aka LipBoat #2, colored pencil on black photo-mounting board, 8.5″ x 11″ • in the collection of Eric German
1991 Spring. Original artwork created in the wake of a love affair. Artwork immediately purchased by a friend.
1999 Summer. While in Baltimore visiting the American Museum of Visionary Art, I am deeply touched by an installation “Mending the Heart Net” by artists Alex & Allyson Grey. Included as part of the installation is a lengthy prose/poem inscribed on the walls, which proves to be so moving that I laboriously transcribe the entire text onto several 3″x 5″ cards that very afternoon:
“From the core of our hearts we dedicate ourselves to the complete and full expression of Love in our activities and in our relationships. Love is the soul’s medicine, a refuge in our hearts protecting us from utter despair. Finding compassion in the eyes of the beloved and the stranger give us the courage to endure. May love sensitize us with care and wisdom. May love help heal the sickness and wounds of life. May love enable us to forgive and accept ourselves. May love enable us to forgive and accept each other. May love help us overcome our cruelty and bitterness, our greed and jealousy, our ignorance and delusion. May love rule our hearts and minds, directing us to reach out, doing our best to benefit others, to comfort suffering, to give gifts, to create beauty in the infinite network that is our world. A heart of loving kindness pours creative grace into the world, dissolving our separateness and mending the heart net. To the healing art of love we dedicate ourselves.”
Soon thereafter I contact Alex Grey, requesting permission to reproduce the text as part of a poster I plan to self-publish later that year. We agree on a royalty; I prepare a mechanical for printing – in monotone, converting the art to b&w, because computerized full-color printing-on-demand is still a few years away. Distributing the poster proves to be challenging and disappointing. In time, at the suggestion of a friend, and the availability new technologies, I print a limited edition using the full color artwork, copies of which are still available as a full-color poster, 11″ x 14″ • $15 post-paid
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