Flying Colors

IF • Twirl

Whip up the waves
of non-being
and wash me away!

How long will I walk
up and down
the shore in fear?
Rumi • Translated by Andrew Harvey from A Year of Rumi

original painting - artist collection - Nashville, TN - USA - "Gaea's Corsage"
watercolor, wax, ricepaper, glazed • 24"H x 24"W • © Lisa Rivas

How brave a ladybug must be! Each drop of rain is big as she. Can you imagine what you'd do, If raindrops fell as big as you?
~Aileen Fisher

The seeds that twirl down from maple trees every spring can fly as far as a mile,
with each wing-shaped seed spinning like a whirligig on the air. greenwavelength

IF • Grounded

The view of one simple thin stem,
with a solid base rooted deep-down in the soil,
is of one strong and up-right foundation
suitable for more growth.

It will branch out and reach with slender arms,
to offer young, tender sprouts to the sky.

These also will develop to become stronger and
then transform into shelters and homes
to many of the small creatures of our world.
Lisa Rivas

"Grounded"
• watercolor, digital, printed on ricepaper and mounted on canvas
• 10" x 10" • Lisa Rivas © 2007
• To purchase click here

For all true love is grounded on esteem. George Villiers

“Don't whiz on the electric fence” ~ American Proverb

Bliss & Blessings for 2012...

Those tender words we said to one another
Are stored in the secret heart of heaven.
One day, like the rain, they will fall and spread
And their mystery will grow green over the world.
-Jalal-ud-Din Rumi
Persian Poet / Mystic, 1207-1273

Highlights • digital • Lisa Rivas © 2012

"Follow your bliss and the universe will open doors for you where there were only walls."
~Joseph Campbell

 

Bodhi Day,

Bodhi Day is on Dec. 8th, a Buddhist holiday that commemorates the day that the historical Buddha, Siddhartha Gautauma experienced enlightenment, also known as Bodhi in Sanskrit or Pali.

According to tradition, Siddhartha had recently forsaken years of extreme ascetic practices and resolved to sit under a Pipul tree (known today as "The Bodhi Tree", a Ficus religiosa or Bo-Tree) and simply meditate until he found the root of suffering, and how to liberate one's self from it. Siddhartha finally found the answers he sought and became Enlightened, and experienced Nirvana.
He then became the Buddha or "Awakened One".

"A tree is a wonderful living organism which gives shelter, food, warmth and protection to all living things.
It even gives shade to those who wield an axe to cut it down." ~ Buddha
Hindu Prince Gautama Siddharta, the founder of Buddhism, 563-483 B.C.

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The Buddha describes his Enlightenment in three stages:
1.   During the first watch of the night, the Buddha discovered all of his past lives in the cycle of rebirth, realizing that he had been born and reborn countless times before.
 2.  During the second watch, the Buddha discovered the Law of Karma, and the importance of living by the Eightfold Path.
 3.  During the third watch, the Buddha discovered the Four Noble Truths, finally reaching Nirvana.

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Never forget...

Ah! Never shall the land forget.
How gushed the life-blood of her brave -
~ William Cullen Bryant

How important it is for us to recognize and celebrate our heroes and she-roes!
~ Maya Angelou

Aloe succotrina - digital •  2009 © Lisa Rivas  ~ RAISED TO THEM!

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The sap of the Aloe is effective in the treatment and healing of wounds.

...connecting branches!

 
Last fall I was invited by an online blogger
to participate in a collaborative project, The Paint-by-Number Exchange. Each participant was to select a Paint-By-Number kit to complete by hand and then to alter the image, giving it their own personal "twist" or embellishment  according to their artistic expression. I chose "The Almond Branches in Bloom", Saint Remy - circa 1890 a phenomenal piece by my champion, painter
~ Vincent Van Gogh. (view here)

This "Paint-by-Number Exchange" was proposed by fellow artist blogger Jacquelyn Berl.
You can view the other 10 entries at her blog: www.AscenderRisesAbove.com

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After painting the image (provided by Famous Art Kits) by hand, I scanned the image to digitally incorporate clothing buttons as flower buttons and alter the image with a flowing ribbon of text.
I then converted the entire image into an e-Stamp.
The "All Mundi" part of the title for this e-Stamp is both a play on words (Al-Mond)
and a reference to the "All World" scope of the e-Stamp.

All-Mundi Button Branch • 50 kilobyte e-Stamp
archival pigment print on archival paper • Lisa Rivas © 2011 • All Rights Reserved

If friends were flowers, I would pick you!

You can purchase this print here, it would be a wonderful gift!

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So what is an e-Stamp? It's my original concept of a virtual postage stamp for emails. I envisioned the e-Stamp as an art stamp with a global intention, as a way to honor "the internet" which has helped to connect us humans. The nationality of the e-Stamp is www—World Wide Web—and the denominations are in kB for kilobytes or mB for megabytes.
My e-Stamps also exist in the tactile "real" world as prints, produced as giclees on a 9-color archival digital printer. Their formats can be totally variable and printed on different substrates.

