the dawn light. Liquid pumps through the veins of the wings until they stand straight and graceful, needing only time to dry before the maiden voyage.

The wings of a butterfly sparkle with the memory of stars. After all, the matter of our familiar and beloved earth is the leftover remains of stars long gone by. So the butterfly sits, drying, the remnants of stars coursing through its veins and forming its being.

When ready, the butterfly opens its wings like a heart in surrender to divine love. At last, in holy ascent, the butterfly takes flight, delicate, fragile, and somehow timelessly enduring. So may we all.

Lexi Sundell’s painting Starwings and limited edition prints are available at RiverStone Gallery.

Copyright © Lexi Sundell 2008. All Rights Reserved.

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