“Out of life comes death,
and out of death, life.
Out of the young, the old,
and out of the old, the young.
Out of waking, sleep,
and out of sleep, waking.
The stream of creation and dissolution
never stops.”
— Heraclitus 5th c.
‘Greater Silence’ is an ongoing series of ink paintings that have emerged from previous Zen practice. The brush creates circles that continually repeat, without erasure or measurement. The body focuses on the rhythm of the breath, activating the brush on each exhale. Mutations in the series are created by changes in brush width, ink density, and the type of paper used. When the order of the circle is allowed to be determined by these and other environmental factors, the 'fields’ become spontaneous with variations that appear as random. These fields of concentrated, repeated gestures create infinite and ambiguous possibilities. Stability is found within the exhale by consistently following the breath, recording the attention, placed, again and again, fully absorbed in the stroke of brush with ink on paper. Here is the opportunity for opening to a larger context of internal spaciousness as painting becomes a trusted method of meditation.