The most beautiful discovery true friends make is that they can grow separately without growing apart.
~ Elizabeth Foley
 

Speaking Earth...

Trees are the earth's endless effort to speak to the listening heaven.
~ Rabindranath Tagore

Earth Day 2011 • variable size • © Lisa Rivas • "Speak"
• digital / mixed media on ricepaper and mounted on canvas

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Seek first to understand, then to be understood. ~Stephen Covey

IF • Journey

“It is good to have an end to journey toward;
but it is the journey that matters, in the end”
~Ursula K. LeGuin

original painting - private collection - Caracas, Venezuela - "Excursión"
watercolor, wax, rice paper, quilted • 36"H x 72"W • © Lisa Rivas

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“Success is not a place at which one arrives but rather the spirit with
which one undertakes and continues the journey.” ~Alex Noble

Microscopic for Fine Art

My botánica print titled "Attraction" was included in a very unique and interesting treasury on  Etsy 
titled "Microscopic for Fine Art Friday" by lauraprill

Laura Prill is a published illustrator and award winning fine artist. Her paintings, collages and drawings are in many private and public collections. She also worked for many years in the licensed greeting card world as an artist, designer and copywriter. Check her Etsy store

A wonderful collection of minute worlds.
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Visit my  Etsy  stores "Lisa Rivas" and "Flying Colors" on the web to purchase some of my work!

IF • Swarm

In talking about flocks of bird and schools of fish… The swarm ...moments when creatures lock themselves into a group "soul" letting go of their particular desires and needs as individual creatures and becoming one body with a transcendent intelligence directing them, creating patterns of motion so complex that they seem to have been choreographed from above.
~ (p. 90) The Creative Life, by Eric Butterworth

"SWARM"  e-Stamp
• fused glass - illustration printed as an archival pigment print, 100% rag paper

Infinite Mind —everywhere present–is the highest frequency of energy, in which all things exist as complete. When you see the creative process clearly, your ideas will get synchronized with energy of the same frequency, multiplying in like kind. This is the swarming process. (pp. 88-89) The Creative Life, by Eric Butterworth

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In life, the issue is not control, but dynamic connectedness. ~Erich Jantsche

... for Good Luck!

A staple in the Southern diet for over 300 years, black-eyed peas have long been associated with good luck. A dish of peas or lentils is a New Year's tradition in most areas, bringing good luck and prosperity for this New Year 2011.

Lisa Rivas © 2011 • archival pigment print on 100% rag paper • Black Eyed Peas

"Remember, black-eyed peas on New Year's Day brings good luck for the entire year!"

Magnificent!

Precious is the breath of little rose drops
all exploding under the soft canopy of pink clouds
and forever being embraced by the wings of a rooted forest...

...an exquisitely framed moment within the interlocking dance of life!

"Magnifica"
• digital mixed with original printed on ricepaper and mounted on canvas • 10" x 10" • Lisa Rivas © 2009
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“Man's life is like a drop of dew on a leaf.”
~Socrates -Ancient Greek Philosopher, 470 BC-399 BC

A breath of fresh air....

Flowers against the digital print (24" x 24"): "Flowering Time Genes"

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Perfumes are the feelings of flowers.  ~Heinrich Heine

Exhibit Catalog,

Catalog for the exhibition of Spatial Schemes: Observation of Nature

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a - front cover  /  b - front inside cover  /  c - back inside cover  /  d - back cover

Spatial Schemes | Observations of Nature

Nashville Arts Magazine just posted this on their website on my upcoming exhibit!

The Parthenon is pleased to announce a new exhibition of artwork by Nashville artist Lisa Rivas.

Rivas creates large computer-generated prints on rice paper.  “She actively paints with technology, layer upon layer, creating a complex environment.  The shapes find their origins in Nature manipulated with the latest technology,” Curator Susan Shockley states.

Rivas visually dives into the landscape she wishes to portray, showing us a detail of what is already a detail. She repeats the shape she chooses with delicate and precise drawing. This is especially evident in Las Botanicas, which is a series of 10 x 10” natural shapes arranged in a grouping to create a large design, just as the small parts of nature create the larger ecosystem. Her vitally colored images, based on natural forms and shapes, suggest the repetition found in Nature.  This concept of repetition is well known in mathematics as the Golden Mean.  The Parthenon’s architectural proportions also conform to the Golden Mean.

Lisa Rivas holds a graphic design degree from The Hans Neumann School of Graphic Design in Caracas, Venezuela.  She also earned a BFA in Fiber from Memphis School of Art, Memphis, Tennessee.  She completed graduate work at The Appalachian Center for Crafts in Tennessee and the Instituto Allende in Mexico.

Please join us for an artist’s reception on Friday, July 16, from 6-8 p.m. This reception is free and open to the public. West Gallery, July 10-October 30, 2010