Gardens and Gateways: Journeys within Memory by Anne Beidler The complexity of China has always seemed astonishing to me. In my travels there, I have contemplated how best to engage the country’s vast history and rich visual texture. I have also struggled to discover common threads that connect one of the world’s oldest cultures with the current great masses of people. And how can I as the artist- traveler, the stranger or waigouren mediate this unfamiliar space and interpret creatively? On my first trip to China, I brought along a small book of one hundred poems by Han-shan from the T’ang Dynasty. These writings by the anonymous, reclusive, yet deeply socially aware Buddhist monk who is guessed to have lived anywhere between 627 and 750 A.D. , held many of the answers I was looking for. I have returned to this volume many times. Here translated by Burton Watson is #29 I spur my horse past the ruined city; The ruined city, that wakes the traveler’s thoughts: Ancient battlements, high and low; Old grave mounds, great and small. Where the shadow of the single tumbleweed trembles And the voice of the great trees clings forever, I sigh over all those common bones— No roll of the immortals bears their names. Han-shan’s poem echoed as I visited famous spots such as Xian’s Terracotta Warriors, the Forbidden City, and the Great Wall and most strongly when walking down an unknown street in a city or looking out a train window across fields lit with many little fires from farmers’ brush piles. It was the unnamed souls of Han-shan’s poems, whose presence is strong in these places that have resonated most deeply for me. China’s history in recent years makes this sentiment more poignant. The two most eventful trips to China were for the adoption of my two young daughters. As they have grown, we have moved together through the complex spaces and time from the culture they were born into, to the one they currently inhabit. I have often felt the invisible ties that connect us to each other and to China through time and space. The adoption community often refers to these connections as “the red thread” referring the old Chinese story of those predestined to meet. The birth mothers of my daughters, though never to be known, are always present for me like ghosts of memories. The focus of the imagery for these mixed-media works is based in color and images from my own photographs , including photographs of Chinese and Korean gardens, temples, gateways and street scenes. My small paintings, prints and artists books allow a format for an unusual kind of interaction between the viewer and the creative work. The world of each book is entered separately by individual viewers. Each encounter is specific. Each dialogue is unique. My photographs have been digitally printed on to organza or silk and layered on to the canvas surface. Found materials include Chinese joss paper that is used to honor ancestors. Small tin niches (small places of worship) seem to echo temple entryways and become a kind of gateway. Applied media include ink, paint, wax, sewn pieces and collage. I have experimented with an overlay of printed images and drawn images. I am also very interested in how printmaking media may begin to come together with painting. These pieces are often created on deep canvases which give a sense of levels and 3 dimensional spaces. They can placed on deep railings along the gallery wall and thus viewed in sequence. Each image becomes a gateway the same way garden or temple gateways invites exploration. My works also bear the notion of the carried shrine. Alluding to the Gau or Gao, as used by Buddhist monks in Tibet and Nepal. The works are meant to evoke an ancient place often visited and long remembered. Ancient images of the Buddha and the female bodhisattva, Guan Yin, who gives solace to the hurt and provides the blessing of children, evoke a place of contemplation. My young daughter’s face is overlapped with that of Guan Yin and in the background are the images of other bodhisattvas or perhaps ancestors. The lone woman with her back to viewer, who is incidentally often an image of me-- which make her a stranger who is simultaneously --myself, evokes once more the un-named souls of Han-shan’s poems. Here translated by Burton Watson, are 2 final poems by Han Shan: #4 Above the blossoms sing the orioles: Kuan kuan, their clear tones. The girl with a face like jade Strums to them on her lute. Never does she tire of playing— Youth is the time for tender thoughts. When flowers scatter and the birds fly off Her tears will fall in the spring wind. #97 My mind is like the autumn moon Shining clean and clear in the green pool. No, that’s not a good comparison. Tell me, how shall I explain? |
| gardens and gateways |